Second Stone (12 page)

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Following Rink, Emariya stepped into an unfamiliar tent. Rink held a lantern up, bathing the walls in a golden glow.

With her knees drawn up to her chest, Jessa rocked back and forth. The blanket on the ground beneath her had bunched and shifted from her restless motion, and she had one corner clutched in stiff fingers. Her head didn’t turn as Emariya walked in; she just kept staring blankly ahead.

“Jessa?” Emariya whispered tentatively.

Jessa froze in mid-motion. She turned huge, shock-filled eyes upwards, looking at Emariya while seeming to look almost through her at the same time.

Without a word, Jessa stood and flew across the tent, flinging her arms around Emariya.

“It’s all right, Jessa, I’m here, I’m all right.” Emariya assumed Jessa had been overcome with worry, though truth be told, she thought the girl was overreacting a fair amount.

A little half-shudder coursed through Jessa’s body. Emariya could feel it as the girl continued to cling to her. Craning her head to look at Rink, hoping for an explanation, Emariya wondered what was going on.

“Separatists slipped into the camp. One got into her tent…your tent.” Rink’s tone hinted at there being significantly more to the story.

“I killed him,” Jessa whispered. “He had a knife, and then somehow I had it. I’m not even sure how it happened, but
I
killed him.”

“Oh, Jes,” Emariya said. Sympathy for her friend’s lost innocence momentarily seeped out before logic took over. She couldn’t let Jessa shrivel into uselessness and doubt. Forcing her voice to harden, she said, “This is war. Like it or not, it is. Do you hear me?”

Jessa nodded, still sniffling.

“I’d much rather you kill him than let him kill you. I mean it, Jessa. You didn’t have a choice.”

Jessa’s shoulders straightened a bit. “I did. I could have let him kill me.”

Better for her to shield herself in anger. Emariya’s voice turned to ice. “That is
not
an option. Not now, not ever. Where we are going, we don’t know what is waiting for us. Hendel isn’t likely to be happy to see us. And when we get there, you’d better have my back.”

“I do, I just—”

“No ‘just,’ Jessa. We must do what has to be done. No excuses, no regrets.”

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When she stepped out of the tent, Emariya was startled to see two soldiers waiting for her. “Is everything all right?”

“Yes, Your Highness. Prince Ahlen sent us—we’re to be your guard. We’re under strict orders not to leave you unattended.”

She had to admit she didn’t mind as much as she had back at the castle. Knowing someone had snuck into her tent worried her more than she’d let on. No matter how much she hated being so harsh on her friend, Emariya couldn’t risk her sulking in despair. It was imperative Jessa keep her wits about her. Too much was at stake. No, it was better to have her pull herself up, knowing Emariya was counting on her.

With her newly assigned guards shadowing her, Emariya started off toward the tent Rink had said Torian and Garith would be in. The nearby fire’s warmth called to her, tempting her to come and sit near its comfort. Unfortunately, she couldn’t yet rest, not until she’d checked in with Torian and Garith. Shrugging off the fire’s lure and ignoring her exhaustion, she continued toward the tent. She barely managed to suppress a shriek of surprise when Leil stepped out of the shadows.

“You scared me,” she scolded, crossing her arms across her chest.

“I’m sorry, Your Highness. I only wanted to come tell you how glad I was to hear you’d recovered and returned. You had us quite worried.” He turned to leave the way he’d come.

“Leil…wait,” she called after him.

He raised a wary eyebrow as he turned back toward her, his face illuminated by the fire. “You don’t have to hide in the shadows. This is your camp, too.”

“No, it isn’t.” His voice was faraway—sad, even. “They keep me out of camp, running information. That’s all right with me; I know people are a bit uneasy with me around.”

Emariya sighed. “They don’t mean to be. It’s just hard for them, you know? Knowing what happened in the past…” She let her words trail off.

“I know, Your Highness. No matter how sorry I am—and I
am
sorry—I’ll never be able to make up for it. I’ll never be seen as any different.”

She wanted to tell him he was wrong, but she knew deep down that he wasn’t. All she could manage was to offer a tight, forced smile and say, “For what it’s worth, I’ve forgiven you.”

“It’s worth enough.” Leil turned and walked away.

Emariya made it to the command tent without any more surprise interruptions. Garith’s face lit up in a huge smile when he saw her. He rushed over and caught her up in a giant hug, lifting her slightly off her feet.

“Don’t scare me like that again,” he said quietly, his lips right next to her ear.

Emariya nodded.

“Promise?”

“Promise. My grandparents gave me something that should help until I can learn to control my gifts better. My mother won’t be able to get in again.” Her voice cracked mentioning her mother.

“So it really was your mother, then?” After she shook her head indicating it was, he smiled sympathetically. “I’m so sorry, Riya.”

“I’m fine,” she lied, pushing down the little voice protesting inside her. She had no intention of dwelling on it right now.

“No, you’re not. I know you, remember? You can’t lie to me.”

So much for that. She looked away. “Can we please not talk about it?”

“Sure,” he said, but he was still looking at her as if she might break at any moment.

“I’m handling it fine, Garith,” she said, offering a shaken smile. “Now, what’s our plan?”

Torian, who had watched the exchange between them with some amusement playing on his face, finally joined the conversation. “While we were gone, Garith sent out scouts. We know where the Separatists are camping, waiting to ambush us.”

Emariya let out a heavy breath. “Is it where you saw them in your vision?”

“No.”

“Are we sure the scouts are right?” She looked back and forth between Garith and Torian, and then crossed the room to stare at the map on the table in front of the prince.

“Absolutely.” Garith sounded unexpectedly confident. Emariya took a harder look at him. He was thriving in his new role as her adviser and interim commander.

“We think we can surprise them and draw them into a battle on our terms.” Torian looked up as a servant entered, carrying steaming plates of supper. The salty, savory aroma of fish made her mouth water. Apparently, they’d been keeping busy since making camp. She looked at Garith pointedly.

He shrugged. “What? I figured while we waited for you, they might as well fish. The ice isn’t that thick.”

They all laughed, breaking the heavy tension of considering the battle it seemed they wouldn’t be able to avoid. “In your vision, could you tell if we were winning or not?” Emariya asked.

Torian nodded, but his face darkened. “We were, without a doubt. But as I said, based on the scout’s reports, they’ve made camp somewhere else.”

Emariya stared at him, confused. Why had his eyes grown so haunted if his vision had shown them winning?

Garith came and stood behind Emariya, staring intently down at the map. “Where do you think it was that you saw them?”

With the tip of his finger, Torian indicated the narrowest spot between the two sections of the river. “Here, where we’d be sure to see them. It’s only a few hours by horseback here from one branch of the river to the next. We’d never manage to slip around.”

“But they are up here.” Garith pointed.

“And we’re here, right?” Torian touched a spot on the map lightly. Their camp was situated just off the mountain range below the river.

“Then why are they up that high?”

Emariya had been studying the map, just like she used to do in her father’s study.

She saw what neither of the boys had. “To see where we cross. They think we are all coming straight from the castle. If we had, we might have stopped at the outpost before crossing the river. If so, we would have come across there. We’d have had no reason to stay this close to the mountains, especially not with our own outpost there, with fresh horses and fresh supplies.”

“They will wait to see us cross, and then drop back. As long as they think we’ll come that way, they will try and bottleneck us in there. They’re waiting at the lowest possible point where they can be sure to see us, whichever way we come,” Garith said.

“Unless we wind down and come up behind them. It’s harder going, sticking to the mountain range. But we’d be out of sight. We could come up behind them and ambush them instead.” Torian brushed his hair out of his eyes and then indicated a spot on the map. “We’d have to send enough of a force to make them think that was where we were crossing, enough to make them feel secure to retreat.”

“So we’d meet them here?” Garith pointed to the narrowing between the two parts of the river.

“Yes.” Torian smiled. “Exactly where my vision showed us winning against them.”

Emariya didn’t like the idea of battle. There would be losses on either side. At least this way, they had the element of having seen their victory. And she could stop constantly scanning for Russell’s face behind her.

“It will take a few days to set it up,” Torian said. “We’ll send a rider to the outpost as fast as we can. We’ll have the outpost march forward, giving the illusion that we are crossing where they expected. In the meantime, we’ll start our trek southward to move into position. If we send the message tonight, they should cross in two or three days time, depending on how quickly the messenger makes it. By the fourth day, we should be in position. Sometime that day, we can expect the Separatists to show, if they start moving at the first sight they catch of our forces.”

“We’ll need to send teams to deal with any scouts they send. We don’t want our plan given away.”

Torian nodded. “See to it. We need to deal with the boy, too. Can you handle it?”

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Once Garith had gone to make the arrangements and send the rider, Torian smiled wearily at Emariya. Would they ever have time to just be together? They’d had small snatches of time alone here and there, but it seemed there was always the shadow of the next catastrophe hanging over their heads, not letting them stop to enjoy it. He knew he’d come closer than he would have ever thought possible to losing her, and still she had managed to come back to him. Somehow, soon, they would make time to just get to know each other better without the taint of trouble knocking.

“You should get some rest. You’ll need your strength,” he said. It worried him that she hadn’t been able to recover fully before they’d left her grandparents’ mountain shack.

Her brilliant smile returned, giving him renewed energy. “I’m fine,” she said, without a hint of annoyance at his hovering. She was quiet for a minute, staring off into the distance. “I don’t think I could sleep anyway. I’m still afraid of not waking.”

He’d been such an idiot. How had he not realized she would still be afraid of that? Crossing the tent, he put his arms around her. “You’ve got to sleep eventually. And you’ve the mindroot, right?”

Emariya nodded.

“All right, then, it will be fine,” he said.

“I think I’ll just stay here with you a little while longer if that’s all right? My tent is apparently still being cleaned up anyway.”

Torian went back to the table to study the map more. “Of course it’s fine.” Torian could hear the exhaustion in her voice.

“Why do you think you are getting visions all of a sudden?” Emariya lifted her vulnerable, concerned eyes to meet his.

“Well, I’ve only had the one.”

“Still. You said it’s rare in your family for them to manifest so young.”

Torian had been thinking about it, wondering the same thing. He was pretty sure Emariya wasn’t going to like his answer. “I think we are activating the Stones, so to speak. Awakening them. Reeve may be about to bind the lines. We will hopefully wed and bind them once we know it’s safe. We’re congregating. Changing. I think our gifts are drawn together and influenced by each other. Perhaps your gifts call to mine.”

Emariya was quiet, processing what he’d said. “Do you think they could be sell-fulfilling?”

“What, the prophecies?” Torian cocked his head to the side, watching her while he waited for her to explain.

“No. Well, maybe. But I meant your visions. Like how you saw the battle at a specific location, and that we could win. So we are drawing the Separatists there. It’s almost like you saw it, so we are making it happen.” Her brow furrowed.

“I see your point.” It was worth heavy consideration. They could go around the Separatists and avoid the battle. The question was if he hadn’t seen the vision, would they have taken a different path?

“You are right, though,” Emariya said, realization heavy in her voice. “If your visions could be self-fulfilling, the prophecies could be, too.”

“How, exactly?”

“Well, what do we know?” She hurried over to the table and dipped a quill into a vial of ink.

Torian slid a blank scroll to her, watching anxiously as she wrote in a beautiful, flowing script.
Souls of the Stones, their sights we bear.

“That probably refers to having visions, right?”

He had to agree; that line seemed pretty straightforward. “Right. And the next is about the gift of the Roths, I think. ‘Sounds of the Stones, their secrets we share.’” While he watched, she wrote that beneath the first line.

“But the next line is where it starts to get less clear. ‘Will of the soil blood will flow’ is followed directly by ‘should three Stones one ever know.’”

“It sure makes it sound like it has something to do with the Warrens, and that it warns of not merging the lines,” Torian said hesitantly.

“But what if we are taking it too literally? Why is there no straightforward line for the Warrens like there is for the Roths and the Ahlens?”

“I don’t know.” Torian shook his head.

“Well, this is sort of the part I meant might be self-fulfilling. People get so caught up on that line about how blood will flow. They’ve convinced themselves that it’s all doom and gloom if the lines merge. But the Separatists fear is what is driving us to battle, where we both know blood will flow. Lives will be lost. So self-fulfilling?” Emariya asked hopefully.