Lydia the Siren's Arc

Chapter 37 of 37

Lydia woke to the sound of buckles. Gregorio stood over the dead fire, already packed. His shield hung on his back. His spear was strapped tight. He tested the strap on his boot and turned toward the tree line without waiting for her. "You slept late," he said. "The beast flew north. I'm following the trail while it's fresh." Lydia scrambled up. "You mean to go without me." "You can't fly. You'll slow me." He started walking. "Catch up or don't." She caught up. The crystal armor let her move faster than her human body should. She fell in behind him, and he did not slow, but he did not send her back either. The trail bent uphill through thinning pines. Then the air changed. Ahead, a line of glowing spheres hung in the air, each one burning a different color. They floated in an even path up the slope, blue and gold, humming faintly. Gregorio stopped at the edge of them. "A mage's ground," he said. "We go around." "There's no around. The trail runs straight through." Lydia pointed. Broken branches and clawed earth led up between the floating lights. The beast wearing her stolen form had passed here. A man stepped out from the trees beside the path. He wore a dark coat stitched with faded stars. Half his face was smooth. The other half was ruined, laced with red scarring like cracked glass. He looked young, but his good eye was tired. "Thane," Gregorio said. His voice lost its edge. "You're alive." "Barely." Thane looked at the spheres, not at them. "They killed every mage in the spire. I built this trail to keep hunters off my ground." His hand moved, and one sphere drifted lower. "You're chasing the winged thing. It came through my lights last night. It didn't slow. Nothing living moves that fast." "Can you track it?" Gregorio asked. "I can do better." Thane finally turned to Lydia. His good eye narrowed on the crystal at her shoulder. "The forest marked you. That thing you hunt wears a shape that was yours. I felt it pass. I can hold its trail in the air for a day, no longer." Lydia stepped forward. "Then show us." Thane raised his hand. The spheres shifted. They peeled off their path one by one and floated up the slope, marking the beast's route through the trees like lamps on a road. The trail glowed clear ahead of them. Gregorio looked at the lit path, then at Lydia. For the first time he did not tell her to stay back. "Move," he said. They climbed together, following Thane's lights. The trail led north, and somewhere ahead the beast carried Lydia's stolen wings. She was closer now than she had been since the grove. But the day was short, and the lights would fade by nightfall.