Truthwitch (The Witchlands, #1)(43)

On her palm was a glowing ruby. The second Threadstone.

Iseult choked and dropped the apple. She wrenched out her own Threadstone—it also shone with a red light. Safi was in trouble.

Iseult jumped to her feet. The Painstone fell from her lap. Agony crashed over her.

First it was pain, in a great downward rush. Then exhaustion that turned her body to limp straw. She staggered forward, into Gretchya’s arms. Yet before she could tumble too far, before she could fall onto her mother’s shoulder and faint, Alma swooped the necklace off the earth and draped it over Iseult’s neck.

Instant relief. Shocking, terrifying relief.

And as Iseult withdrew from her mother, Gretchya turned to Alma. “Can you sense Safi’s location?”

Alma nodded, her grip on the stone turning white-knuckled. Then she pointed southeast. “That way. But she’s moving north fast. She must be in great danger.”

“We’ll go,” Gretchya declared, moving toward the bay mare. “We have two cutlasses and the bow—”

“No.” Iseult straightened to her full height. A breeze surged into the willow, shaking branches and pulling at her cut hair. Somehow, with that burst of cool, fresh wind, Iseult finally regained control of her tongue. Of her heart. “Please, do as you had planned and travel to Saldonica.” Iseult’s fingers wrapped around the Painstone, ready to return it.

“Keep it.” Gretchya laid a hand on Iseult’s wrist. “You’ll never make it to Safiya otherwise.”

“And take Alichi,” Alma said, motioning to the gray mare. “She knows the terrain.”

“The brindle will be fine.”

“The brindle won’t be fine,” Gretchya snapped—and Iseult flinched. There was actual emotion in her mother’s voice. “Alichi is rested and knows the trail. So you will take her, the Painstone, and some money. A cutlass too.” Gretchya tugged Iseult toward the mare. “Or would you rather have a bow? You can also take the shield.”

“I’ll be fine.”

“How do I know that?” Gretchya rounded back on Iseult, her eyes hard. “I never knew if I would see you again. Do you think it was easy for me to let you go? Do you think it is easy now? I loved you too much to keep you in those walls.” Her mother drew closer, her words urgent and fast. “You will take Alichi, and you will go to Safiya’s rescue as you always do. You will leave me again because you were meant for bigger things than I can give. And as always, I will pray to the Moon Mother for your safety.”

She pushed the reins into Iseult’s left palm, but Iseult found her fingers had stopped working. Her voice too, for there was a hole, deep and exposed, where her heart had just been.

“Here.” Alma appeared beside Iseult and offered her a cutlass—the kind used to hack through grass and undergrowth—in a simple scabbard on a worn belt.

But Iseult could not reply. She was still felled by her mother’s words. Alma wound the belt around Iseult’s hips and hung the second Threadstone over Iseult’s neck. Two bright red lights throbbing over a dull pink. Then she gripped Iseult’s left bicep. “My family’s tribe is called Korelli,” Alma said. “They come to Saldonica in late autumn. Ask for them—if you ever come. I hope you do.”

Iseult didn’t answer—and she had no time to wallow in her confusion, for in moments, she was seated forward against the mare’s neck, her cutlass set back and out of the way.

“Find me again,” Gretchya said. “Please, Iseult. There is so much I haven’t told you about … everything. Find me again one day.”

“I will,” Iseult murmured. Then without another word or another glance, she dug her heels into Alichi’s sides, and she and the mare set off after Safi.

*

Iseult and Alichi found the road easily enough. As Alma had promised, Alichi knew the route and her canter was sure. Scruffs chased after her for several minutes, but he soon gave up.

Iseult’s heart clenched with each step that the hound lagged, and she couldn’t keep from waving when he finally shambled to a stop.

After a quarter hour, the silver meadows ahead shifted into moonlit marshes and sandbars. The breeze began to smell of salt and sulfur, then a wide dirt road appeared before her.

Yet rather than kick the mare into full speed, Iseult pulled the horse to a stop. She was just north of the weedy crossroads at which she’d met the silver-haired monk—a woman as different from that Bloodwitch as the Aether was from the Void.

Then the mare’s ears twisted south. Alichi sensed company. Iseult swung her gaze down the road, to where a horse and rider approached at full gallop. Iseult could see the unmistakable halo of Safi’s blond hair. She could also see the unmistakable white cloaks of four mercenary Carawens less than a quarter mile behind.

What the hell-flames had Safi gotten into? And how the hell-flames was Iseult going to get them out?

Iseult closed her eyes, gave herself three inhales to find that place she never could hang on to when her mother or Alma were around. Alichi shifted uneasily, clearly ready to get away from whatever was coming—and Iseult was inclined to agree. The horses couldn’t gallop forever, and Iseult was pretty sure that four Carawen monks would be hard to stop without some defense.

A defense like the lighthouse.

Iseult pushed the mare into a canter. She needed to be at the perfect speed to fall in with Safi—