“Dace, you feeling okay?” I study him carefully. All too aware that should his strength fail, there’s no one around here to help me restore him.
“I’m fine.” He pulls me toward the trail. But the way his jaw clenches, the way he averts his gaze, leads me to believe he’s anything but.
Still, with no other choice, I trek silently alongside him. Unwilling to put a voice to the long list of questions storming my brain.
Are these Phyre’s tracks?
And if so, what do we do once we find her?
Wouldn’t our time be better spent searching for Dace’s soul?
What if we
’ve fallen way off track—and what if it’s all my fault?
What if Phyre really is just sort of tragic and odd, but otherwise has nothing to do with any of this?
What if I’m endangering Dace by leading him on this crazy, nonsensical chase?
Dace squeezes my hand and pulls me to a stop. The alerted look on his face enough to quiet my thoughts.
“Do you hear that?” he whispers, nodding in the direction where a strange sort of chanting and wailing is coming from somewhere deep within the woods.
A chill slips over my skin. One that has less to do with the frigid climate we’re in, and more to do with the tone of the song.
It’s the sound of sadness and melancholy.
If complete and utter despair had a note, it would chime just like this.
Dace is the first to move toward it, but I’m quick to catch up. With lowered heads and stooped shoulders, we creep quietly forward. Edging up alongside a grove of tall pine trees flecked white with snow, I stare at the scene before me in complete disbelief. Only vaguely aware of Dace’s whispered voice in my ear, saying, “Well, that explains it.”
thirty-four
Dace
I gape at the spectacle before me. Telling myself it doesn’t truly exist. Just a trick of my mind. Not unlike the delusions that plagued me back in that hell dimension of the Middleworld.
Sinking into the comfort of a deeply rooted denial, when Daire drags a startled breath beside me that confirms it’s real.
The ice sculpture is elaborate.
Intricate.
Diamond shaped and massive in size, it’s been carefully carved by a talented hand. Its surface so shiny and slick, it serves as an easy distraction. Though a closer look reveals a much smaller diamond sculpture suspended inside, containing a radiant sphere that shimmers in a nimbus of light.
I recognize it the instant I see it.
And judging by Daire’s horrified gasp, she knows it too.
Though I can’t imagine how she managed it, somehow Phyre has captured my soul and encased it in ice.
It’s only when I lift my gaze higher that I see the razor-sharp stake she’s rigged to hang precariously above it.
It’s an ingenious contraption.
One that commands a sort of awed reverence.
One that requires a few hushed moments to take in its full magnitude—to understand how it works.