Page 35 of All the Wandering Light

Was the rat to blame for all the other things that had gone missing since they’d left the Nightwood? The maps, the compass?

River felt an uncharacteristic prickle of disquiet. For a moment, Kamzin’s presence was almost tangible. He half expected to find her standing behind him, chin tilted and arms crossed in that stubborn posture she so often assumed, her large eyes flashing like starlight. The visions of her had been disquieting, though he’d had none recently. Kamzin had no magic, and in a way, seeing the world through her eyes had felt like stumbling around with his hands tied behind his back. Yet he hadn’t felt weak. He had felt bold, and heedless, and full of a jangling energy.

If he ever figured out who had placed the spell on him, he would kill them.

He found Esha in the shadow of an enormous boulder from which a rare pine grew, jutting out of a crevice like a warning hand. He stood with his arms folded, gazing down at the girl who knelt before him. River thought her name was Ivy. She was thirteen at most, clad in a torn and overlarge chuba that had no doubt been stolen from one of the mountain villages, perhaps by her parents. She had the characteristic raggedness of most witches, her frame too thin and her bird’s-nest hair tangled with leaves.

She was shaking. River wondered how long she had been there, and what she had done to displease Esha. He had a contemplative look that always foreshadowed something unpleasant.

“Brother,” Esha said without turning, “what have you found?”

Ivy’s eyes swung to him. She wore a hopeless expression that only deepened River’s sense of foreboding.

“I’ve narrowed the search area to three mountains,” River said. “We should be able to locate the star within a day or two, if the skies stay clear.”

He had no idea if this was true. But given the mood Esha was in, River felt no inclination toward honesty.

“A day or two,” Esha repeated. “That was your estimate yesterday, I recall.”

“Oh, was it?” River abandoned any hope of quickly extricating himself from the conversation. Esha’s tone was calm and deliberate. It was a bad sign. It was how he had spoken before he had driven a boar’s tusk through River’s shoulder when he was five years old, after they had quarreled over a game. Sky had nearly killed Esha for that, and afterward, Esha had been careful not to injure River in ways that left obvious marks. River knew that Esha had enjoyed tormenting him in part because he was Sky’s favorite, and though Esha felt little warmth toward Sky, his resentful temperament made him view Sky’s allegiance to their youngest brother as a personal affront.

“It’s difficult to travel quickly, with so many ill,” River said. “Whatever it is, it’s almost as bad as obsidian poisoning—”

“It is obsidian poisoning,” Esha said. “A scout found traces of it at the edge of the last stream. Any ideas how it ended up there?”

River’s thoughts flashed to Kamzin’s fox. But that was impossible. Wasn’t it?

His head was beginning to ache. “Why are you asking me?”

“Why am I asking you? Was that your customary response when you faced a challenge as Royal Explorer?”

“No one tried to poison me before I took up with you, Esha.”

Esha smiled. “Tell me about the sky city.”

River blinked. “What?”

“The city you found on Raksha. Tell me about it.”

“I already did.” He had recounted his last expedition to Esha and Thorn. Why was Esha bringing this up now? His labyrinthine mind was as much a mystery to River as it had been when they were children.

“A city of shadow, you said.” Esha rubbed absently at one red-rimmed eye. “Towers made of darkness that disappeared when the light touched them. But what did you feel when you were there? Did it feel alive?”

River didn’t want to think about the sky city. It had been a haunted place, tucked into the wind-scoured summit. He still found it difficult to believe that anyone had ever lived there—not because it was impossible, but because it was so unpleasant, the sky close and confining. He had felt little connection to those long-ago witches who had abandoned it. Yet he had felt something when he stood there. A watchfulness that seemed to seep from the ruins themselves.

“I suppose so,” he said. “Why?”

Esha didn’t reply. He merely stood there with his arms crossed, gazing thoughtfully at the girl who still crouched before him on her knees, shaking.

“One of our scouts found her halfway back to the Nightwood,” Esha said finally. “What would you do, River? I’ve heard stories about what the Royal Explorer would do.”

River regarded Ivy, who seemed as frightened of him as she was of Esha. He had indeed encountered deserters in his service to the emperor. Some people were simply incapable of dealing with the hardships that accompanied his expeditions. Though River, as Royal Explorer, had acquired a reputation for executing deserters, the truth was that he generally let them flee. In the harsh wilderness, revenge was a luxury. But this girl wasn’t some shirking assistant—she was just a child. No doubt Esha had chosen her for the mission on the basis of her shape-shifting ability.

“I would let her go,” River said.

Esha considered him. River wished that he would rant and pace, unpleasant as that was. Esha’s calm was like the coiled tension of a viper—you knew that when he did lash out, it would be brutal and without warning.

“Apparently, she planned to rejoin her sister beyond the Nightwood,” Esha said, turning back to Ivy. “She wasn’t content to serve her emperor.”