He loves me. Me. The hungry me, the fighting me, the blood-stained me. I cup it like a desert-dying man cups water—preciously. I’ll always be here, with him. I know that.

But I will miss this look.

Malachite has to sprint through the bones and between the bisected body of the giant insect to get to the other side.

“Massive wyrms with six eyes and an ancient bloodthirst, no problem,” I say, catching up with his hurried steps down the tunnel. “But give you something with more than six legs and you suddenly take issue.”

“Don’t even start,” he snarls, face even more bloodless than usual. “I’m not proud of it.”

“Who would be?” Fione asks as she, too, catches up. “I gather no one on Arathess is partial to giant insects.”

“They aren’t insects,” Yorl corrects. “A common mistake—they’re more akin to crustaceans. It’s a clever trap of the ancestor council’s—they’re highly repelled by the scent of juniper. You could walk through a tunnel full of them with a single bough and they’d all scatter.”

“Remind me to pack an array of very specific tree branches next time,” I chime.

“Whatever they are, whatever they hate, they’re horseshit,” Malachite mutters.

Lucien draws even with him. “You did well, Mal.”

“Ugh. Don’t patronize me, Luc.”

“I think it’s kind of cute, actually,” I tease, wiping the black blood off my mouth with Lucien’s offered handkerchief. “The most badass of badasses in all Vetris is weak to creepy-crawlies!”

“What did I just say about the patronizing?” the beneather snaps.

“Everyone has a weakness,” Fione agrees. “Yours is understandable, at the very least. I’ve known him since nursery, but I still don’t understand Lucien’s obsession with fictitious novels.”

“Or yours with the color pink,” Lucien drawls.

“Or mine, with cake!” I add. “Actually, I understand that one intimately.”

“A pink room filled with cake and novels,” Yorl murmurs. “Why not arrange it when this is over?”

Lucien beams at the celeon. “A fine idea. Maybe a rousing duel for Mal, and what will it be for you?”

Yorl waves his paw. “I require little. But I do indulge in a peppermint cordial from time to time.”

The pleasant idea floats around us all, sanding down the grumpy look on Malachite’s face and warding off the growing chill of the Dark Below as we press on. They don’t know if they’ll die here, or later, or at all. They think none of them might survive. It’s a brave thing, to think about a nice future in the terrifying present.

I smile to myself and lead on, first in line for the deadly traps; my friends are so brave. Brave and silly.

Of course they’ll live.

Because I’ll make sure of it.

28

28

THE DURANCE
OF THE
ANCESTORS