“I’ve found this is the least obtrusive form.” This time, his mouth moved with the words. “Unless I am in a place where mortal men ought not to be.”
I nodded dumbly, feeling a little warmer than I should. He certainly hadn’t modeled himself an unattractive mortal.
“If I am to act more like a mortal”—he gestured up the river, insinuating we should walk again—“then you must act more like a god.”
Adjusting my bags and slipping on my shoes, I followed his lead. “I am hardly a god.”
“You will meet those who do not agree with you.”
Thinking of Father Aedan and Shila, I sighed, feeling every bit as petulant as Ristriel had claimed mortals to be. “All right, I’ll humor you. How do I act more like a god? Glow at people?”
His lip quirked. “Yes.”
I shook my head, pinching my lips to keep from smiling. The river curled south, but this time Ristriel kept moving straight ahead, utterly confident in his direction. We’d be in the woods again in half a mile.
“You must act superior.” He was quieter, watching the ground pass under his feet. “Like you are better than those around you.”
“Better than mortals?” I retrieved the cheese from my pocket and chewed and swallowed another bite. “Do you think you’re better than me?”
“You are not a true mortal.”
“But if I were?”
He didn’t answer for several paces. “I might make an exception.”
Something about the answer warmed me. It was a comfortable warmth, like curling up by a hearth with a new thread and needle. It was the most at peace I had felt since returning home. It was easy to forget myself, to forget this godling’s secrets, when he was charming. Yet I did not think he was aware that he was.
We stepped into the forest, though the trees were thinner and farther apart than they had been before, as though a fire had swept through some hundred years ago. The terrain was flatter as well, which made for easier travel.
“How much farther?” I asked.
“To Nediah?” Ristriel was about to step through a tree, then stopped himself and walked around it instead. “Two hundred forty-three miles and a third.”
My pace slowed. “That’s incredibly specific.” He didn’t have so much as a compass on him, let alone a map.
“I have watched Earth Mother turn for a long time.”
There was no mirth in the statement. It was as though he were remembering something unhappy, like the death of a loved one or the loss of a home. I wondered at it, but he closed into himself, shifting back into a horse. Though, by his size, he was more of a pony.
He didn’t appear to notice he had shifted. And for some odd reason, it felt cruel to point it out to him.
CHAPTER 11
I found some spring tubers along our way and pulled them, explaining to Ristriel that while I had some money, it was best to be self-sufficient. I showed him what edible plants I managed to find, and for the rest of the day, he pointed out any he saw as we walked, for in his Sunlit state, he wasn’t able to pick any of them. We made camp in the evening, and when night fell, he shifted into a midnight wolf and raced out into the forest, returning an hour later with a hare. I thanked him, and he watched me in wonder as I pulled out a knife to skin it.
Preparing animals for meals was something I had done often in Endwever—rabbits, squirrel, or fowl. But when I pierced my knife through the hare’s hide and drew it down, that same burning shiver from days before coursed up my spine, and I dropped both tool and catch together, my hands shaking.
It had felt like that. The birth of my star. Like someone had stabbed me with a knife and cut me open head to hip.
“You’re hurt.” The wolf stepped closer. He sniffed my hands, but the only blood on them was from my dinner.
“No.” I wiped my fingers on the wild grass and then hugged myself. “No, I’m not. I just . . . remembered something.”
Ristriel lifted his head, eyes meeting mine. “Remembering can be the worst kind of hurt.”
I rolled my lips together. Swallowed. “I think you are right.”
“I will keep you safe, Ceris.”
I smiled and, forgetting myself, reached out to scratch behind his ear as though he were any tame dog. He dropped his muzzle, silent, but leaned into my touch.
After a moment he pulled away into a band of moonlight, and suddenly there was a human hand reaching for the knife. “I can do it,” he said, every bit the man he’d been before, but this time he was solid through and through. So close, so physical, I noticed he smelled like a winter storm. Like the stillness and cold before the snow fell.