new location. But if he slowed time too far, if he thrust through that barrier he’d felt while traveling back to see Karen and the wagon train after the attack, then when he dropped the object, it returned to natural time. It shifted location, but he couldn’t leave it behind, in the past. As long as he stayed on this side of the barrier though…
Off to the side, he caught a ripple on the otherwise still plains, and he drew to a halt at the edge of a small stream. The plains had grown more rumpled, with higher hills and deeper flats. To the east, a forest stretched into the distance, its edge growing closer. During the last break, Eraeth had said it was the same forest that held the Faelehgre and the sukrael, although they were much farther north.
Between his position and the forest, he could see one of the distortions he called Drifters. He’d seen dozens of them since he’d left the forest, but none of the Drifters had been this close. And here, with the world slowed, the Drifter looked… different.
He glanced back to where he knew the Alvritshai were. Aeren had said they’d reach the first Alvritshai outpost that afternoon, at a rough division where the plains ended and the first few stands of forest began, marking the end of dwarren lands and the edge of Alvritshai territory. It would be another few days before they reached Caercaern and the halls of the Alvritshai.
But Colin knew he could catch up if he fell behind.
He moved closer to the Drifter, careful not to come into contact with any of its outstretched ripples. The Drifter coruscated with light, shifting though all of the various colors at its edges and through its arms but melding into an intense white as the light reached its center. The center itself was clear, and as he drew closer, he realized that he could see through it.
What he saw on the far side wasn’t what he expected. Grass, yes, as if the plains continued on through the eye of coruscating light. But this grass wasn’t lit with afternoon sunlight. Instead, it was silvered with faint moonlight, as if it were night on the far side.
One of the arms of the Drifter reached out, as if sensing him, and he pulled back. It brushed by where he’d stood a moment before and passed on, almost like the antennae on an insect.
Frowning, Colin searched the grass and found a stone, releasing his hold on time so he could pick it up. He turned, the Drifted no longer coruscating with color, merely a ripple of distortion, like heat waves, although he could still see the moonlit plains on the far side. It was moving slowly toward him. Stepping forward, he tossed the stone at the eye in the Drifter’s center. It passed through, landing with a thud and rustle of grass as it rolled into the moonlight.
“It’s a doorway,” he murmured to himself. He considered for a moment, then slowed time. The Drifter shifted from clear ripples to coruscating colors again, but stopped drifting forward.
He prodded the stone with his staff through the distortion, then shifted position, keeping track of the rippling arms of the Drifter. If he stooped over, he could step through the eye himself, but the thought made him shudder. He couldn’t see anything of significance on the far side, nothing to place where the doorway led. The features in the background-the shape of the land itself, the hills and depressions-seemed to match where he stood, although the forest appeared much closer. It was simply night there.
Then he caught the scent. A familiar scent. But here, with time slowed, the scent was strong. An earthen scent, of leaves and mulch and trees.
The Lifeblood. So strong he could taste it, as if he’d placed dried leaves in his mouth. It struck his gut hard, an ache shuddering out through his bones. Since he’d given Eraeth the vial of Lifeblood, the pull of the Well had eased and he’d had fewer and less severe seizures, but now the craving returned, harsh and powerful. He fought it back, forced himself to focus, to inhale deeply. Because there was something else as well, another scent intertwined with the Lifeblood. He concentrated, but he couldn’t place it, even though he felt he should, as if he’d smelled it before. Like roses, sweet and clean.
He stood for a long moment in deep thought. He thought about what Aeren had said, that the Drifters had swallowed entire armies. He suddenly remembered Peg vanishing during the storm as they fled the dwarren.
But it didn’t explain where the distortions were coming from. Nor why they were appearing more frequently now than when Colin’s family had first headed out onto the plains.
He shrugged, turning away from the distortion, and as he did so, he heard a faint whisper.
… Colin…
He stilled, spinning slightly, like the needle of a compass, until he faced the forest on the far side of the distortion. Osserin?
The Faelehgre didn’t respond, although Colin thought he heard.. . something.
Without looking back, Colin headed toward the far woods, slipping around the distortion and leaving it behind. A hundred paces farther on, he felt the faint edges of the Lifeblood’s influence slip through him and he hissed in response, repressing a shiver. He could taste its coolness against his tongue, could feel it filling him, tingling through his skin, worse than when he’d smelled it near the Drifter. The fine hairs on his arm and on the back of his neck stood on end, and for a brief moment he shuddered at the thought that he had ever left its embrace.
Then his stomach cramped. He gasped, found himself on his knees, one hand on his staff holding him upright, the other fisted in the grass and earth, the dried blades cutting into his palms and fingers. He focused on the slivered pain, so thin and sharp, and fought back the duller, wider ache in his gut.
Trembling, he rose and pushed on toward the forest. He hadn’t thought he’d react so strongly to the Well, now that he’d been away from it for so long. And he knew he was only at the edge of its influence. He could feel its power growing as he moved closer.
Except he was too far north to be within its influence at all.
… Colin…
I can hear you, Osserin. I’m headed toward the forest.
A wash of relief, and as if the Faelehgre had focused in on his voice he heard the reply clearly. We’ve been trying to contact you since you left. We’d given up, but then we sensed you close to the forest. We’ve been calling for you for the last day.
Colin stepped under the branches of the forest and sank into their shadows, the dulled scent of pine filling his senses. He moved deeper into the forest, feeling it close in around him, sunlight lancing down through breaks, dust caught in the shafts seemingly motionless.
Where are you?
Here, Osserin sent and Colin focused in on the direction of his voice. Here, by the Well.
And then Osserin wove out of the forest, flickering in agitation. A few other Faelehgre hovered around him, darting here and there in agitation.
“What’s wrong?” Colin asked. “What’s happened? I didn’t think the influence of the Lifeblood spread this far north.”
It doesn’t. It shouldn’t. But look.
Osserin streaked away, the others following. Colin forged after them, picking his way over tangled roots and the fallen trunks of trees, using his staff as a crutch. He reached the crest of a ridge, began making his way down the far side, then glanced up and halted in shock.
The ridge was the edge of a shallow bowl, earth sloping down toward a basin. In the center of the basin sat a ring of river stone, rounded and smooth, like the lip of the Well at the center of the Faelehgre’s ancient city.
“Another Well,” Colin murmured. Except this Well pulsed with a faint blue light.
He stumbled the last few steps and leaned forward over the lip of the Well, down into its depths, toward the blue light. He couldn’t see any of the Lifeblood-the Well appeared empty-but he could smell it, could feel it throbbing in his skin.
It’s filling slowly, Osserin whispered. We think that’s why the radius of our own Well increased, why we can travel here now. We think it has something to do with the disappearance of the Wraiths.
Colin shoved back from the Well. “Tell me what happened.”
Osserin hovered uncertainly for a moment, as if he didn’t know where to start, but then his light dimmed and he settled closer to the ground.
It began a few days after you left. Or so we think. We can’t be certain. But that was the first sign that something was different. We sent out some of the Faelehgre to scout. What they found was not that something had changed, but that something was missing. The Wraiths were no longer in the forest, were no longer anywhere within the Well’s influence.
