After a few days of walking across the tundras of ískan, they stepped onto a trail that Myraden recognized. If they took it farther west, it’d bring them to Teyjkravi, the old capital of ískan—which she’d only travelled to once during her childhood.

  But, when they reached the trail, it ran diagonally northeast across the bottom corner of the nation, passing through forests and along the edge of the central ískan ice sheet.

  On one side, a dirty wall of ice rose above the brown grass and gravel about fifty feet, almost like a cliff, except sharper and smoother. The glacier covered the entire central plain of ískan, rendering only the hundred-mile swathes of land along the coast habitable. Even by sprite standards, the central sheet was unliveable. They might tolerate the cold, but without food or trees, there was no point.

  To the east, a forest of ashy tree trunks poked out from the ground like a giant pincushion. Their skeletal branches hung limp, and many of them had collapsed. When she brushed her hand along one, it crumbled and collapsed, taking another two shrubs with it before falling into the olive-green newgrowth.

  Even if the Dominion had burned the old forests, they couldn’t stop new shrubs and saplings from sprouting up.

  Ganbjarne led the way, carrying a heavy pack on his back, then walked the Hand, using his sword as a walking stick as they navigated the overgrown path. At the very rear, Myraden rode on Kythen’s back, keeping watch over their surroundings and monitoring her senses for any sign of an Unbound Lord.

  Of course, she also kept herself veiled, hiding from Lord Two’s senses. She didn’t pick up on him, but a few ash wraiths had strayed dangerously close to the path. Never enough to see them, but enough to sense them.

  Ganbjarne did his job. The only beasts they saw were a pack of wild bloodhorns walking along the upper ridge of the ice shelf, and a herd of karebain galloping through the ashy forests, manabulbs dangling from their antlers. He only stopped after the fourth day to shed his antlers, then continued on.

  “I remember this path,” she told the Hand.

  “Did you walk it often?”

  “Not often.” She leaned closer to Kythen’s neck, but also pulled herself lower to better speak with the Hand. “But my father brought me here once…when I was seven or eight season-cycles. We made the trek to Teyjkravi.”

  “What for?”

  “I, as his only heir, was to meet the governor-king of ískan and be sworn in as the next Cursebearer of the Leursyn family.”

  “Did it happen?”

  “It did, yes. I do not remember much about the governor-king, but I remember the road to get there. As a child, it was a long road.”

  The Hand nodded. He stayed silent for a few seconds, then said, “When I first travelled to meet Meythis, I took this road to Harmkvord as well. When we made our rebellious schemes. But it has changed greatly since then.”

  Myraden scratched her chin.

  “He spoke about you often,” said the Hand. “He loved you like a son, even if the others in your family wanted him to try for a male heir.”

  “Did he say why he only had one child?”

  The Hand exhaled. “Your mother did not give birth easily. They feared that having another child would kill her, and he wasn’t about to jeopardize her life for familial pride. It wouldn’t have made a difference in the end, though.”

  “My mother is still alive,” Myraden said. She swallowed. “She survived the journey to Sirdia, but…we are not on speaking terms anymore.”

  “That’s a shame.”

  Myraden shut her eyes, but had no response.

  “Your revelations,” the Hand said. “We need to keep working on opening your Inner Gates, and you still need your Spirit Revelation.”

  “I have been thinking about it. I was not sure if I was ready to try again.” She’d already tried once, and there were only two more chances to get it right before she locked down her spiritual system.

  “At some point, you will have to make the leap.” The Hand slowed down to walk beside her and Kythen. “You will have to accept your new reality, whatever it is. Find an all-encompassing purpose.”

  “Just…how?” She blew out a puff of air, but, unlike the Hand’s breaths, it didn’t turn to steam. “How could my desires have changed all of a sudden? It does not seem possible.”

  Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

  “They haven’t changed,” the Hand said. “You’ve grown up. You’ve become a different person, and you’ve changed without realizing it. It happens to everyone. One day, you think that dream you’ve clung so tight to…just isn’t what you want anymore, and you heart lies in a different place.”

  Myraden, Kythen said, did you like being angry? Did you like that desperate desire for revenge?

  “No,” she replied in íshkaben. “I hated it. But I didn’t think I had any other choice.”

  But something changed.

  “I met Pirin.” She lowered her head again, imagining the first time they’d met. He’d been so quiet, scared, and impossibly na?ve, but so desperate to achieve what he wanted. To help people, and to prove that he, as an Embercore, wouldn’t always be a burden. No hate, even though the Dominion had taken his father—or close enough—from him.

  He’d always been trying to build something better.

  “I am going to try one,” Myraden said to the Hand in Low Speech. “I think I am close.”

  “Don’t think you’re close,” the Hand asserted. By now, Ganbjarne was looking back at them. Over the past four days, this was probably the most either of them spoke. “Know you’re close.”

  “I do not want anyone else to grow up like I did,” she said softly. A faint chill ran down her spine. Almost there. “I do not want anyone to be lost, angry, and hopeless. I want there to be a life beyond war and suffering.”

  A spear of resonance jolted through her spine, and she shuddered. Her eyes flew open, and she had to unveil herself for a moment as her Center-Rhun channel shuddered and flared, shaking loose the char and opening the gate up completely.

  A burden lifted off her shoulders, and her lower back felt almost weightless. “It worked.”

  “Excellent,” said the Hand. “Now, you must consider the Heart Revelation. We do not have time to celebrate.”

  On the seventh day of walking, the forest faded, leaving only an empty plain of grass. A light snow covered the ground, hiding the mud, but frost-covered stalks still pushed through. No one had walked the old path since the snow fell. No grass grew on it, and it was easy enough to follow.

  As the charred forest faded away behind them, the ice wall crept closer to the coast, until noon, when Myraden could see both without turning her head. Seagulls circled overhead, and the salty, faintly tangy smell of the ocean mixed with the lingering aura of ash.

  There was something different about the smell of the sea at Harmkvord. Less rotting fish—it was too cold for them to rot. Maybe the cooler air brought out different scents, or the waves crashing on the far-away rocks sent up more spray. The sea spray was almost always what caused the thick hoarfrost.

  But if she could see the ocean, and smell Harmkvord…

  Home. This was home.

  She jumped off Kythen’s back and landed in the ankle-high snow, then sprinted down the path. She dodged the Hand and Ganbjarne, racing to the top of a nearby hillock, then stopped and put her hands on her hips.

  A mile along the path was a small cobblestone manor with ever-ice windows and The charred remains of thatched roofs. It had never been meant for defense, but rather, was the family manor of the Leursyns. Burned, of course, but she recognized it in a heartbeat.

  Beyond, farther down the slope, was the village of Harmkvord. Blackened buildings lined the edges of a sheltered bay, and crumbling piers reached out to sea, where fishing boats would once have docked.

  “This is as far as I will travel,” said Ganbjarne when he reached the top of the hill. “I trust you two will find your ways, wherever you’re heading next, or can figure the same route back to Ravi, if you need.”

  “Thank you,” Myraden said. She offered a short bow, then said, “Eane guide you, if nothing else.”

  He began walking away, but after a few seconds, she asked, “How many sprites are left, sir?”

  “In Ravi?” He shrugged. “Fifty, perhaps. In Harmkvord, I cannot say, though I do not expect you to find many.”

  But she didn’t let that dampen her mood.

  For the first time in nearly a decade, she was back home.

  Pirin faded in and out of consciousness. He laid on the cot of the Featherflight’s crew quarters, tossing and rolling as the winds shook the airship. Bandages covered every inch of his body, but he relied more on his enhanced body to heal. He cycled Essence to the wounds, using it to rebuild his flesh and veins, to help his body generate more blood, and to get himself back into a wakening state of mind.

  Days passed. The air warmed up when they passed the mountains, but he couldn’t say exactly where they were heading—except North into Sirdia.

  Finally, when Pirin could keep himself awake for more than a few minutes at a time, he rolled onto his side—unconcerned about his injured arm—and faced Nomad. The man stood at the stove, stirring a pot. “Where are we going?”

  “North.” Nomad tapped the ladle on the edge of the pot. “The retreat is going smoothly.”

  “We need to head to Kerstel,” Pirin said.

  “We thought you’d need time to recover, and that you should do it in the safety of Northvel. We still have a month, perhaps, until the Dominion can move their army to Northvel.”

  Pirin winced. “That’s not enough time at all, not if we…take breaks. Kerstel. I need to advance to Wildflame, and I can recover along the way.”

  “Pirin…”

  “We have to,” he insisted. “There’s no time. If I don’t travel to Kerstel, we’ll lose.”

  “I’ll have Alyus adjust our course.”