“Because this is a dream and I wanted to see you again,” Aster said, smile fading. Her wide-set eyes—hazel eyes that Forest and Iris had both stolen from her—were bright with piercing sadness. “It’s been so long since I looked at you and truly saw you, Iris. And I realize how much I missed. I’m sorry, sweetheart, but I see you now.”
The words cleaved Iris’s chest in two.
She was doubling over from the pain, the rawness, and she realized she was weeping, as if her tears could wash away what had happened. Because her mother was dead.
“Iris.”
A familiar voice began to melt the edges of the room. The bunker. The tendril of darkness.
“Iris, wake up.”
It was the voice of a boy who had arrived at her flat on the worst day of her life. Who had brought her abandoned coat to her, as if he were worried she would catch cold. The voice of a boy who had followed her to war and thrown paper wads at her face and set a newspaper in her hands with her article on the front page and challenged her to run up a hill to see the view beyond it.
The dream broke. Iris was curled into herself, quietly weeping.
Roman sat beside her. The moonlight was bright, and his hand was on her shoulder. She could feel the heat of his palm through her jumpsuit.
“It’s all right,” he whispered.
She covered her face, to hide her emotion. But terrible sounds slipped through her fingers, and she shuddered, trying to swallow everything down to where she had once kept it hidden in her bones. She could deal with this later. She was mortified that she was sobbing in a trench, and the Sycamores were no doubt listening to it, and they must think she was so weak and pathetic and—
Roman gently removed her helmet. He caressed her hair; it was matted and gross and she longed for a proper shower and yet his touch was comforting.
She drew a resolved breath, pressing her fingertips to her throbbing eyes. Roman’s hand drifted from her hair, his arm coming to rest around her shoulders. She sank into his side, into his warmth.
“I’m sorry,” Iris whispered. “I dreamt of my mum.”
“You have nothing to be sorry about.”
“I’m embarrassed that I—”
“No one heard you but me,” he said. “It’s not uncommon to wake up with tears in your eyes here.”
Iris raised her head, a crick pulling in her neck. Snot flowed from her nose, and she was about to reluctantly wipe it on her sleeve when a handkerchief appeared, as if from thin air. She blinked and realized Roman was handing her one.
“Of course, you would bring a handkerchief to the front lines,” she said, half a grumble.
“They didn’t include it in your ‘things to bring to war’ list, Winnow?” he quipped.
Iris blew her nose. “Shut up, Kitt.”
He only answered with a chuckle, setting the helmet back onto her head. But he remained close at her side, keeping her warm through the darkest hours before dawn.
{31}
Western Wind
That afternoon, the temperature rose to a sweltering level. Spring had at last arrived with its warm sun and lengthening days, and huge clouds were building in the sky overhead. Roman watched them brew, knowing they would soon break with a storm.
Sweat dripped down his back, tickling the nape of his neck. His jumpsuit was drenched, sticking to his skin. Shade was scarce in the trenches at this time of day, and he tried to mentally prepare himself to soon be wet and muddy, wading through ankle-deep puddles. His bag, at least, was made of oiled leather, so everything within it should be protected. Because that was all that really mattered to him. The things in his bag and Iris, sitting across from him. Very soon, they would return to Avalon Bluff, and he could finally draw a full breath. He could finally have a moment to relax.
She caught him staring at her.
He was suddenly grateful that speaking was forbidden in this part of the trenches. Or else Iris might have made a comment about the frequency of his gazes.
The wind began to blow.
It whistled over the trenches, but a few threads of air spun downward, and Roman was thankful for the coolness.
That was what he was absently thinking about—his gratitude for the wind, Iris, his future articles, Iris, how much longer until sundown, Iris—when the blasts came, rupturing the quiet, blue-skyed afternoon. The shells screeched in rapid fire, earsplitting, shaking the earth. Roman’s heart shot into his throat as Iris fell off her stool, reflexively cowering on the ground.
This was it.
This was his absolute worst nightmare coming to life.
He lunged across the distance, covering her with his body.
The mortars continued to howl and explode. One after the next after the next. The blasts seemed everlasting, and Roman clenched his eyes shut as clods of soil and splinters of wood began to rain down on him. Iris didn’t move beneath him, and he was worried that he was crushing her when she whimpered.
“It’s all right,” he said, unsure if she could hear him over the din. “Stay down, breathe.”
At last, there came a lull, but the air steamed and the earth seemed to weep.
Roman shifted his weight, easing Iris upright.
She was trembling.
Her eyes were wide and wild as she stared at him. He could lose himself in those hazel eyes, in wanting to calm the fear that blazed within her. But he had never felt so terrified or powerless himself, and he wasn’t sure if he was going to be able to get them both out safely.
Soldiers began to flow around them like a current, preparing rifles and screaming orders. Yet there was such stillness between him and Iris. As if time was stopping.
“Get your bag, Iris,” he said. Calmly, as if they had experienced this together before.
She grabbed the strap of her leather bag. It took her a moment to slip it over her back, her hands were quivering so violently.
Roman thought about her notes. All of the soldiers’ stories she had gath ered over the past few days. The horror and the pride and the pain and the sacrifice and the victories.
She had to carry those words back home. She had to live through this so she could type it out. So her words could be carried by train six hundred kilometers to the Inkridden Tribune in the glib city of Oath.
She has to survive this, Roman thought. He didn’t want to live in a world without her and her words.
He exhaled—his breath shook, like the bones in his body—and he looked up to the sky. A wall of smoke was rising, blowing on the western wind. It would soon cover them, and Roman could taste the salt and the metal and the soil in his mouth.
Fire, cover, and move.
“Are they coming?” Iris asked.
She was answered by another heavy round of artillery. She jumped again as the screaming shells exploded closer now, pounding deep into the ground. Before she could cower, Roman was pressing her upright against the wall of the trench, covering her with his body. If anything hurt her, it would have to come through him first. But his mind was racing.
Behind them was the dead man’s zone, which suddenly felt more perilous than he had ever imagined. Roman realized Dacre’s soldiers could be creeping closer to their trenches, using the cover of smoke. They could be creeping like shadows across the scorched grass, rifles in their hands, mere meters away from them.
He envisioned a battle coming to a head; he envisioned fighting. Would Iris run if he ordered her to? Should he let her out of his sight? He envisioned hiding her in a bunker, fleeing through the trenches with her, fueled by white hot fear.