Lees raises her hands above her head and calls out. “Mya Mya Mya!” Her voice rolls like a wave, a ripple of sound expanding over the trees. “You found us!”
And though relief washes over me at the sight of her, my stomach twists into knots at the sound of her voice. She is loud and she is high in the air, her voice carrying on the breeze, uninterrupted by the trees below.
It’s likely that the sound of my name has been carried far enough to reach Dora and Anki. Maybe far enough to reach Thern and Pada, too. A shiver runs over me as I realize I have no idea where those two are. Perhaps they are quite close, and will emerge from the trees at any moment.
“And look who you’ve brought with you,” Lees continues, her hand sweeping toward Morsk. “My future betrothed.” Though Lees’s words are mocking, there’s a quaver in her voice. She had expected me to be alone, but here I am with this group of four. I’m sure she’s surprised to see anyone with me at all, but to see Morsk must be particularly alarming to her. “Have you come with my brother to try to drag me back? Or has Chev sent you to say that he has changed his mind?”
These last words—so innocent and terrible—tear a hole in my heart.
I will have to tell her. I will have to be the one who tells her that her brother came here to give her whatever she wanted, as long as she came home to him and to her clan. And then I will have to tell her that he is dead.
“You need to come down,” I call, yelling to be heard over the waterfall. I stride toward her, skirting the edge of the lake, trying to get closer so our words are more private. The others follow. I almost tell them to stay under the cover of the trees, but I think better of it. It makes more sense for us all to stay together. “There are things happening. Things I need to tell you—”
“But I want you to come up here!”
“We need to go!”
I watch her as she begins to scramble down, though Noni stays right where she is. The rock is steep, but handholds and ledges are plentiful, and she makes the climb appear easy. Still, the sight of her clinging to such a sheer face makes it hard for me to breathe. She stops about halfway up from the bottom and calls out again.
“You should climb up! There’s a cavern at the top that leads to a passageway through the rock. I want to show you!”
A passageway through the rock . . . Could it lead to the other side of these cliffs—the side that faces the sea? Could it lead us closer to our camp on the beach?
“What kind of passageway? Where does it go?”
“I’m not sure—we didn’t crawl the whole way through. But light comes in from the other side.”
Climbing might be our best option, I realize, because of the need to get out of sight before one of the Bosha follows Lees’s voice to the lake. Even if we couldn’t use the passage as a path back to the beach, a cave at the top of these cliffs would hide us, at least for now.
I look at Kol. He leans on his spear, taking his weight off his wounded leg. “Could you make it up?” I ask.
“Of course,” he says, so self-assured I know he is trying to be funny. “I’ll carry the dog.”
“Stop it,” I say. “Don’t tease me right now. I need to know if you think you could climb.”
He lifts his drooping head and smiles at me. His smile is still warm, though the usual fire in his eyes has almost gone out. The corners of his lips turn down, despite the smile.
“You’re in pain,” I say.
“I can climb.” And with those three words Kol walks to the foot of the cliff and searches for the first handhold.
Pek bends down and holds a hand out to the dog, who stops howling long enough to sniff him. “I think he’s crying because he can’t get to the girls,” he says. Lifting Black Dog and laying him across his shoulders so he is propped on the pack he carries on his back, Pek follows Seeri and Morsk to the foot of the rock. Seeri starts to climb beside Kol, and Morsk starts up behind her. “I’m not sure I can handle hand-over-hand and carry the dog, too,” Pek says. “But I can try.”
“Be careful!” Seeri calls. I watch as Pek holds the dog’s feet against his chest with one arm and grabs hold of the rock with the other. He digs in a toe and takes his first step up the rock. He rises, establishing a good grip with his one hand before searching for overhangs for his feet. It’s slow going but he makes progress, and seeing that Kol is also managing, I begin to hope we will all make the top. Seeri’s feet are already off the ground the height of two men, though she still has the same distance to go above her.
Kol has managed to pull himself to a spot above my head when I begin to climb behind him. I gain on him quickly, though, and when I perch on a ledge beside him, I stop.
He is seated on a narrow sill of rock, his feet firmly on a wider ledge beneath him. His hands are pulled up into the sleeves of his tunic. “Just resting,” he says. “And trying to warm my hands.”
I can’t blame him. Wind is blowing over the rock, gusting straight down the face. A thin film of water slicks the rock from the spray of the falls, and spots in the shade are so cold it feels as if we’re climbing ice. My chilled fingers sting, and I prop myself opposite Kol. Checking my balance, positioning myself so that my legs hold my weight evenly, I slowly let go and rub my hands together.
“How are the others doing?” Kol asks. “Is Seeri to the top?”
Looking up, I am encouraged to see how far the others have gone. “She’s just about to reach Lees now,” I say. As I watch, she steadies her first knee on the shelf of rock beside the place Noni sits. Pek, even with the added challenge of carrying the dog, is not far behind. “I don’t think Pek wanted to let Morsk get too far away from him,” I say, only half-teasing. Pek is strong and clearly an experienced climber, but even the best climber would struggle to carry both a pack and a dog. “The extra motivation apparently helped. He’s made the top. Seeri’s taking the dog from him now.”
I wait, still looking up at them, willing them each to make the summit safely. When Pek pulls in his feet and disappears from view, I turn back to Kol, expecting a smile or maybe a smart comment about Morsk.
But instead, I find him slumped sideways, his head leaning against the rock, his eyelids lolling shut. “Kol!” His name flies from my lips as I reach to grab his shoulder. But before I can touch him, he slides forward. The front of his tunic grazes my outstretched hands as he slips from the ledge.
I throw off all my cautious thoughts of balance and lunge toward him, grabbing his collar, the laces threading through my fingers and winding around my hand. The hairs of the elk hide dig into the skin under my nails. His weight tugs at my clutching hands, but the Divine holds me balanced, and I hold Kol.
His head jerks up and he snaps awake. As he realizes where he is—as he comes to know that he is about to fall—he grabs the rock with both hands and pulls himself back up.
It happens so quickly, yet I feel every moment, see every detail as if time doesn’t pass at all. I notice the chill of his skin when the backs of my fingers graze his neck. I notice the shifting of his weight, leaning away and then toward me, as his foot underneath him finds a hold again.
And I notice the relief—the ripple of release that rolls from Kol to me and back again like a shared sigh. I notice the breeze that shimmers up from the ground, as if the whole island were sighing in relief along with us.
And I notice the quickness with which the relief we share is snatched away.
My fingers, numb from holding so long on to the cold stone, have slowly lost their grip, even as I stared at Kol and hoped for him to hold on. I look down into the oval surface of the lake straight below, and I see the reflection of two figures—a boy and a girl, clinging to a ledge, white wisps of clouds sweeping across the sky above them. For a long moment only the clouds move, but then my hands are sliding along the rock and I am falling.
And then the surface shatters all around us, and I lose him in the lake’s blackness.
The lake is a world of liquid cold that sinks down into my bones. My eyes open and I see shafts of sunlight stabbing through the surface, illuminating curious fish, a swirl of bubbles, and a figure floating through the water, lying on his back, arms spreading wide as he moves away from me.
Kol.
Swim, I tell myself. Swim to his side and pull him out before he drowns. But as I stretch out an arm, pushing through the long fronds of sea grass that grow up from the bottom, threatening to wrap around him like the limbs of some mysterious Spirit that lives in the lake, the water clouds with silt and debris that filters down from the surface—bits of rock and pebbles knocked free by our bodies as we fell.
I kick hard toward the place I just saw him—through the dark smear that has gobbled up the light—and one of my searching hands finds something soft, warm, and alive. My fingers trace over his face. I kick once more and I am beside him, wrapping an arm around his waist and pulling him up.
We break the surface, pushing into the cold bright air. I tread water. My eyes search the bank. I spot Seeri near the base of the cliff, hurrying down to help.
I swim as hard as I can, but I’m not Pek. Carrying extra weight slows me down. By the time I reach the shallow water at the edge of the rocky shore, Seeri is wading in. She grabs Kol by the collar and pulls him away from me. Morsk appears behind her, and before I can tell him I am fine—before I can tell him to attend to Kol—he scoops me up into his arms and carries me onto the bank.
“I’m fine,” I say, but even as I say it, I hear the croak in my own voice. I hear the rattle of cold in my own breath.
“You need to get into the sun,” he says, carrying me to a spot where a wide circle of light falls on a patch of grass beyond the rocks.
I get to my feet, icy water dripping down from my hair, running down my chest beneath my tunic. My feet are unsteady, cold water swishing inside my boots, and I sit down on the trunk of a fallen tree and pull off one boot and then the other, shaking out the water while scanning the bank for Kol and Seeri.
I find them close to the water’s edge, as if she didn’t dare move Kol far. Tugging my wet boots back onto my feet, I hurry to them. I reach Kol just as he sits up and gags, lake water pouring out of his mouth.
I drop down beside him. I want to wrap him in my arms, but before I can reach for him, he pulls away. He stretches out onto his side and his eyes flutter shut. I’m not sure he even knows that I’m here. A low moan rattles from his throat.
“Kol?” I say, pushing back the wet hair that covers his eyes, and I notice the heat in his cheek.
I need to get Kol into the sun. This is what I’m thinking as I turn to look back to the clearing where Morsk carried me. I need to get Kol warm.
Leaning forward, bringing my face against his, I let my lips press against his forehead. His fever fills them with heat. His eyes flutter open, and he says my name.
“Mya.”
“You need to stay still now. You’re sick.”
Kol’s lips twist into a lopsided smile. “I know.”
Morsk comes up behind us and scoops Kol up to carry him to the sun. “You both need to try to get warm,” he says. “I’m going to go search for an easier route up the cliff.”
Seeri follows us to the patch of sun. She looks after Morsk as I kneel down beside Kol.
“I’ll go help him,” she says, “though I’ll keep my distance. I still don’t trust him, but you deserve some privacy.”
When she walks away, I can’t help but wonder if she thinks I need to say good-bye to Kol. Does she think he is dying? He can’t be. He’s sick with an infection, but he can’t be dying.
He can’t be.
“Kol?” I whisper. He turns his face toward my voice, and for a moment I’m hopeful he will open his eyes, but they stay closed.
Hope. I feel it draining from me like mead from a cracked cup.
I find myself whispering a prayer to the Divine, which is not something I have a habit of doing. I pray only when I’m desperate, when I know I need her the most, and I know that in a way, that is worse than never praying at all. It shows I believe, but not enough to do anything about it. I know the Divine can help me, but I also know I can do most things myself. I don’t know. I suppose I don’t want to admit when I need help.
But right now, I admit it. Right now, I need the help of the Divine and anyone else who will give it. “Help me help Kol,” I whisper. “Help me get him to the top of this cliff and out of danger.”
“Was that a prayer? A prayer for me?” It’s Kol. He stirs and opens his eyes.
“It might have been,” I say. “I’m just happy you’re well enough to hear me.”
“I once prayed for help when I was being chased by a saber-tooth. The Divine sent me you.”
His voice is so weak, I lean over him to hear. His face is so close. His eyes cut into me, opening a place I’ve been trying to hold shut.
“I’m hardly the answer to a prayer,” I say.
He coughs, turns to spit out another mouthful of the lake, and then pulls in a long, deep breath. As he lets it out—part breath, part groan—he curls onto his side and his eyes fall shut again.
I slide my fingers across his forehead. Though his hair lies damp and cold against his face, his skin still burns.
I look up to see Morsk and Seeri hurrying toward us. “We found a route that looks a little easier,” Seeri says. Without speaking a word, Morsk scoops Kol from the ground and drapes him across his shoulders, not unlike the way Pek carried the dog. Kol groans, but that’s all. He must be out. If he were conscious, he would object to being carried, especially by Morsk.
The route Morsk and Seeri found is longer to the top but much less steep a climb. As I follow Morsk up, using my hands only at intervals, I think how much Pek would’ve preferred this way up with the dog. Maybe Kol could have made it up without falling.
I push that thought from my mind. I can’t look back. Only ahead.
At the top Lees runs to us, but Noni shrinks back, standing against a wall of rock that pushes even higher above our heads. She eyes Morsk. “Who are these people?” she asks me.
Certainly Pek has spoken to her since he reached the top with Black Dog. Certainly Lees has told her she can trust each of us.
Or maybe not. Maybe she told her to trust all but one.
“It’s all right,” I say. “They came to help us.” I feel Seeri and Pek beside me—I feel them flinch as I say that Noni can trust even Morsk.
And something about their reactions makes me flinch, too. I don’t want to admit it, but their doubts are making me doubt, too. Could they be right? Could it be that I’ve been foolish to trust Morsk, just because my brother did?
But if Morsk was hoping to help the Bosha find us, why would he have carried Kol to the top of this cliff?
“You can trust all of them to help you,” I say, trying to believe my own words.
“And what about them?” Noni asks. She lifts her hand to point to the other end of the lake.
I don’t need to turn my head to know who’s there. I knew they would come. As soon as Lees let out her cry, I knew.
I turn, and there they are. Dora and Anki. Standing in the very place I stood when Lees called out my name.