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Cyn rose to his feet. “Don’t you dare fucking leave me. You hear me? You’re going to hang on, and we’re going to get out of here.”

Zeke made a small noise that I wasn’t sure was agreement or protest, but I suspected he wasn’t sure himself.

“Eat quick. We need to move. Now.” Cyn looked around. “It’s colder now that we’re far from Moicae, but I’m not sure how close to the walls we are. It can’t be far.”

I grabbed the branches and stood. “I’ll carry these.”

Cyn looked at Zeke as he staggered to his feet. “Shift. Your magic should help hold the curse at bay longer.”

The air around Zeke shimmered and blurred like a heat haze until it returned to normal, revealing him in his alternate form.

“Let’s go,” Cyn barked, trudging ahead as I took Zeke’s hand.

The moment his clawed hand wrapped around mine, he wailed and dropped to his knees.

“Zeke!” Cyn rushed back, sliding on his knees to catch Zeke as he collapsed forward into his arms. “Zeke, wake up. Wake the fuck up.” The panic in his voice made tears spring to my eyes.

Zeke’s eyes opened, but he didn’t move.

“He’s having a vision,” Cyn said, voice softening as he peered into the milky white that consumed Zeke’s eyes, sclera and all.

We remained still for only a couple of minutes before Zeke took a gasping breath and sat up. He reaching for me and tugged me into his lap, making me drop the branches.

“What happened?” Cyn asked, remaining with his leg bent behind Zeke’s back to support him while rubbing soothing circles over one of Zeke’s hands.

Zeke held me with his other arm looped around my waist, like he needed me to anchor him just as much as Cyn. “I remember what I saw this time, but I don’t understand it,” he said, his voice raspy from screaming during his dream and again just before his vision.

I placed my hand over his, holding his arm tight around me. “What’d you see?”

“It wasn’t anything concrete. Not one clear picture. Only items and people.”

“Who?”

Zeke looked at Cyn. “Rinlora and Kairian.”

Cyn’s eyes hardened.

“Not together, though. And there was a lot of rope and a broken horn.”

“What kind of horn?”

“Shyrlivi, I think. Or an animal. The piece wasn’t big enough for me to tell. But it was black.”

Cyn chewed on his tongue piercing as he processed the information, then asked, “Was that all you saw?”

“All I remember. I really don’t feel good,” Zeke said, beads of sweat sliding down his forehead and chest. “I think the sickness is blocking parts of it, so it’s not clear.”

Cyn pushed his fingers through his hair. “We can’t sit here and dwell on it. Rinlora isn’t here, and hopefully Kairian has fucked off back to where he came from. We need to focus on getting out of here before anything else.”

Zeke had told me that sometimes his visions weren’t important, just little bits about mundane things to come—or that had already happened. Maybe he’d seen Kairian because of our hallway encounter? Same with Rinlora, since she worked with me when I met with Ezra’s mother.

But the one thing I remembered him telling me was that his visions were clear and linear. He saw everything as if it were a movie scene playing out. This was now the second vision he’d had while touching me that wasn’t clear. I couldn’t help but wonder if the reason for it had nothing to do with sickness and everything to do with my being partially human.

We wandered for a long time without speaking until we reached a deeply carved trench that cut through the trees and forest floor.

“What’s this?”

“I don’t know,” Cyn whispered, peering along the trench.