However he’s doing it, it’s taking everything in me to keep up, especially when we begin the downward slope, the steadily dropping path making every blind step I take seem like a leap of faith.

The risk of injuring myself—again—grows as the gradient increases, our speed never slowing. Yesterday, it took us nearly thirty minutes of careful, thigh-burning trekking before the ground began to even out beneath the ocean. Today, it takes less than half of that before I’m panting my way along the flat tunnel, already dreading the incline that’s ahead.

I have to keep up.

I have to keep up.

I force myself to push past my aching muscles and throbbing wounds. I let the pain fuel me, driving me forward, unwilling to let that bobbing light out of my sight.

I’m bolstered when I realize they must be starting to feel the strain of the journey, too. But as they slow, so do I, my body unable to maintain the pace, especially once the ground begins to tilt upward.

I curse as I stumble over a rock in the dark and nearly go down, but I manage to keep my feet under me. Just. If I can survive this passage without breaking my ankle—or my neck— it’ll be a miracle.

Up, up, up, we travel, with me summoning every ounce of strength I have left to try to catch up to them. I may have had limited mobility for almost a week after escaping Lengard, but I’ve had two and a half years of training with Enzo before that, including his merciless endurance drills.

I can make it.

I can make it.

I stumble again, and again I keep my feet under me, but only by reaching out to steady myself on the wall. I grimace as I yank my hand back, remembering Arryn’s warnings not to touch anything this close to the old quarantine zone.

I’m gasping, gasping, gasping for air as I scramble higher up the path, nearly sobbing with relief when the bobbing light vanishes. Vanik and Ward must have reached the end, which means I’m nearly there, too.

I put in a burst of speed once the incline finally levels out, aware that once they leave the tunnel, I need to be close enough to see where they go next—close enough to follow, close enough to try to stop them, even if I still don’t know how, exactly, I’m going to do that.

I don’t attempt to Speak anything—I can barely draw air into my lungs, so I have no chance of getting a word out, Spoken or otherwise. All I can do is keep moving up the unforgivable slope, keep placing one foot in front of the other as I hurry after them as fast as I can manage.