The Burned Land

“You do not have to come,” Kaelen said for the third time.

“I know.”

“The ruins are cursed. No one has set foot in them for twenty years.”

“I know that too.” I tightened my cloak. “That is exactly why I am going.”

We rode north at dawn, Kaelen on a black stallion and I on a gray mare. Tobias stayed behind to guard the citadel, and Nara had pressed a small silver flask into my hand before we left.

“Moon water,” she said. “For the Moonwell. Do not drink it until you have to. And Sera, whatever you see in the ruins, remember that it is only memory. It cannot hurt you.”

“What will I see?”

She only looked at me, with her black, sad eyes.

The road climbed through bare hills. The snow thinned.

After three hours, Kaelen drew rein at the top of a ridge, and I saw it below.

The valley of Dark Moon Pack lay scorched and silent.

Black walls leaned against a pale sky. A temple stood in the center, roofless, its great doors hanging off their hinges. Weeds had grown through the cracks. Not a bird sang.

“I came here once,” Kaelen said, very low. “Before. It was green. There were lanterns in every window.”

I reached across the space between us and took his gloved hand. He did not speak. He only held on tighter.

***

We left the horses at the gate and walked in on foot.

Every step made the ground whisper. I felt the borders as we crossed them, a soft humming against my skin, like a cat rubbing against my ankles. The stones knew me.

At the temple, the doors creaked. Inside, moonlight spilled through broken beams, though it was daytime.

A spiral stair led down into darkness.

“The Moonwell,” I whispered.

“Yes.”

“How do you know?”

“I do not. But I think you do.”

He was right. My feet moved before I decided. I descended the steps one by one, hand on the cold wall, and came out into a cave the size of a ballroom. In the center lay a round pool of water so clear and still it looked like glass. Silver light rose from its depths.

I knelt at the edge. The air smelled of rain.

“Touch it,” Kaelen said from behind me. “Whatever it shows you, I am here.”

I dipped my fingers into the water.

The world dropped away.

***

I stood in the temple hall, but it was whole and full of candles. Priestesses in white robes moved between pillars, singing. A woman with silver eyes knelt at the altar with a baby in her arms.

My mother.

She was young and lovely. Her hair was dark auburn, the same shade as mine, and tears ran down her cheeks. She kissed the baby’s forehead and whispered words I could not hear.

Then a bell tolled, and the doors burst open.

Wolves poured in. Men in black cloaks, with blades that gleamed red. Priestesses screamed. Candles toppled and fire raced up the curtains. My mother pressed the baby into the arms of a small, gray haired woman, Nara, and said something fierce. Nara ran.

My mother turned to face the invaders. She raised her hands. Silver light flared from her palms, and for a moment the whole hall blazed like a second sun.

A tall man stepped out of the smoke.

He was lean and handsome, with a neat beard and cold gray eyes. He wore a lord’s ring on his left hand, set with a dark blue stone. He looked at my mother the way a man looks at a locked door.

“Elara,” he said. “The pack gates are open. The war is lost. Give me the blood, and I will spare the child.”

“You will never touch her,” my mother said.

“Then I will take it from you.”

His blade came down.

I screamed. The vision shattered. I was on my knees at the edge of the pool, water streaming down my wrists, with Kaelen’s arms tight around me.

“Sera. Sera, breathe.”

“He killed her,” I gasped. “My mother. A man with a blue ring. He opened the gates. He was one of yours, he wore the king’s colors under his cloak.”

Kaelen went rigid. “A ring?”

“A lord’s ring. Dark blue stone. Silver wolf head.”

“That is the Ashford crest.”

I stared at him. The cave seemed to tilt. “Ashford. Like Lila Ashford.”

“Lord Marek Ashford.” His voice was flat. “Her father.

He died ten years ago at the battle of Ironford. I attended the funeral. He was a hero.”

“He was a liar,” I said. “He was alive in my mother’s temple twenty years ago, and he opened the gate himself.”

“Then why would he…” Kaelen stopped. I watched the pieces click behind his eyes. “He put Lila in your family.

After she was born, after he faked his own death. He wanted her near you.”

“Near my blood.”

“Near the end of Dark Moon.” Kaelen’s hands closed hard on my shoulders. “This was never a family cruelty.

It was a plan.”

My teeth were chattering. “Then Lila never was sick.

She was raised for this.”

“Yes.”

“And my father…”

“Knew more than he told us.”

The cave seemed very cold. Something moved at the edge of my sight, a flicker of gray on the stairs. Kaelen turned, and in a heartbeat his sword was out.

Nothing was there. Only a wet footprint on the bottom stone, still fresh.

I slowly stood, my legs trembling. Beside the pool, half hidden behind a pillar, I saw a thin square of paper pinned beneath a stone. I lifted it and read the single line scrawled across it.

Welcome home, little priestess. Do bring the prince.

Above us, light flashed across the ceiling. A shadow moved along the crumbled wall of the temple, tall and thin, with a gray coat and a lord’s neat beard. He lifted one gloved hand to us, almost politely, and then he was gone.