The Offering (The Pledge 3)

I hadn’t realized that the tent had swelled with bodies, and that we were now standing before a crowd of faces, all watching us expectantly. Behind Max I saw Claude, as well as Aron, and I saw the way Aron looked at Brook, much the same way Max looked at me. But he stayed where he was, and reminded me of one of her soldiers as he stood amid them. Beside them all was Caspar, looking far, far too much like his sister.

I smiled sadly at him, grateful he’d survived the explosion.

Outside, the sounds of battle had died down. They’d not stopped completely but had faded now. I could still hear minor skirmishes coming from beyond the tent walls—shouting mostly. But there was no more gunfire, and there were no more bombs or cannons or grenades.

“What’s happened out there?” I asked Max, who was busy surveying the interior of the tent, taking in the bodies that littered the floor—the two masked soldiers, Queen Elena, Niko.

He took a step back when his gaze landed on Xander, lying unconscious. “What’s happened in here?” He glanced curiously at Sage, who scowled back at him suspiciously.

“He needs a doctor,” she repeated. And as if on cue, a thin woman shoved her way through, wearing what could only be described as an animal pelt—a wolf or a coyote—drawn up over her head, so that her enormous green and yellow eyes peered out from beneath its upper jaw.

She said nothing but went immediately to Sage and dropped down beside her. They whispered between themselves, and I stepped closer, straining to hear what they were saying. The woman shot me a warning look, cautioning me with only those too-big eyes to stay back. And I did as she indicated.

She reached into her pocket then, and pulled out a pouch, dumping a handful of what appeared to be crushed powder into her palm. Then she proceeded to sprinkle it into Xander’s mouth.

She uncorked a small flask and chased the powder with a translucent red liquid.

Xander came up choking and coughing and spitting, but alert.

From the look on Max’s face, he was as relieved as I was. I slipped my hand into his and let our fingers intertwine. “So, is it over?” I asked. “The war?”

Max looked down at me and sighed. I could read the regret on his face. “Just this battle, Charlie.” He looked to Caspar then, and I wondered if Max knew that Caspar was Eden’s brother. “With the help of Caspar here, we were able to overtake the camp. But the war’s not over yet. Elena’s soldiers have done a lot of damage, and have covered a lot of ground. I don’t know how long it’ll be before we can stop them.” “My forces, you mean.”

Max looked at Sage again, as if considering her for the first time.

Sage didn’t seem to care what Max or anyone else had to say in the matter. She stood up and brushed the ash from her pants. “I guess it’s time for me to start spreading the word,” she announced, “so I can fix this mess my sister started.” She turned to the one soldier from Elena’s army who still remained in the tent. “You. Fetch the general.” He started to obey, pushing past those who had been his enemies just minutes earlier, but she stopped him. “And for crying out loud, take off that stupid mask.”

It took several hours to sort everything out.

And several more before we were ready to leave the encampment.

Sage was as good as her word, and by the time we were saying our farewells, she’d already sent messengers to every general under her command, recalling her forces and withdrawing them from Ludanian soil.

That had been the easy part. It was devastating to make our way back out onto the battle-ravaged land. To see the damage that had been done, and the people who’d lost their lives. All for nothing. For a queen’s selfish pride.

My fingers closed around the sapphire pendant in my pocket, hardly blemished after what it had been through. Max had returned it to me, recounting the horrors he’d witnessed when he’d watched Elena’s soldiers burn Deirdre’s village to the ground.

Brooklynn had lost too many of her soldiers as well, as had Sage. And I watched as Caspar bent down time and again to wipe mud away from the faces of children, making mental notes of those who’d died.

We all lost someone, I thought achingly, and then I was forced to tell Xander and Caspar about Eden. I had to tell them about my decision not to release Sabara’s Essence, and how Elena had executed Eden for it. It was like reliving the moment all over again.

Caspar sobbed openly, tears cutting a path down his mud- and ash-streaked face.

Xander, on the other hand, remained stoic, almost to the point of appearing heartless. If it weren’t for the way he clung to Sage—who seemed never to leave his side—I might have wondered if he’d even heard me.

But I saw the way his fingers sought hers when I told them. The way he clutched her like a lifeline, as if he might topple over if she weren’t there to hold him up.

It made me think her support went deeper than just the fact that she’d saved him from the dungeons of her sister’s palace and kept him alive while they’d been on the run.

My suspicions were confirmed when it was time to leave and I had to watch them saying good-bye to each other. I felt like a voyeur, inadvertently seeing the way she whispered softly to him, privately. And the way he glanced around, making certain they couldn’t be overheard, before responding.

I turned away and busied myself with other matters. Whatever their relationship was, I had no business prying.

“Are we ready?” I asked Aron when I saw him securing a pack on one of the horses we’d be taking until we reached the train.