The light of dawn beamed down upon Zyryxa as she crested the hill and gazed down into the valley. She squinted into the sun, seeing nothing left of the homestead but cinder and ash.
She shading her eyes, hoping that Lexyn never went down there. Maybe she saw the flames and fled. Perhaps she hid somewhere, fearing that returning to their camp would lead the raiders to Zyryxa. She clung to that thread of hope.
Zyryxa scoured the hilltop for signs of Lexyn’s presence. She didn’t have to search for long. Zyryxa staggered off Zyrxl, her body still weak, hunger and thirst gnawing at her. She couldn’t rest yet. Not when Lexyn could be in danger.
Sliding through the snow, Zyryxa’s bare shins burned from the cold. She crawled along the tracks, studying the indentations. She traced them to a point overlooking the valley where Dryxl had perched long enough that his prints went through several layers of accumulated snowfall and where Lexyn had dismounted.
“You arrived after the attack,” Zyryxa murmured, her eyes following the tracks down the hillside all the way to the burnt palisade. “And still you went down there. Why, Lexyn?”
Zyryxa sat in the snow, too worn out to cry. As the sun continued to rise, it became clear there were no survivors among the ashes. Lexyn either perished in the flames, was captured by the raiders, or managed to hide, unable to make her way back to their camp. Each possibility twisted a blade deep into Zyryxa’s heart.
Qoryxa’s flaming eyes! She was tired of losing loved ones. If Lexyn was gone, she had nobody left. A bard father who she couldn’t call dad anymore, a sister that acted like she despised her, and a little brother who would die in the rite if she couldn’t stop it—if they weren’t dead too.
Zyrxl nudged her, and Zyryxa pressed her head against the drake’s forehead. The tears finally came. She barely had time to wipe them away before hearing footsteps. Hoping for a miracle, she was cursed with Pelzyq. She didn’t even have the heart to be angry.
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He sighed and knelt by the tracks, his gaze following them to the burnt homestead. “Why’d you have to go down there, Little Mouse?”
“Stop calling her that! All she ever did was give you chances you didn’t deserve!”
“Aye,” his deep voice cracked with uncharacteristic softness. “Lexyn was a ray of light too bright for this world. She deserved better.” Sighing, he crashed into the snow beside Zyryxa.
Zyryxa studied him as if seeing him for the first time. There was none of his usual mockery. He looked worn out, broken in his somberness. Zyryxa realized, with profound discomfort, that Pelzyq cared about Lexyn. She couldn’t trust this change in him, but she was too sad to challenge it.
Zyryxa overlooked what must have once been a beautiful valley view. Now, it was unbearable. Lexyn had been more than a friend to Zyryxa. She remembered the night they first met, this stranger comforting her as she wept for a woman she could no longer call her mother. Lexyn had known her soul unlike anyone else left alive in this cold world, she shared her dreams of compassion, challenged her outdated beliefs, protected her from certain death, and helped mend her broken parts. And Lexyn was only here because she wanted to help Zyryxa. Zyryxa wasn’t ready to see what might have remained of her.
“We will learn what happened,” Pelzyq said, his voice slow and steady, with a mighty undertow of rage. “If she’s gone, we’ll kill whoever did this. If she’s alive, we’ll find her and then kill whoever did this.”
“She can’t be gone,” Zyryxa whispered.
Pelzyq’s eyes softened. “I know the kind of men who’d do this. Lexyn is not the type they feed to the flames.”
Zyryxa’s stomach wrenched, imagining the horrible things she might now be enduring. “Then every moment counts,” she said, stumbling to her feet.
Pelzyq tried to help her stand. She shook her arm free of him, and he stepped back as if bitten. Zyryxa felt a pang of guilt but couldn’t apologize. She wiped her snot on the top she borrowed from him and started downhill.
“Careful with my furs,” he said humorously.
“Don’t pretend you care about me,” she snapped. The hurt that flashed in his eyes made her regret her words. But Pelzyq quickly reminded her why he didn’t deserve warmth.
“I’ve got no interest in being friends with a bitch like you,” he said. “If it were you down there, I’d be marching to Riverwatch with a smile the size of the Everice on my face.”
“And I’d do the same for you.”
“Good,” he snarled. “Let’s get this over with!”