When I look back at Sinisa though, her eyes are still searching.
“Don’t…you see it?” I ask hesitantly.
The change in her expression is all the answer I need.
“She can’t see it,” Rhet says with an air of arrogance. “And she can’t follow us any farther either.”
“What?” The word is low and deadly, but it’s not enough to curb the panic rising in her tone.
Sinisa storms forward, only to run into an invisible wall.
Rhet shrugs and uses the momentum to set me on my feet beside him. “I tried to warn you. No Reaper can pass.”
Sinisa’s eyes widen as she begins pounding against a thick shield of air. She jogs to the left, and then to the right, all the while keeping a hand on the clear barrier.
When she realizes there’s no way in, or at least stops searching for one, she fixes me with a desperate look in her eyes. “Please, I have to help you find the Guardian. If I don’t…”
Her mouth hangs open, the words refusing to flow so I never actually find out what happens when Reapers don’t complete their missions, but I know that Sinisa has already failed once.
I become suddenly aware of Rhet’s eyes on me. “There is one way,” he says.
Sinisa’s eyes cut to him so swiftly I flinch.
“What is it?” I ask, surprisingly interested in hearing our options. I mean, this is the Reaper who tried killing Gem. It would be completely reasonable, and perhaps even responsible, to leave her here at this strange, magical barrier.
But I don’t just see a Reaper when I look at her anymore. I see the little girl who had no choice but to defend herself. I see the friend who just saved my life.
“If you can vouch for her, we’ll let her through.” Rhet directs his attention to Sinisa, a glare reddening his features. “But remember who and what she is, and how you met her to begin with.”
Something tells me it’s been years since even she’s known who she is. In the past few hours, we’ve learned more about her than she probably has since becoming a Reaper. I get the impression that all this time she’s thought that all she is is a Reaper, someone sent to executions without any other purpose but to bring about death.
But when the wolves attacked us, she protected me. She screamed my name and ran to my side when I was bitten.
Surely, she is more than just a Reaper.
“I—I think so, yeah,” I hesitate, the words threatening to bolt from my lips while my fear of being horribly wrong about her struggles to hold them back. It doesn’t succeed. “Yes, I mean, I vouch for her. She saved my life.”
Rhet nods, and rather than seeming grudgeful, it’s as if he holds no doubt. It puts me at ease.
Rhet reaches out an open hand. “Take my hand and you may enter.”
The gesture freezes her in place. Sinisa gawks down at his palm, eyes incredulous. I too can’t help but stare at Rhet like he’s lost his mind. His hands are completely bare; no gloves, nothing to protect him from her Reaper power.
But before I can remind him of what she’s capable of, and before Sinisa can do anything, a black bird dives between them. Crow swoops back into the air, circling around for another malicious strike at the extended hand. The bird misses, Sinisa startles back, but Rhet remains unmoving, the invitation still there.
The bird hovers in between the two of them, wings flapping like razors, fending off what I guess is a perceived threat.
“Crow,” Sinisa warns. “Get out of the way.”
The bird does as it’s told, flying to the ground so quickly that the leaves beneath it waft in the air.
When she’s thoroughly done glaring at the bird, she returns her attention to Rhet, one eyebrow high. “You know I can’t. Not unless you have a death wish.”
Caw, the bird seems to say in agreement.
“Yes, you can,” Rhet says, the words deliberate, each one slow and with meaning. “I am protected, and it’s the only way you can cross.”
Sinisa stares at his hand, considering it.
A drumming warns in my chest though, trickles of fear coursing through me. If Rhet dies, I’ll have to drag myself to the encampment alone. I’ll have to beg for the other bandits to bring me my sister, to insist that Rhet had promised to do so before his untimely death. I might also have to beg for Sinisa’s life and tell them that it was only after Rhet’s insistence that she grabbed his hand.
“Are you sure?” I ask. “If you’re wrong, then, well…I would just encourage you to make sure you’re not wrong.”
“I’m not. I will be fine.” His voice resonant, the words like stones, Rhet’s arm seems stronger, steadier than ever. “Are you coming, Reaper?”
Sinisa’s eyes dart hesitantly to the trees, but only for a second. With a hollow clap, she swings her hand into Rhet’s and winces.
Her eyes are shut.
They stay shut, waiting.
But when nothing happens, she opens them one at a time.
We both stare at their hands, interlaced like the moon cradled in the night sky, waiting for the black power to seep out of her fingertips. But it doesn’t.
She looks to me with amazement just as Rhet yanks her through the barrier. Her shock grows deeper when she beholds the bandit encampment inside.
Behind her, the crow goes wild, cawing furiously and pecking at the translucent wall.
“Crow can’t come?” Sinisa asks, looking over her shoulder. She almost sounds excited about it.
“No.”
I look to Sinisa, hoping to give a telepathic apology for our host’s lack of explanation, but instead, I am struck with awe as runes the color of lavender blossom on her forehead.
“Sinisa,” I breathe her name like it’s a cloud floating from my tongue. “Your—your runes.”
As if expecting to find her face on fire,
