Part 14 (1/2)

”Armande said to tell you h.e.l.lo, and that he hopes you're eating enough. He keeps saying he should have gone with you to make sure you're properly fed.”

”I wish you were both here.” Except I didn't want them to be angry with me, too. I hadn't told Sarit the secret I'd revealed, only that they knew something and it had changed everything. She did know where we were heading, though.

”How are things going with you?”

”Sam still mostly talks to Whit.”

”And Stef?”

”Still upset with me.” I closed my eyes as snow began to fall. ”They aren't mean to me. They don't ignore me. But they're all different toward me.”

”Are you being different toward them, now that they know?”

I shrugged, even though she couldn't see it.

”I'll take your silence as a yes.” Sarit sighed. ”You can't expect things not to change. Give them time to adjust.”

”You're right.”

”Of course I am.”

”But Sama””

”You know what you're asking of him. It's probably taking everything he's got just to keep functioning. You remember how he was after the market attack last year. This is worse than that.” Her voice crackled as the SED signal grew weaker. ”I know this must be hard, especially after the way Li treated you, but they don't mean the silence the same way she did. Why don't you try talking to them?”

”About what? The longer we go like this, the more awkward it gets.”

”Music? Food? How much you hate the cold? I don't know, Ana. They're just as miserable as you are. Don't wait for them to be friendly with you first. But if you won't take action, I can't help you.” Something crashed in the background, and she swore. ”Sorry, Ana. Armande needs me. Earthquake.” She clicked off before I could say good-bye.

I sat outside, watching snow gather on my mittens and SED.

Our goal wasn't the dragons' land, exactly. The library had information on dragons and their habitat, of course, so we knew roughly where they lived, but I didn't need to go quite that far north.

In his previous lifetime, Sam had come across an immense white wall, like Heart's city wall. There, dragons had discovered him and killed him.

That was my goal, because we knew dragons patrolled that area, and there was built-in shelter on one side. At first, I'd been afraid I would have to ask Sam to remember details about his trip north, or that I'd have to see if he'd recorded any details in a diarya”and if that diary had been scanned into the library's digital archivesa”but the sylph ended up saving me again.

They knew where the other prisons were.

Of course they knew.

So the sylph led us north, through the forest of elms and pines and spruces, and though Cris a.s.sured us we were getting closer, it seemed we'd be ”almost there” forever.

We'd been in the wilderness so long, Heart, Janan, and everything we were working toward seemed like another life.

”This is it,” Stef said, walking up ahead with Whit. ”This is the edge.”

Whit checked the sky, all clouds and coming darkness. ”Then we'll stop here for the night. Looks like it's about to get harder to travel.”

Sam came up behind me, glancing at me from the corner of his eye. ”The edge of what?” He spoke to Whit only, but Stef answered.

”Weren't you paying attention this morning?” She rolled her eyes. ”Our SEDs are about to be disconnected from the others. We're too far out of Range.”

Sam shook his head. ”But they work farther south. And east and west.”

Whit dropped his backpack and began unpacking the tent. ”That's because people go those ways sometimes. They explore. There's food. Other things we can actually use.”

”There are towers scattered across the continent,” Stef said, ”maintained by drones. They're what connect your SED to others when you're outside of Range. But up here, there's only forest and dragons. No one comes here.” Her gaze darted toward me. ”Except us, unfortunately.”

She could hold a grudge for a long time.

”So no more calls or messages. Not after tonight.” Whit frowned as he and Stef began putting together the tent.

No more Sarit was what it really meant.

”I'll gather dinner.” At my words, the others only nodded.

Sylph flashed off into the woods while I dropped my backpack and dug through it for the canvas sack we used to carry dead animals.

Sam pulled water bottles and a smaller sack from his backpack, and Cris headed toward him. They usually filled up water together, and returned with what looked like clumps of dead gra.s.s, but actually tasted okay after being boiled and mixed with whatever kind of meat we got that night. Human or sylph, Cris was still the best at finding edible plants. I wished he'd go with me, though.

In the woods, sylph darted around, quickly burning squirrels, rabbits, and doves. I dropped the creatures into my sack one by one, and by the time I returned to the others, the tent was up and Sam and Cris were boiling water for dinner.

”Here you go.” I placed the sack of animals by the pot, hoping. Waiting.

”Thanks.” Sam didn't look up. ”Stef's cooking.”

”Okay.” That was good, actually. Stef was a much better cook than the rest of us. But that wasn't what I'd been hoping to get from him. Maybe a smile. Or a complaint about the weather. I wished I could tell how much of his misery was aimed at me, and how much was everything piling on top of our search for dragons.

Sarit told me to try. I gathered my nerves. ”Sam, I know I didn't tell you about the exchange, but I had a good reasona””

He shook his head. ”I'm not ready to talk about that yet. I just can't.”

The rejection stung. I turned away.

While the others took care of dinner, I retreated into the tent, pulling out my notebooks and the temple book. I'd discovered all sorts of interesting things over the last few weeks, but nothing the others would care about right now, so I kept them to myself.

I huddled in my corner of the tent and turned on the lantern, temple books spread around me. My notebook was almost full with all the translations and facts I'd collected.

I'd only been working a little while when Cris came into the tent and sidled up to me. -Anything new?- His presence made my corner of the tent wonderfully warm.

”I think I'm getting to a part that explains how the temple key works.”

He nodded, just a flicker of shadow.

”When Meuric had me trapped in the temple, I pressed a lot of the engravings on the key.”