Journey onto the Storm (BOOK 2)

Chapter 15

YUVEN

Almost there, but never close enough.

Ancient spires of alabaster marble tore through the dark and cracked in a crimson bubble of torment. It lifted off the frosted walls and cupped the canopy of snow and rained blood. Chains clanged against a pit of stone, empty of a heart. Rage rumbled in his throat and released the roar of Derelicts, but when he breached the surface of muck, he awoke to the beautiful sun. He brushed his feathers out of the extra tangles of his hair, but the taste of bile and rust remained on his tongue. He fumbled for a phial before it drove itself through his nose and stole his sense of taste and smell both. Free of the endless irritant for the time being, he returned the phial to his strap and glared at the mess he was left with.

I wanted to get out of this forest sooner.

Adara sat on the ground and rifled through a lie, while Fenrer rested on his stomach, head tucked in his arms without a response. This wouldn't be a problem if he stuck to the schedule. Yuven hauled himself off his stinging back to move for his Oathbound and ignored the Anima for the time being when she raised her head. Knees bent, he poked Fenrer's cheek, where he awoke — if he had been asleep at the start. His gaze drifted to him with an unseen yawn. Shadows weighed down his face, and Yuven said, "Just because you're tired is not going to stop me from getting us to the steppes."

"Do you know the meaning of rest?" Adara, the Anima, asked while she rubbed her lower back. "We sleep, and then walk."

"You have enough energy to complain." Yuven poked Fenrer on his spine when he lowered his brow back into the embrace of his forearms with a soft groan. "We need to get moving, Wolf Boy." He returned to his pack when Fenrer stirred in full and grabbed the parchment taking them home. Ink roads shimmered with magick and correction of their path, with the environment reflecting off the fresh parchment. Time abandoned him the longer Fenrer took to lift himself out of his stupor and gave Adara more time to waste in getting home.

"Where exactly are we heading?"

"Haneka, Sivaport," Yuven repeated and glared at Adara. "I said this before we left."

"I mean — can I just take a look at the map?" Adara reached for it, but Yuven leaped to his feet and kept it out of her reach. Her hand snaked its way through his space, and he tugged it further out of her reach. "Can we not do this so early, Yuven? Give me the map."

"Why do you want it?"

Adara's nostrils flared while Fenrer straightened himself out with a stretch. "Why are you not letting me take a look?"

"Because I don't want the path to get jumbled," he bit and put it back in his pack as Fenrer gathered their packs and handed it off to their owners. "Let us go. We're not out of Dyrin yet." But once we are... I am that much closer to you. He brushed his fingers down his throat, and longed for a warm touch instead of the bloody taste on his tongue. It shimmered with heat waves, but he shook them out and got them moving once more.

"Yuven?" Fenrer questioned.

"I took my medication."

The forest edge broke into expansive fields. Mills rose from the landscape, dotted across farmland. A cobbled road went around the forest and back into the basin and terraces, but he followed the wheel tracks. Underneath one of the posts directing to the nearest towns, a small, roadside shrine sat in the dirt, in the visage of the Ancient Ivara. He folded his arms when Fenrer went for it and set it back on the stone before kneeling in front of it.

"We can't be stopping for every little overturned statue," he grumbled. "It will survive without your reverence."

Fenrer sighed and turned back to him. "I can't ignore it if I see it, Yuven." He got off the dirt path and brushed off the grime from his pants. "Besides, nothing wrong with praying for a quiet journey." He smiled, bright as the dawn, but Yuven rolled his eyes and pushed them down the direction the marker pointed — the town of Jankha. Out of the way of the bustling roads and lacked Warden outposts from his recollection of studying reports.