Aamon chuffed a greeting to his brother.
The others skidded and stiffened as the full view of the site opened. Several swore. Weapons were drawn. All attention focused on one spot.
Nyx gently slipped Aamon’s head from her lap. She stood, needing to ensure there were no mistakes. She stepped in front of the tall bat and lifted her arms, like protective wings.
“This is Bashaliia,” she said.
Only a few expressions softened with her explanation.
Kanthe was the first to move closer. He raised an eyebrow and inspected her companion. Then he simply shrugged. “I have to say he’s grown a bit.”
Graylin edged closer as the ground shook. “Everyone aboard quickly.”
Nyx stopped them. “Wait. Aamon. He’s…” She stared at Graylin, not sure she had the words or the strength to tell him. “I won’t leave him here.”
Graylin circled the bat enough to see Aamon’s sprawl, the blood soaking his fur, the twist of his legs. Still on his side, Aamon saw him, too. He pawed his front legs, as if trying to run to him.
Graylin rushed forward to stop his struggle. Anguish strangled his voice. “Aamon…”
Darant came up behind him. “We’ll get him aboard. Don’t you worry.”
A blanket was used as a makeshift travois. As they hauled Aamon up and carried him toward the ship, Nyx kept close to one side, Graylin on the other.
Bashaliia followed, crabbing on his wings and hindlegs.
Darant looked skeptically back at the bat, but Nyx waved him onward. In moments, they all retreated into the dark hold. Bashaliia balked at the confinement and burst upward, clearly preferring his own wings.
Once everyone was aboard, the forges flared under the Sparrowhawk. The ship shot upward, leaving the final destruction of Dalal??a below. As if it had been waiting for them to depart, the ground shook violently, tearing apart the rest of the stone plaza. Walls broke and tumbled. Gates collapsed. Standing stones sank into the rock like foundering ships in a stormy sea.
Then the Sparrowhawk crested into the clouds, and a moment later, into bright sunshine. Nyx kept near the open stern door. She searched the skies, then saw a familiar black crescent glide into their wake and follow behind.
Satisfied, she turned to the two forms bent over the travois.
Graylin knelt next to his dying brother. Kalder sniffed, nosed, then slumped beside Aamon, pressing close against him. Nyx hung back, not sure if this was her place to intrude.
Graylin spotted her and lifted an arm, then dropped it, plainly not trusting himself to speak. Nyx edged over. She settled to her knees. They flanked Aamon’s head. The vargr’s tired eyes were closed. His breathing slowed.
“He … He was so … stupid,” Graylin said.
She glanced over, shocked, but he was smiling sadly, tears shining.
“Trying to train him.” He shook his head. “Kalder caught on quick. Aamon … he preferred to splash at trout in a stream, nose any crotch, chase after anything that bleated or squawked. He had an ongoing war with cricka’burrs in my cabin, searching nonstop for their chirping.”
She tried to imagine this stout-hearted champion being so carefree. She closed her eyes, seeking that happy heart. She placed her hand on his furry crown. She started with a hum, soft, just a summer’s warm glow. She layered in breezes through the woods, the rattle of leaves. She sang of dewy grasses, dappled streams. She let those strands sink through his bloody fur, past a pain nearly faded.
She lured him with birdsong and chirping cricka’burrs.
She felt him rise to her, casting out threads of winter woods and ice that broke branches. That’s your home, isn’t it. He answered with the warmth of a hearth, the absentminded scratch, the pride in a voice, even the scold. She saw a bed too small for all three. She tasted offal tossed from a kill, shared by all.
She understood his heart, what he was saying in the end.
This is my home, always my home.
She reached a hand and found hard fingers and a calloused palm.
Yes, here is your home.
As she held that hand, she sang deeper, drawing in one brother, then the other. Kalder whined, weaving in the raucous trail of the hunt, the wild run across sunlit meadows, the tussle of brothers. It came with the scent of frost in the morning, the call of a mate, the warmth of a den. Graylin softened next to her, maybe not hearing that song as clearly, but still sensing it. She twined them all together, letting them all share one another, to say farewell as best they could.
She knew this was why Aamon had held out through all the smoke and misery. To rejoin his pack, to savor its warmth one last time. Now that he was here …
She withdrew herself, letting these three brothers sing this most private of songs together. She waited and listened from afar. She heard Aamon’s song slowly fade, drifting farther and farther away. It passed her briefly, nudging her gently. For a moment, she saw a tall forest, full of endless trails and misty distances.
Aamon glanced back once at that threshold—then turned and raced off into that last wilderness.
She sighed her farewell, knowing he was gone.
Graylin shook next to her.
Kalder moaned softly, mournfully.
Graylin draped over Aamon, gripping Kalder, too, as if trying to hold the pack together by sheer will. But no one had that much strength.
She touched Graylin’s back. He reached an arm over to her. She drew nearer, to a man who might be her father. She let him pull her even closer. She leaned into him, until they were holding each other, comforting one another.
At long last, what a birth in the swamps had failed to bring together, sorrow finally did.
62
THREE WEEKS AFTER arriving back in the Rimewood, Graylin trotted his pony across sunbaked sands toward the thundering waterfall that hid the pirate’s lair. Kalder trotted alongside him, his tail flagging. The vargr growled at the nearby bustle of the ramshackle town nestled under the high cliffs.
The two of them had just returned from a three-day journey to the western heartwoods to bury Aamon. Graylin had picked the spot where he had first found a pair of scared, savage pups. He had thanked those cold, dark woods for lending him such a stalwart brother. After Aamon was buried, the forest had howled with the songs of the vargr. Kalder had answered it, even vanishing for a night.
Graylin stared down from his saddle at his brother. He had feared Kalder wouldn’t return, but by morning, the vargr had slunk back to his campfire, his tongue lolling, his eyes gleaming with a shine of the wild forest. Graylin would’ve understood if Kalder had kept to his forest, but when his brother returned, Graylin had shaken with relief.
Thank you, brother. I could not lose you, too.
Graylin straightened in his saddle and cantered his pony toward the gap between the waterfall and the cliff. Behind him, he had passed Kanthe and Jace. The two had been sparring with one another in the sand, one with a sword, the other with an ax. Those two made for an odd pairing, an unlikely friendship, especially as there was clearly an ongoing competition for Nyx’s attention, not that she gave either of them much satisfaction in that regard.
He glanced back.
Nyx stood at the edge of the river pool, staring up at a dark crescent circling high in the sky. The bat—Bashaliia—consumed most of her time, and he suspected a good chunk of her heart. The two young men would have a hard time competing with that.