Page 23 of Hearts Lost

ALOSERIN

WE CAN’T DO NOTHING

“Well, we can’t just do nothing,” Ithronel says.

She’s given me a full tour of the area she’s set up in the field of undulating blue grass, explained what’s edible and what’s probably not, and very politely given me back my weapons. Even the one she was wearing.

And I’m trying very hard not to like this woman.

Respect, sure. I can respect a woman who found herself in a strange and terrifying place with an unconscious man from the kingdom she’s been raised to hate and fear and somehow did not panic. I can respect a woman who not only survived but built a little shelter and even managed to find something edible in this oppressively hot hellscape. And, naturally, I respect the fact that she didn’t slit my throat despite having ample opportunity to do so.

But my insides did a strange little fluttering flop when I saw her cloak on the grass beneath the shelter she’d constructed, when I realized she must have been sleeping next to me for the five days she’d said I’d been unconscious. And that’s the kind of liking I can’t afford. Because this woman, competent as she clearly is, was sent by King Grathgore. And Grathgore doesn’t seem the type to do something on a whim. No, she has a reason to be in the Kingdom of the Fall, and that reason isn’t to explore the void.

But I’m still no closer to uncovering what that reason actually is. My men have been watching her closely ever since she arrived, of course, and they’ve faithfully reported that she’s done absolutely nothing. Well, aside from wandering into the officers’ mess below her guest room every single night, which is kind of depressing. It’s also why I’d been avoiding the officers’ mess. I didn’t want to have another late-night cup of bourbon-spiked tea with the woman who was probably sent here as a spy, at the very least, or perhaps as some sort of flirty, attractive weapon.

And yet here I am, trapped in the damned void with the woman who was sent here by the king who’d tried to destroy our entire kingdom. And she’s staring at me like she’s expecting some sort of response to her statement. I cross my arms over my chest and frown at her as a trickle of sweat slides down the back of my neck. Voids, the heat here is like nothing I’ve ever experienced.

“What are you suggesting?” I ask.

Ithronel throws her hands in the air and makes a noise like she’s extinguishing a candle. “You’re the one whose parents are void experts! You tell me! What do we do next? How do we get out of here?”

I pinch the bridge of my nose and sigh. Void experts. Yes, that about sums up my parents’ bizarre obsession with this place, the fact that their gloomy estate is filled with disturbing artifacts and sketches of a place they’d never seen. A place they never wanted to see. I tilt my head up and stare at the strange lilac glow above us. It feels wrong in a way that makes the hair on the back of my neck prickle in a warning.

“How in the stars did we end up here?” I mutter.

I’m not expecting an answer, but for a moment Ithronel looks like she’s about to speak. Then her expression shifts and she turns away. A low current of alarm threads through my chest; some deep instinct whispers that she knows something. She saw something.

I clear my throat and try to look friendly. Approachable.

“What do you remember?” I ask.

“Something… like an explosion,” she replies, with a frown. “White light inside the teleportation hub. Then, something like black smoke.”

I’m nodding, remembering the inky black tendrils that blossomed from the ground and swallowed the figures inside the teleportation hub. My gut twists. Does this mean Orryen is gone? Does this mean everyone who’d been standing inside those stones is gone? Stars, the thought makes me feel sick.

“I saw that too,” I say.

“What do you think it was?” she asks.

Ithronel’s threading her fingers together over her chest, and that low pulse of alarm beats in the back of my mind once more. She looks nervous. She’s acting like she knows something she’s not saying.

Or not. Or maybe she just doesn’t want to think about the trauma that landed her in the void with a man she doesn’t know, a man who was unconscious for five days, and maybe I’m just being an asshole. The stars know no one’s ever accused me of being too trusting. One of the hazards of my job, I suppose.

“I’ve no idea,” I finally answer. “Have you found anyone else? Any other, uh, sign of anyone else?”

She shakes her head. “No, but I haven’t explored much. After I had such a hard time getting back from the river, I was afraid to go too far. I didn’t want to lose—”

Her voice tightens. You, I think. She was about to say she didn’t want to lose me. Something inside of me feels uncomfortably warm and tight. I clear my throat and turn around, trying to ignore it.

“What’s over there?” I ask, pointing at the low, rolling hills.

Ithronel frowns. “It’s like… a beach,” she answers.

Fear twists inside my chest.

“The black shores of the void,” I mutter.

She nods. Her lips are pressed into a thin, grim line. I glance from the low, rolling hills to the twisted trees and back. I know there’s a void beast under the trees. I also know no one has ever gotten any further than the black shores of the void. No one who’s returned, at least.