Page 48 of The Incendiary

“How close are you?” I asked Shera. “I’m⁠—”

I gasped and froze when my boot smacked against something rigid, and the smell of carrion wafted over me.

“Ary?” Shera asked. “Are you all right?”

“Are you close to the ravine?” I asked her. “I think there’s something here.”

“What?” she asked nonchalantly. “That rotting dead body?”

I froze, eyes wide. “There was a dead body out here and you didn’t tell me?”

“I thought it was a deer. It smelled rotten, not fresh, so I didn’t bother taking a closer look”

“Good gods, Shera.”

“Don’t be dramatic,” she retorted cooly. “I’ll be sure to investigate next time, if I must.” There was a pause, then a faint rustling. “I see you.”

On my right, her glowing violet orbs came closer in the darkness. Between the shock of finding what I suspected was a corpse and keeping emotions suppressed while inside the fortress walls, my composure cracked at the sight of her, and silent tears fell.

She traded her stroll for a faster trot, and I knelt in the dirt to receive her. Taking her in my arms was like leaving a stuffy room and inhaling cleaner air. I tried and failed to ignore the intrusive thought, the brutal reminder that the reprieve I found holding her in my arms was as close as I could get to how it felt to rest in his.

Through our pathway, she sensed my unease, nudged my cheek with her nose, brushed her shoulder into mine and purred, as if her purr could fix everything.

“I missed you.” I scratched behind her ears the way she liked, soothed by her plush cushion of fur. “You’re well?”

“I’m well.”

I pressed a quick kiss to her forehead, which she didn’t particularly like, and laughed when she let out a low, playful snarl. I pulled back to assess her and swore she looked older. Her silver fur had thickened, and it shimmered elegantly in the moonlight.

“You’re eating well out here?”

“More than you’d like to know, I’m sure.”

True. I knew she had to hunt to eat, and I could, too, if needed, but unless someone I loved was harmed or in danger, killing didn’t come easy. I felt inclined to hold on to that part of myself.

I turned back toward the rancid-smelling mass on the forest floor. It looked to have a covering, but I couldn’t make out many details past that.

“I’ve been mostly by the ravine, but I’ve also been testing how far our connection reaches,” Shera told me.

“How far?”

She started grooming like there wasn’t a decomposing body next to us. “About thirty miles.”

“How can you tell the limits of our connection?”

She switched paws. “I can feel you. When I go too far, I can’t feel you anymore.”

I stared at her and wondered what else she could feel through our connection that I couldn’t. While I could hear her when she spoke, I never knew how close to the fortress she was.

“Well?” she asked boredly.

The moon was bright enough to guide my path, not to fully see what was before me. With a weary sigh, I stared at my palms. I was far enough out that a flash of light wouldn’t be noticed if I could manage it.

I closed my eyes and reached inside my wheel for Aesta. White flashed behind my eyelids, and when I opened them, the center of my palm glowed. I took careful breaths as I watched the air shimmer around a palm-size ball light.

I squatted down, knowing I had only seconds before I lost control of the power in my veins and the light burst and temporarily blinded both me and Shera.

By the size of the body, it was male, though he had a bloody canvas bag over his head. His throat was slit, messy and jagged. Just below his shoulder blades, a threadbare blanket was draped partly over his body, partially displaced by the elements or hungry animals. The exposed skin I could see was bloody and covered in small cuts and bruises. There was a deep knife wound in his left shoulder and bruising around his throat.