I'd already considered this possibility when she was a Dallisor. My answer wouldn't change now. "I would go to my death before causing yours."
"You said that all Endreans eventually go bad. What if it's only a matter of time before I become just like Endrick?"
Most Antorans believed this wasn't a question of "what if," but a question of "when." The Halderians had nearly been wiped out by the Endreans. They would never trust one again. The Coracks were so certain of the Endreans' corruption that our orders were uncompromising, unforgiving. I was left to stand across from a girl who made my heart race, wondering if one day she'd put a knife through it.
Anxious to find any way to save Kestra, I remembered a theory about the Endreans. We had no evidence to support it, but it was her best chance to survive. Probably her only chance. "You have no magic now, so let it be. Maybe the lure of power becomes too great, or magic depletes the soul. Or maybe the water in the Blue Caves somehow taints the magic. I don't know why, but it always corrupts."
She wasn't convinced. "And if I never obtain my magic, would you still trust me to join the Coracks, to fight at your side?"
Now I took a single step forward, ignoring the pinch in my lungs. "Kestra Dallisor earned my trust. Kestra the Endrean will not lose it."
She shifted away, putting more distance between us than before. "I doubt your captain will see things the same way."
He wouldn't, nor would most Coracks. Even if Tenger allowed her to join us, Kestra would charge into battle, never knowing if her greater enemy was ahead of her, or at her back.
My failure to answer seemed to deepen her sadness. It was thick in her voice when she said, "This is why I've said there's no future for us. Surely you understand that now."
"No, I don't understand! Forget what Tenger believes! I don't know your future, or mine. But I know who you are today, and how I feel about you. Whatever your name, or your past, or whoever you will be tomorrow, I still want to be ... yours." With that, I stepped forward again, and this time she didn't back away.
Kestra's smile came slowly, but it was real and it was for me. She started to speak when a loud cry overhead rang through the night air.
She was the first to recognize it. "Condors." Kestra grabbed my arm, yanking me face-first to the ground. A shock of pain lit across my injured back and ribs, and flashes of light appeared in my vision.
Wind from the condors' wings rushed past us, their screeches boring through me like a drill. I covered my ears, still fighting the echoes of pain reverberating through my body. Kestra probably didn't realize how hard she had pulled me down.
"These condors don't have riders," she said. "That's better, but we have to stay low."
The horse we had used to escape bolted away upon hearing the next screech. Kestra called after it, but to no avail.
"Keep your head down," she told me. "These condors notice faces, and movement."
I probably couldn't have looked up anyway, and I certainly didn't feel like moving, or breathing for that matter. Had we crashed onto solid rock?
A tremulous, high-pitched neigh rang through the air, overpowered by the condors' screech. The powerful flap of wings rushed more wind over me, and then it was silent.
"I think they took the horse," Kestra mumbled. I opened my eyes to see her beside me, visibly trembling.
Tenger had once described to us being in a battle where condors had plucked grown men from the ground, flying them off to their doom or to the bowels of a dungeon to be tortured for information. But clearly they were strong enough to carry a horse as well. Hardly comforting news.
"Henry Dallisor reported us to Endrick, who sent his condors for us," she said. "Endrick expected we'd be on that horse."
"At least they're gone."
But her eyes only widened. "The Dominion doesn't give up, Simon."
Neither did I. Holding my breath against the pain, I forced myself to my knees. It was too dark to see much, but I already knew our options were spare. The road we were on cut across a slope. Below us was tired grassland and thin bushes. Farther uphill, where the slope began to flatten out, was All Spirits Forest. Kestra had seen it too.
"Don't you dare." I was firm on this. "If Dallisor blood would've gotten you killed in there, imagine what would happen to an Endrean."
"We're no better out here! By now, Endrick will realize we weren't on that horse. Something else is coming."
In answer to her warning, the road began vibrating beneath us, a low hum that was quickly growing louder. Coming closer.
Kestra turned sharply. "Oropods!"
Dust was kicking up on the road, though with the hills between us and Highwyn, I couldn't see anything yet. It amazed me how on only two legs an oropod managed to turn up more dust than a half dozen horses. I guessed at least six of the lizardlike creatures were headed our way, and each of their riders would be well armed. At the rate the dust was rising, I guessed we had less than five minutes.
Desperately, I looked uphill again. How many times had I been warned not to go into that forest? Tenger had even forbidden it to the Coracks, unless there was no other choice.