The Offering (16 page)

But Brooklynn didn't look nearly as certain, and she backed away, disentangling herself from Eden, her hands slowly lifting. “Charlie,” she intoned warningly. “That's not a toy.”

“I know exactly what it is and how to use it,” I told her, and I watched as recognition registered in her expression. I wondered if it was something in my eye, or the fact that I'd armed it myself and I held it straight and true. “Looks like I won't be needing that lesson after all.” I took in the scratches on her cheek, and the swelling that was already starting along her jaw.

I glanced at Eden, too. The skin around her left eye was inflamed and pink, and would probably be a deep shade of purple by morning. My fear now was that it would swell, making it hard for her to see while she drove us, and that worry pricked my ire toward the both of them.

“Get up!” I insisted, waving the point of the arrow from one to the other irritably. “You've had your fun. Now get up and clean this mess. I'm tired and we don't have time to waste on your childishness. The two of you
will
get along, or so help me . . .” If stomping my foot would have punctuated my words, I would have done so. But I worried that I would sound childish, so I stopped myself in time.

“Or what? You'll . . . shoot us?” Brook finished, daring to mock me. “Fine. You're right. We shouldn't be fighting. But let's be honest. You're not shooting anyone, Charlie . . . or Layla . . . or whoever you are. Put that thing away. We'll be
good.” She glanced at her cohort in this fiasco and held out her hand in truce. “Won't we, Eden?”

Eden glared back at her but then turned to me. I must've looked serious, because she sighed when she took Brooklynn's hand. From where I stood she seemed to squeeze a little too hard, but I was past caring now. All that mattered to me was that the fight was over.

I uncocked the string and lowered the crossbow, feeling moderately satisfied that they wouldn't attack each other again. At least not now.

It took them nearly an hour to undo the mess they'd caused in less than five minutes, and another two hours of driving in terse silence before anyone bothered to speak again.

Brook had settled down in back, on one of the mats where we'd be sleeping. She sullenly stayed as far from Eden as she could, despite the “truce” she'd called for my benefit. I suspected they were both nursing some pretty tender injuries that neither of them would ever admit to, both too stubborn to confess that the other might have bested them.

When I thought Brooklynn had finally dozed off, I dared to ask the one question I couldn't stop thinking about, despite knowing that asking it would probably reopen painful wounds. “Do you ever miss him?” I asked as quietly as I could, and hoped Eden could hear me above the engine.

She was quiet too for a moment, but then she glanced at me in the rearview mirror. “Don't you miss Angelina?” she asked, before turning her attention back to the ramshackle road.

It was all the answer I needed.

And suddenly I understood why Eden had hit Brook. She wasn't mad at Brooklynn for asking all those questions. She was mad at herself . . .

For leaving her little brother all those years ago.

I wasn't sure when I'd actually fallen asleep, or even when I'd lain down on one of the sleeping mats, but the confusion I felt upon waking lasted only a few moments before I rolled over and found myself staring directly into Brooklynn's face. Her mouth was wide, and her breaths were long and deep. She was snoring, which was likely what had awakened me in the first place.

When I turned away from her, I realized that I'd somehow managed to sandwich myself between her and one of the VAN walls. The space I was lying in, like the bedroll wrapped around me, was narrow and cramped. And the floor beneath the lightweight mat was firm, making my back throb.

Trying not to disturb Brook, who continued to snore in complete ignorance of the less-than-comfortable sleeping arrangements, I wriggled out of the makeshift bed and went in search of Eden. Like the morning before, she appeared to have abandoned us. Something she seemed to be skilled at, I was learning.

But I knew she hadn't gone far. The VAN door was ajar, and even from inside the vehicle, I could smell the smoky scent of a campfire.

“Coffee?” I heard her ask as I saw her reaching for the pot before I'd descended the steps across from the driver's seat.

I nodded and grabbed one of the tin mugs she'd already set out for each of us. “Should we be worried about the fire? That someone might notice us here?” I asked as she filled my mug all the way to the top, and when I took my first sip, I recognized the flavor. It was the same caustic blend Caspar had shared with us the day before, only this time my taste buds rejoiced.

Eden just shook her head before setting the pot near the edge of the flames. “Not anyone we should be concerned about. I veered far enough from the main thoroughfare to give us a chance to rest.”

“Did you? Rest, I mean?” I looked her over, noting the fact that I hadn't seen a mat for her in the back of the VAN, where Brook and I had slept.

I hadn't been wrong, either, when I'd guessed that her eye would be swollen this morning, but it wasn't as bad as I'd thought it might be. It was bruised and engorged, but she could still open it, which meant she could still see through it. A favorable attribute in someone operating your vehicle, I thought wryly.

“I slept out here,” she answered. “Nice to listen to the waves.”

“Waves . . .” I started to ask but then glanced around. I didn't know what Eden meant at first, but then I heard it.

It was far-off, the whooshing sound that came and went, first long and insistent, then fading away, only to return again . . . unrelenting.

Something from Sabara's memory—not mine—pricked at me, something I hadn't noticed before. It was the air. It was
crisp, which wasn't such a strange thing for the time of year, but the breeze carried a tang that stung my nose.

The sea
, Sabara whispered, waking within me. There was something hopeful in her spirit.

“The sea,” I whispered aloud, tasting the words, and the salt in the air, on my tongue.

Eden had no idea it was a dead queen with whom I conversed, and she answered my musing. “Just beyond the bluff. We've reached the southwest tip of Ludania, and will start moving east toward Astonia. We took only a slight detour—couple of hours at the most. If we're lucky, we'll be able to slip over the border without being noticed.”

I looked where Eden had indicated, but for as far as I could see, all I could make out was pale sand and reedy grass that stretched all the way to the rocky walls ahead of us. Yet, still I heard it.

Whoosh . . . whoosh . . . whoosh
 . . .

Never-ending.

“Do we have time? Can I go see it?”

Eden's brow lowered, the purple streaks of her hair caught in the morning sun and making her look more severe than ever. “The sea?” she probed. “Have you never . . .” I had once, but she didn't finish her sentence, just nodded resolutely and set her mug on one of the flat-sided rocks that surrounded the fire. “I'll come with you. To be certain you're safe.”

“Should we wake Brook?” I asked, suddenly eager to see what had managed to incite Sabara. She was anticipating some wondrous thing that I now anticipated too.

Waving off the suggestion of waking Brooklynn, Eden
started walking in the direction of the whooshing sound, her boots cutting a path through the sticklike grass. The sound grew louder and more insistent, and seemed to be coming from all around us as we climbed higher rather than lower.

When we reached the edge of the plain, where we had to mount several rocky steps onto the bluff, the view before me took on a dramatic transformation.

Suddenly it wasn't just grass and sand, or even rocky outcroppings, in our line of sight. It was water. For as far as I could see, there was water. Not stagnant like that of a pond or a lake. And not meandering, cutting a path through the land, the way a river did. Not even like the sliver of a sea I'd seen once before, an ice-crusted inlet we'd had to cross by ferry on our way to the summit in Vannova.

No, this water was undulating. It rolled and swelled and rippled like a living, breathing entity that kissed the horizon and disappeared into eternity.

Birds with feathers that ranged from the color of downy snow to the deep sooty gray of smoke screeched overhead, circling and dipping as they rode the wind that seemed as ceaseless as the surging waves. My hair whipped and stung my cheeks, making them tingle almost us much as my impatience.

“This way,” Eden insisted, leading me away from where we stood overlooking the water from too high up at the cliff's edge. If we miscalculated our steps from here, the drop to the jagged rocks awaiting us below would be perilous. Farther along the bluff Eden had spotted a way down where the water met the sand. “Watch your step,” she cautioned
again and again, the way I would if I were leading Angelina.

The route we took was not nearly as hazardous as I'd first thought, and as we moved, I realized the grass that had tried to grow here had been trampled, as if the route had been used recurrently. A path to the sea.

The smell grew harsher, and Sabara's memories told me that this was the flavor of sea salt, permeating everything, not just the water but the wind and sand as well. Even my lips when I licked them tasted of salt.

I was breathless when we reached the bottom, and my feet dropped from the firm rocks of the path into the soft sand, sinking almost to my ankles. Above us the jagged cliffs loomed, watching us with their rigid intensity.

I shot Eden a questioning glance, begging for permission to chase after the shifting waves. I was mesmerized by them. I watched with enthusiastic eyes as they rolled in, tumbling over themselves and lapping the shore. They smoothed the sand, compacting it and making it glisten. And then they were sucked away once more, waning into the next one that approached.

Inside me I overheard Sabara's musings.
You'll never know anything as powerful as the sea, Charlaina. Not even I have that kind of strength. It is truly undying.

I knew she was right. The sea—this great and captivating sea—had been here long before Sabara had taken her first breath, and it would be here still, long after her Essence had sputtered out, dying at long, long last.

And me, I wanted to feel it beneath my feet, between my toes. I wanted it lapping at my shins and splashing at my knees.

Eden showed me a wry smile, an affirmation of my greatest desires, and I set loose, shucking my shoes from my feet as I raced toward the water. The sand slowed my steps, but I persisted, my gales of laughter getting lost on the chilly wind that slapped at my cheeks.

I stepped gingerly onto the wet sand, pulling the hems of my pants up so they passed my knees as I hesitantly approached the surf. The froth-tipped waves swept toward me, and I jumped back, afraid of what they might do. How they might feel.

Go. Go, Charlaina, go
, Sabara urged, a siren's chant.

And I went, doing as she decreed.

My toes slipped beneath first, the frigid waters making me gasp. And then delight sang through my veins as I answered the summons of the sea. When I felt the pulsating ocean around my ankles, I turned back to see Eden, her arms crossed in front of her. She was the eternal sentinel.

I waved, hoping to crack her stoic expression. But she remained straight-faced and unflinching, until the water lured my attention once more by crashing against my knees.

I giggled with delight. Then I splashed the ocean whenever it splashed me. I dashed toward the retreating waves as they withdrew back into the sea, and ran again when they came racing toward me. They were faster, always faster than I was, and invariably I was caught by them, until it didn't matter that I'd tried to protect my clothing, to keep it dry. I was wet, from my hair to my toes.

When I heard Brooklynn's voice calling to us from above the constant wind and the ceaseless whooshing of the waves,
I ran across the sand to where she navigated down the path to the shore, where Eden stood watch.

“Brook! Come on,” I cried, not glancing at Eden now, knowing she wouldn't give up her post even if I invited her. “It's magnificent, the sea. You have to try it!”

Brook looked at me dubiously, and then at the surf beyond. I used the tips of my fingers to pry salty strands of hair from my mouth, and used the backs of my hands to wipe sand from both my cheeks.

“I don't know,” she said mistrustfully as I dragged her toward the awaiting water. “It doesn't look safe. In fact, it looks positively unsafe, if you ask me.”

“Well, it isn't,” I assured her. “Now, take your boots off. Trust me.”

It wasn't my speech that convinced her. I knew because I'd never been capable of such a feat. It was her curiosity that won in the end, and by the time I'd let go of her hand and was jumping into the next incoming wave, Brooklynn had shed her boots and was right behind me.