Even if her sister couldn't hear them, Tova should, but he stood straight and unflinching at Ashyn's side.
Daigo and Moria skirted a dead tree. As they rounded the roots, the figures of Ashyn and Tova disappeared behind it. Then Moria stepped out the other side and--
They were gone.
Moria shoved through the dense woods, squinting into the darkness until Daigo stopped and nearly tripped her again. He glanced over his shoulder, not at her, but behind them. Then he backtracked. Moria hurried after him. This time when he stopped, she halted in time. He looked up at her and made a noise deep in his throat.
They must have passed the spot.
"Where are they?" she said, her voice echoing.
Daigo grunted and started into the forest. When Moria tried to follow, he growled softly, telling her to stay. As soon as she stopped moving, the silence prickled at the back of her neck, as if someone was creeping up behind her. She spun and saw nothing.
She strode to the nearest tree, rammed her dagger into her belt, and grabbed the bottom limb. She swung up from branch to branch, not slowing until there weren't any more that would hold her weight. Then she stretched out and peered down to see . . .
Nothing. She saw nothing.
Moria's boots squelched in mud. She could not see well in the ink-gray night, but she could make out obstacles before she smacked into and stumbled over them. There were no trees in this barren strip. There were rocks, though, and the gurgle of water, so faint it was as if a tiny underground spring was trying to hide beneath the stagnant, fetid water.
She walked to a large rock. There was a smaller one attached, like a baby on his mother's back.
"We've been here before," she said, casting an accusing glare at Daigo. "I thought you were leading us out."
He harrumphed, as if to say, What do you expect? I'm not a tracking hound.
They needed to find out what had happened to Ashyn. Moria had no idea what she'd seen--a hallucination, a phantasm? It didn't matter. What was important was that it had not been Ashyn. She had to get back to the village to find her sister . . . but they were lost. Hopelessly lost.
Moria collapsed on the rock. Daigo put his front paws on her knee, the dampness of them seeping through her breeches. He rose until he was looking her in the eye, his whiskers tickling her cheeks.
They said the Wildcats of the Immortals possessed the spirits of ancient warriors. Moria had never given that much thought. She tried not to, if she was being honest. It seemed demeaning to be trapped in the body of a beast and bonded to a mortal girl.
"It doesn't matter, does it?" she whispered. "Even if you were a great warrior, there's nothing here for either of us to fight."
He sighed, his breath warming her face. Then he backed off her and looked around. As he did, his gaze stopped on something behind her. She turned to see a dagger stuck in the shallow streambed, point up.
Moria took off her boots, unwrapped her feet, and stuffed the silk into her boots. Then she rolled up her breeches and stepped into the stream. It was like breaking through winter's ice on the cistern, and she bit back a gasp as she walked.
The blade was buried up to the collar. When she crouched and reached into the water, her fingers brushed something oddly soft. Then she felt the ridges of the carved handle. She yanked. The dagger flew up . . . with a hand wrapped around the haft.
Moria fell, splashing as she landed on her backside, icy water shocking her again. A man's hand still clutched the dagger's haft. An arm was attached to the hand. A dark-skinned arm covered in tattoos. When she made out eyes in the inking, her breath jammed in her chest. She was sure of what she was looking at--the nine-tailed fox. Then the design became clear. A dog's head. The Inugami clan.
It was Orbec. A substandard warrior from an elite family. He'd been sent to Edgewood to toughen up, and he'd stayed there by choice. It was easier in Edgewood, where his tattoos meant something and where no one expected him to be more than average. He was above average in one skill, though. Throwing a dagger. He'd been the one who'd taught Moria.
Moria stood there, looking at his body. I let the commander send him into these woods. I got them all killed--everyone in my village. I was supposed to protect them, and I was underground, entertaining a convict, throwing daggers at a wall.
That was the fact she'd been struggling to ignore. The shadow stalkers had come and the Keeper had not been there to stop them. That her village--her father--died because she wasn't there.
I failed.
Her legs gave way and she fell to the ground, shaking and gasping for breath. Daigo yowled and rubbed against her, but she barely noticed. She tried to cry, to let it out, but no sound would come. She just kept shaking.
When something struck her hand, she looked to see Orbec's dagger on the ground. It was an ancestral blade, with the stylized dogs engraved along the handle. Daigo bent and nudged it toward her.
"I don't want--"
He snarled, cutting her off, then glowered at her, telling her to stop being dramatic. Gather her wits. Take action.
He nudged the blade toward her again.