The Orphan Queen (The Orphan Queen #1)(61)

In the stables, I liberated a gelding horse from his stall, along with a sack of oats. There was still enough grass on the ground to supplement his feed.

I adjusted my cap and put on the small Indigo Army jacket I’d just stolen, and on my way out of the keep, I told the gate guard that I was a new messenger; I showed him a sealed paper I’d nicked from the map room. Without comment, the guard waved me on.

Dawn was still hours away, but the wraithland’s glow shed plenty of light to see by. The chestnut horse picked his way down the road, keeping close to the old railroad tracks that wound through the mountains.

The first day was much like my journey to West Pass Watch, but much faster. I managed to spear a rabbit for dinner, but when I began skinning it, I realized how big and heavy it was—much larger than normal rabbits. Swirls of dark, dark blue crawled up from its hindquarters; I’d thought they were shadows before.

With an acid tingle in the back of my throat, I heaved the wraith rabbit back into the woods and ate some of my rations instead.

The second day, I entered the wraithland.

Josh’s warning had been good; I knew the moment I stepped across the border.

Cold prickled over my face, like I’d stepped into a fog bank. The air was wetter, heavier, and the sun dimmed as though it had receded a great distance. Gray tinged the sky.

“It’s as though half the color has seeped out of the world,” I muttered to my horse. His ears flickered back, but the muscles in his neck remained taut as he stared into shadows so deep they looked like night.

I petted him and murmured reassurances, but he didn’t acknowledge me.

Fingers of white mist reached through the waist-high grass, rustling the browning blades until they sounded like voices. “Who’s watching?” it sounded like. “Someone’s watching.”

I twisted around, horse tack squeaking as I scanned the forest around me and the base of the mountains behind me. There was nothing unusual, though; just that vague, growing tension and sensation of being followed.

As the sun arced across the sky, West Pass Watch became invisible among the russet heights of the mountains. I was truly alone now.

My heart felt like it fluttered in my chest. “Do you have a name, horse?” I reached forward and scratched his ears. “Not that you can tell me, I suppose. What about Ferguson?”

He shook his head and grunted.

Good enough. “Ferguson it is.”

It was stupid, but having a name for the horse made me feel a little better. A little.

Hyperaware of every gust and gasp of wind, I pushed deeper into the wraithland until nightfall. With Ferguson tied to a wilting tree, enough slack on his lead so he could chew on the yellowing grass, I climbed into the cradle of an oak tree’s branches.

Deep slashes marred the trunk and branches, evidence of huge predators nearby. The wooden ridges pressed against my spine as I settled in, then forced down a small meal of deer jerky and water. I didn’t feel safe exactly, but with a hundred golden leaves veiling me, I hoped I’d get a little rest.

Acrid-stinking wind cut through the forest. Something—a leaf?—caressed my cheek with a dry scrape. I jumped and scrubbed my palms over my face, but whatever had touched me was gone, and the area was too dark to see anything.

I bit back a panicked meep and dug through my bag for Black Knife’s spare mask. When the cool silk covered my head and the eye slit was faced forward, I tried to breathe more deeply to slow my racing heart.

“There’s nothing out there,” I whispered.

The only sound was the wind in my ears and the soft thumps of my horse moving below.

I lit a candle stub and pulled out my notebook, pen, and a flat bottle of ink that I’d found would sit in my packs without getting in the way. By the flickering candlelight, I wrote about my first day in the wraithland, recording detailed notes about the smell and wind and ailing vegetation.

It’s watching me, I wrote, and closed my notebook.

Trees groaned all night in the wind. Every time I closed my eyes, something crashed in the woods. Part of me wanted to find it and face it.

Instead, I pulled my blanket higher and my mask lower, trying to ignore Ferguson’s grunts and sighs. In the fits of sleep, my body grew stiff and tense, overwhelmed with this unfamiliar place and unfamiliar sounds. The night had never seemed so long.

Sometime before dawn, a shout tore from the north. A human shout.

I jerked awake and peered through the darkness.

“The trees told me there’s someone here.” Brush crackled and the man stomped through the forest.

A jumble of other voices replied, too many to distinguish their words or number. If they spotted me—or my horse—I was in trouble.

Torchlight broke through the trees. The light floated higher than any normal person would hold it. When shapes began to appear between the trunks, it was clear:

They were glowmen.





TWENTY-TWO


I MOVED AS quietly as possible, shimmying down the side of the tree opposite from where the glowmen were approaching. My belongings were already in my bag, and I hadn’t unsaddled Ferguson the whole way. If I could get down, tighten the girth, and adjust the bridle without being spotted . . .

My toes breezed over the ground. I felt around for a heartbeat to make sure I didn’t do something stupid like step on a twig and alert the whole wraithland to my presence. But my footing was good, and I lowered myself from the tree and crept around the trunk.