“You need to calm down.”
“You need to stop being such a pathetic waste and choose where your loyalties lie!” L’zar’s gaze swung toward Maleshi. “That’s what this is about, isn’t it? You want to know my plans for a final time so you and the scourge of the Night and Circle can take what’s mine. You want all the threads you could never touch to wrap yourselves together within them.” Spittle flew from the drow’s mouth as he shouted in Corian’s face. “I see everything, Corian! Everything except your choices because you haven’t made them yet!”
Corian stood firmly against the verbal assault and lifted his chin. “You think I’m choosing whether or not to betray you?”
“Well, I’ll know when you do. Try to go behind my back again, vae shra’ni, and neither of you will make it out of this alive.”
“Stop blowing this out of proportion, L’zar.” Maleshi stepped toward him and ignored Corian’s warning glance. “Corian chooses his vow to you over everything else, time and time again.”
“You’re trying to undermine me. Both of you!” L’zar’s wild eyes rolled furiously in his head, and he swiped at the empty air in front of him as if trying to clear away a swarm of gnats. “After everything I’ve done for you, this is how you repay me?”
“Stop.” Corian tilted his head in warning. “You’re not thinking clearly.”
The breath went out of L’zar all at once as he gazed at the thick magic in the air only he could see. “I am unraveling.”
“L’zar…”
The drow burst into enhanced speed and knocked Corian against the side of the mountain as he raced down the path. Maleshi staggered against the edge of the switchback, her black hair whipping around her head as the blur of gray and white zipped from side to side and finally darted to the valley floor before disappearing into a grove of white-trunked trees on the north side of Nor’ieth. Two dozen small black birds squawked and took off from their perches in panicked flight. The entire valley echoed with L’zar’s ragged, curdled scream of rage, and then there was nothing.
Corian sagged against the side of the mountain, dirt and dislodged stones raining down around him. “I knew it.”
“Don’t do that.” Maleshi brushed her hair from her face and fixed him with a gentle gaze. “None of this is your fault.”
“Not now. But I left him to his own mind for far too long.” Dropping his head back against the mountainside, Corian stared at the sky. “I should have questioned him sooner. Long before he started questioning everything else.”
“He’s overwhelmed, ma gairín.” Maleshi moved slowly toward him, stopped, and offered her hand. “Being here, of all places, isn’t helping his frame of mind, either. You know that.”
“Just one layer on top of the next, huh?” He chuckled wryly when she nodded, then finally grasped her hand and let her pull him to his feet. “I don’t know what world he was made to inhabit, Maleshi. But it wasn’t this one.”
“Or maybe this world wasn’t meant to contain him. Hm?” She gave him a wan smile and flicked a patch of dirt off his shoulder. “Once we leave this plane, he’ll clear his head. You’ll guide him like you always have, and we’ll finish this. Whatever happens after that won’t matter nearly as much as this, will it?”
“He wasn’t wrong. That he’s unraveling. I can’t read the Weave, but I don’t have to. I know he shouldn’t have come back here. If we’re not quick enough, we’ll lose him entirely, and making the crossing Earthside again won’t do a thing to help.”
Maleshi replied, “Then I suggest we let the Aranél at the top of this mountain do what she came here to do. We’ll guide her too. And judging by the surprising intensity of L’zar’s most recent outburst, I’m willing to bet he’ll write this whole thing off as a bad dream.”
“He won’t wake up from a psychotic break. Not one caused by an overload of magic that doesn’t belong to him.”
“It does belong to him. He’s made it part of him, and no matter what the Sorren Gán might want from L’zar after this, there’s no pulling them apart. Cheyenne wouldn’t have half the power she does if that weren’t the case.” The general turned to head down the path. “I’m finished with hiking for today, vae shra’ni. Come find me when you’re ready to talk about something else.”
He snorted. “Like what?”
“Anything but L’zar and his madness.”
Chapter Forty-Three
Ember stared at the white stone buildings rising around her, trying to ignore the thick taste of vinegar filling her mouth. Not the flavor I would’ve paired with more magic than exists in all of Richmond.
The crawler moved slowly beneath her as her guiding hand swiped across the control panel. The machine’s metal legs had only cracked into a building’s outer wall once, and when she’d recovered from the startling sound, she forced herself to pay much closer attention to where she was going and how much room the bulky contraption needed.
A strange, lilting tune filtered through the buildings in front of her. Multiple voices rose at once in a wordless song. Ember slowed the crawler to a stop and cocked her head. That’s the weirdest song I’ve ever heard. Like someone gave a saxophone to a whale.
White light moved around the corner of the closest building before fading away to reveal one of the olforím standing calmly in front of the fae girl. Ember swallowed. “Hello.”
The woman dipped her bald head and smiled, her hands clasped in front of her between the draping sleeves of her sheer, glowing robe. “We can offer you aid with your difficulty, fae. If that is what you wish.”
“My difficulty, huh?” Ember chuckled and glanced around the otherwise empty grouping of buildings. “Which one?”
“The root.” The olforím woman gestured toward her with a wide sweep of her arm.
