He would be there. She swallowed hard.
“He’s right,” Caedmon, the final voice in the family, said. “You can’t go back. No more shooting.”
“You can’t stop me.” But fear tightened her skin until it itched. Did she want them to stop her? She wanted to see Camulos again, and she certainly didn’t want to believe he would kill her. But Camulos himself had told her that he had to. Oh gods, what would she do?
“Of course we can.” Caedmon plucked her bow from where it sat next to her.
“No! Give it back!” She reached for it, but Bradan gently pushed her back.
“It’s for the best. We can’t allow you to see him. We love you too much to lose you. Without your bow, you aren’t a threat to him. When he forgets about you, we’ll give it back.”
Panic streaked through her. She’d never been without her bow. “I need my bow!”
No matter how she begged, they wouldn’t give it back to her. She’d even cried, which she despised, but she couldn’t control herself. Being without her bow made her feel helpless. Worthless.
After a long night of tossing and turning on her pallet without her bow on the floor next to her, she woke to a quiet dawn and grim brothers. The men filed out of the house, silent and stern.
Caedmon, almost the last to leave, turned to her and hugged her. Against the top of her head, he whispered, “I’m sorry. But this is safest for you.”
She watched him walk out the door through blurry vision, her throat tight with loss and loneliness.
“Andrasta.”
She turned to see Marrek standing behind her.
“I thought you’d gone.”
“No, you were just busy staring forlornly after the others.”
She gave a watery chuckle, but there was no joy in the sound. He was the youngest, and as such had been with her the longest before he too moved onto training with their brothers. Whenever she was sad, he was usually the one to comfort her.
“Wait a moment.” He grinned, then turned and walked to the far side of the room.
Her jaw dropped when she saw him pull one of the huge benches closer to the wall, right beneath the high shelf where they’d stored her bow. She’d never have been able to pull that weight, or reach that high even with the bench.
But Marrek had her bow down before she could fully process what he was doing.
He pushed the bench back in place, then returned and handed the bow to her. “Here. Keep it hidden from the others.”
“Thank you, Marrek!”
“You’d just make another eventually. But I know you love this one best. And I’m not saying you can go back to the clearing. I’ll break your bow before I let you put yourself in danger like that. But this bow is everything to you, and I respect your judgment. A
nd your skill. So practice near the house. If you see the god again, tell me and I’ll stay with you.”
Andrasta threw her arms around Marrek. “Thank you, thank you, thank you.”
Camulos waited in the forest for Andrasta, his hand clenched around the shaft of his bow. She was late. Hours late. The same fear that had dogged him every other day that he’d waited for her was nipping at his heels.
He was afraid she wouldn’t come, because he wanted to see her so damned badly. And he was afraid that she would come, because eventually the gods would come down upon their heads.
Every day when he returned to Otherworld, that bastard Cernowain was there, watching him. His eyes asked if Camulos had done it yet. When it was clear he hadn’t, Cernowain’s expression darkened. Not with anger, because the gods didn’t feel anger through their cold logic. And not with sorrow, though if Cernowain had felt emotion, Camulos had a feeling that’s what would have been on his face.
Because there was no way for this to continue, not without the death of one of them—or both. Every day, the pressure of the gods’ threat weighed upon him. If he didn’t fall in line and do what was expected, things would become far worse.
“They’ve gone to see her.” The voice that carried through the trees was masculine, and distinctly unwelcome.
Camulos turned to see Cernowain, who stood with his boar, white snowflakes glinting from the hair of both.