Echo North(79)
And then I am falling, spiraling down and down and down.
But I am not afraid.
Don’t let go, says my heart.
Don’t let go.
DARKNESS, LIGHT, AIR. I AM helpless and small. Someone is weeping. I’m cradled in warm arms.
I sleep and sleep.
Papa is singing to me. I like to hear the sound of his voice. I reach up tiny hands and tug on the ends of his beard.
I grow. Old enough to be told the story of my name. Old enough to wonder what it might be like to have a mother. Old enough to know my father is the kindest man who ever lived.
I remember, I remember what I shouldn’t be able to: I have lived my life twice over.
And twice over I have failed.
Somewhere outside of myself I can feel Hal’s fingers, pressing into my temples.
I open my eyes.
HAL STARES AT ME, HIS hands still tight against my head. His face is streaked with tears and my own cheeks are damp. Pain pulses through me, but it is duller than before. I take a ragged breath, then another and another. “I failed you,” I whisper. “I failed you twice. They sent me back. Hal, the Winds sent me back to try again and I failed.”
He rubs his thumb across my scarred cheek. “No you didn’t.”
“Hal, I let go.”
He shakes his head. “No you didn’t.”
And I glance down and see my left hand still curled tight around his ankle.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
HAL CRADLES ME AGAINST HIS CHEST, gently, like he’s uncertain if I want him to touch me. I’m shaking so hard I feel like I might burst apart. I try to focus on Hal, his heartbeat strong beneath my ear, his breath on my cheek, his cold fingers tangled in mine. I don’t understand what he’s done, or what I’ve done. I don’t know how to reconcile the two versions of my life, pages of a book glued together, impossible to tell what words belong to which page. But I know that it’s real. I know that it happened.
And I am not the only one who is living out this story for the second time.
I lift my head to see the Wolf Queen looming over us, angry and brittle as starlight, as ice. “If the girl-child had known everything you have made her endure twice over, she would have never come. Clever of you, Halvarad, not to tell her.”
I hate that she has the power to make me doubt him even now, to make me want to pull away. But I don’t. I hold tight to his hand, and strength pulses between us.
“You are wrong.” Hal’s eyes blaze with fury, his face is flushed and the mark on his cheek from the spot of oil seems nearly healed.
How long have we been here, holding on to one another? There seems to be a change in the wind, blowing down through the top of this woodland hall. I can feel it, I think: the cords of his enchantment falling away from him, the Queen’s hold evaporating like smoke.
“Echo would have come to save me anyway. That is who she is: she gives of herself to the people around her. Gives and gives and gives. Because at the heart of it, in her heart, there is compassion and strength, goodness and knowledge and truth. She would have come all this way, to stand up to you, to break me free from your spell—she would do it all twice, even though I don’t deserve it, not then and not now. That is what burns in Echo’s soul. That is why she’s still holding on to me now.” His voice cracks and he turns his eyes to mine, tears sliding down his face. “I was so afraid, so afraid to go back to her. But I was glad when you lit the lamp, when I woke and saw you leaning over me. I was glad, because it meant you would be free. And then I remembered—I remembered that you’d done this all before, and I couldn’t bear it. I couldn’t bear—”
“Hal, it’s over. Can’t you feel it? Your century is fulfilled. You’re free.”
He sucks in a deep, shuddering breath, and lifts his head once more to the Queen. Her hatred seethes toward us, a tangible thing. But she doesn’t take up the threads of her spell-song. She just stands there, staring at us.
“Isn’t he?” I demand. “I’ve fulfilled your terms. He’s free. We both are.”
“You fools,” spits the Wolf Queen. “I do not require an enchantment to destroy you.”
Then she shouts a harsh word at the sky and the world explodes in rock and fire.
I leap to my feet and yank Hal up after me, holding on to his hand with all the strength remaining in my body. The earth cracks in two beneath our feet and fire rages below, molten lava leaping up to consume us. I throw myself across the crack and Hal jumps with me; we run, hand in hand. Mountains explode around us, rocks and ash and fire raining down. The noise deafens me, and all sound narrows to a ringing in my ears.
We run, choked for breath. Ever the earth is rearranging itself underneath, seeking to shake us apart but we don’t let it, our fingers locked hard together. Another mountain bursts ahead, and lava rushes toward us from every direction.
“Jump!” shouts Hal, and we narrowly leap over a new crack.
The lava oozes toward us; I can smell the sulphur, taste the heat. It will make short work of us—there is no escaping this.
“Up here!” Hal cries.
A rock juts up through the river of fire and Hal scrambles to the top with me awkwardly hanging on to his heel. He leans down to grasp my arm and pulls me up after him.
All around, the world shudders and shakes. Lava licks at the base of our rock but doesn’t reach us. Even so, the heat singes my hair, sucks up the moisture in my skin. Soon there will be none left, and I will crack like the ground and fracture like the mountains. This is the full weight of the Wolf Queen’s power, her true nature. I can’t help but think that she is neither wolf nor woman but something else entirely, a creature born of fire and malice and hate.