Kingdom of Ash

The Crochans had returned to their camp in the Fangs and waited.

Manon and the Thirteen dismounted from the wyverns. Something churned in her gut with each step toward Glennis’s fire. The strip of red fabric at the end of her braid became a millstone, weighing her head down.

They were almost to Glennis’s hearth when Bronwen fell into step beside Manon.

Asterin and Sorrel, trailing behind, tensed, but neither interfered. Especially not as Bronwen asked, “What happened?”

Manon glanced sidelong at her cousin. “I asked them to consider their position in this war.”

Bronwen frowned at the sky, as if expecting to see the Ironteeth trailing them. “And?”

“And we’ll see, I suppose.”

“I thought you went there to rally them.”

“I went,” Manon said, baring her teeth, “to make them contemplate who they wish to be.”

“I didn’t think Ironteeth were capable of such things.”

Asterin snarled. “Careful, witch.”

Bronwen threw her a mocking smile over a shoulder, then said to Manon, “They let you walk out alive?”

“They did indeed.”

“Will they fight—will they turn on Morath and the other Ironteeth?”

“I don’t know.” She didn’t. She truly didn’t.

Bronwen fell silent for a few steps. Manon had just entered the ring of Glennis’s hearth when the witch said, “We shouldn’t have bothered to hope, then.”

Manon had no answer, so she walked away, the Thirteen not giving Bronwen a passing glance.

Manon found Glennis stirring the coals of her hearth, the sacred fire in its center a bright lick of flame that needed no wood to burn. A gift from Brannon—a piece of Terrasen’s queen here.

Glennis said, “We must move out by midmorning tomorrow. It was decided: we are to return to our home-hearths.”

Manon only sat on the rock nearest the crone, leaving the Thirteen to scrounge up whatever food they could find. Dorian had remained back with the wyverns. The last she’d seen of him minutes ago, a few Crochans had been approaching him. Either for pleasure or information, Manon didn’t know. She doubted he’d share her bed again anytime soon. Especially if he remained hell-bent on going to Morath.

The thought didn’t sit entirely well.

Manon said to Glennis, “Do you think the Ironteeth are capable of change?”

“You would know that answer best.”

She did, and she wasn’t wholly certain she liked the conclusion she reached. “Did Rhiannon think we could be?” Did she think I could be?

Glennis’s eyes softened, a hint of sorrow gracing them as she added another log to the flame. “Your half sister was your opposite, in so many ways. And like your father in many regards. She was open, and honest, and spoke her feelings, regardless of the consequences. Brash, some called her. You might not know it from how they act now,” the crone said, smirking a bit, “but there were more than a few around these various hearths who disliked her. Who didn’t want to hear her lectures on our failing people, on how a better solution existed. How our peoples might find peace. Every day, she spoke loudly and to anyone who might listen about the possibility of a united Witch Kingdom. The possibility of a future where we did not need to hide, or be spread so thin. Many called her a fool. Thought her a fool especially when she went to look for you. To see if you agreed with her, despite what your bloody history suggested.”

She’d died for that dream, that possibility of a future. Manon had killed her for it.

Glennis said, “So did Rhiannon think the Ironteeth capable of change? She might have been the only witch in the Crochans who did, but she believed it with every shred of her being.” Her sagging throat bobbed. “She believed you two could rule it together—the Witch Kingdom. You would lead the Ironteeth, and she the Crochans, and together you would rebuild what fractured long ago.”

“And now there is just me.” Juggling both.

“Now it is just you.” Glennis’s stare turned direct, unforgiving. “A bridge between us.”

Manon accepted the plate of food Asterin handed her before the Second sat beside her.

Asterin said, “The Ironteeth will turn. You’ll see.”

Sorrel grunted from the nearest rock, disagreement written across her face.

Asterin gave Manon’s Third a vulgar gesture. “They’ll turn. I swear it.”

Glennis offered a small smile, but Manon said nothing as she dug into her food.

Hope, she had told Elide all those months ago.

But perhaps there would be none for them after all.

Dorian lingered by the wyverns to answer the questions of the Crochans who either did not want to or were perhaps too skittish to ask the Thirteen what had occurred in the Ferian Gap.

No, a host was not rallying behind them. No, no one had tracked them. Yes, Manon had spoken to the Ironteeth and asked them to join. Yes, they had gotten in and out alive. Yes, she had spoken as both Ironteeth and Crochan.

At least, Asterin had told him so on the long flight back here. Speaking to Manon, discussing their next steps … He didn’t bother. Not yet.

And when Asterin herself had gone quiet, he’d fallen deep into thought. Mulled over all he’d seen in the Ferian Gap, every twisted hall and chamber and pit that reeked of pain and fear.

What his father and Erawan had built. The sort of kingdom he’d inherited.

The Wyrdkeys stirred, whispering. Dorian ignored them and ran a hand over Damaris’s hilt. The gold remained warm despite the bitter cold.

A sword of truth, yes, but also reminder of what Adarlan had once been. What it might become again.

If he did not falter. Did not doubt himself. For whatever time he had left.

He could make it right. All of it. He could make it right.

Damaris heated in silent comfort and confirmation.

Dorian left the small crowd of Crochans and strode to a sliver of land overlooking a deadly plunge to a snow-and-rock-strewn chasm.

Brutal mountains rippled away in every direction, but he cast his gaze to the southeast. To Morath, looming far beyond sight.

He’d been able to shift into a raven that night in the Eyllwe forest. Now he supposed he only needed to learn how to fly.

He reached inward, to that eddy of raw power. Warmth bloomed in him, bones groaning, the world widening.

He opened his beak, and a throaty caw cracked from him.

Stretching out his sooty wings, Dorian began to practice.