Dom Thornwood's Arc

Chapter 3 of 14

Dom rose slowly from the glowing tracks. The wanderer did not step closer. He only watched the blue prints fade, his scarred arms loose at his sides. "It came for that book," the man said, nodding at Dom's coat. "I've been waiting for it to come for me." Dom followed him to the wood's edge. The wanderer's shelter sat against a thick trunk, branches lashed together and packed with moss, a small window cut high in the bark. Loose papers were stacked inside the doorway, weighted with stones. The wanderer ducked in and came back out with something wrapped in cloth. He unwrapped a curved blade carved from antler, pale and sharp, a small blue stone set in the hilt. "I cut this from a shed antler I found in a ring of dead grass," he said. "The grass was burned in the shape of wings. The stag dropped it where I slept. It knew I would come looking." He held the blade flat on his palm. No threat. Proof. Dom studied the man's face. The eyes were tired in the same way his own were tired. "Why do you want to cross?" he asked. The wanderer was quiet a long moment. "Three years back, I saw a man at this tree line whose shadow fell the wrong way. He smiled at me like he knew my name." Dom's hand tightened on the journal. The same man. The same smile. Two of them, marked on the same day, by the same wrong thing. He had been looking for a second rider. He had not understood until now that the second rider had been chosen for him. "Pack what you need," Dom said. "We ride together, or not at all." The wanderer nodded once and turned back to his shelter. Dom looked at the fading prints in the dirt. The plan was no longer his alone. Whatever waited on the other side had been waiting for both of them.