Page 153 of Keldori By Daybreak

I nodded, but I knew it was out of the question.

As for Ciarán, I would not let us both be miserable. I would not let him suffer because of the role I was required to play.

Una was ready to travel again late in the afternoon. I’d managed to sleep for a few broken hours. Hopefully I didn’t look as exhausted as Ciarán. He was impassive behind his dark cowl, and while he communicated mostly in tight bows and ‘yes, my Lady’s, I knew it wasn’t because he was trying to get under my skin, but rather because he was still trying to sort out his own feelings.

As Una ran through meadow and forest, Ciarán kept his arm around my waist to keep us balanced on her back. Whatever future we were riding towards, and as uncomfortable as riding an onchú across a magical landscape was, there was something gentle about this moment, and I tried to sit in it as comfortably as I could.

Fog rose on the horizon to occlude the darkening sky. As the sun continued to fall, a faint glow emanated from the low cloud.

“Skal?” I asked Ciarán through our mental bond.

He replied with a nervous hum.

We met the cloud at its edge, right where the terrain dropped off into a steep valley full of behemoth trees. Thick trunks ridged in frills and strange steppe-like growths made it difficult to see far into the forest despite the ambient glow of the fog that shifted between the foliage. While most trees I was familiar with had wide bases and pointed tops, these ones seemed inverted.

A familiar earthy smell wafted on the wind, and I wrinkled my nose, trying to place it.

Una came to a stop at the valley’s lip, and Ciarán slid off her back to walk ahead. Rays of dying sun caught the bits of hair that had come loose from his knot as he rifled through his pack. He pulled out a map and spread it out in the dirt while I tried to make sense of the forest in the valley below.

“That’s not good,” Ciarán said as I came up behind him to look at the map. The rough shape of Skalterra’s continent took up the page, and while I recognized the squiggle of mountains near the top, I had no idea what I was looking at.

“What’s not good?” I asked.

Ciarán sighed at the trees. “Mycastrath. Skalterra’s most deadly forest.”

“I can handle trees if I have to,” I promised, though apprehension was already turning my palms slick with sweat. I reached for the back of my head to pick at the hair fuzz at the nape of my neck. “Promise. If I keep my eyes on Una—”

“It’s not a forest of trees,” Ciarán said. “It’s fungi.”

I inspected the forest below with fresh eyes, and the lopsided, gilled silhouettes suddenly made more sense.

“Fungi,” I repeated. “And are mushroom forests common in Skalterra?”

“Thankfully, no.” Ciarán continued to inspect the map. “We can go northwest and cross into Riverstead, but there’s a marsh there, and we’ll need to find someone to ferry us through. Or we can go southeast into the Barony Deadlands.”

“‘Deadlands’ doesn’t exactly inspire confidence. What’s there?”

“Rotsbane, mostly. Some desert. You traveled through it earlier this summer, but I think you were on the Baron’s boat.” Ciarán pulled his hair down from his knot to scratch at his scalp as he thought.

We had traveled on the Baron’s boat, but I’d been posted up outside Fana’s cabin door for most of the journey on Galahad’s orders. The few moments I’d been allowed on the deck, rotsbane had paced along the river cliffs.

“Probably best to avoid rotsbane,” I suggested.

“True, but there’s the issue of getting a boat in Riverstead.” He looked up at the stars as they winked to life in the darkening sky. Their constellations were foreign to me, but Ciarán traced a finger through the air. “And I think we might be significantly closer to the Deadlands. It’s going to add a few days to the journey regardless but—”

“A few days?” I blanched. “We don’t have a few days! We might not even have this day! Our friends might already be sailing to their death!”

“And passing through the strath would be our death.” Ciarán pushed his map back into his pack. “So marsh or Deadlands? You’re in charge, my Lady. It’s your call.”

I looked back over the forest. The smell clicked into place. It reminded me of the mushrooms back home. These ones were definitely a bit bigger. But big mushrooms were just big mushrooms. As long as we didn’t try to eat them, we’d probably be fine.

“What’s wrong with Mycastrath?” I asked.

“Marsh or Deadlands. North or South.” Ciarán stepped in front of me to block my view of the valley. “There is no forward.”

“Is the fungus poisonous?” I asked.

A muscle in Ciarán’s jaw twitched. “No. Maybe. No one who has entered the strath has ever come out. I thought we were aimed more south and would miss it entirely. Passing through isn’t an option. It’s death. We have a better chance against the rotsbane.”