The Beauty of Darkness (The Remnant Chronicles 3)

Fright, thick as night.

Fervor, Jezelia, fervor, a hot whisper in my ear.

And then another voice, soft and quiet, as thin as a flutter of wind.

There.

“Lia?” Kaden said, touching my arm.

I jumped, the haze vanishing. Everyone stared at me, but all I could think was, pachegos. My chair squealed back behind me, and I raced to the side table where the piles of maps lay. “Move the food!” I yelled as I carried the armful of maps to the table and spread them out.

“What the devil?”

“Did you see something?”

“Someone tell me what she’s doing.”

I shuffled through the maps until I found the one I wanted.

There.

“A northern route,” I said. “This is the way he’s coming.”

A wave of arguments rose. “We already discounted a northern route. He could get caught in a late snowfall.”

“Farther north,” I said. “By way of Infernaterr. It’s the perfect route. It’s flat, and winter never reaches there.”

By now both Kaden and Rafe were looking over my shoulder at the map too.

Kaden stepped back and shook his head. “No, Lia. Not there. He would never come that way. You know the clans. Even Griz and Finch. Too many in his army fear the superstitions of the wastelands.”

I leveled my gaze at Kaden. “That’s the point. He is using that fear.”

He looked at me, still not understanding.

“Fervor, Kaden. He no longer has me. He’ll create his own. A different kind of fervor to push them forward.”

The dawning rolled through his eyes—and then the worry. How much sooner would they reach here than we thought?

“I’ve heard them,” I said. “The cries of the young soldiers. The howls of the pachegos. The Komizar uses their fear to rally them. And what better way than the wastelands of Infernaterr to move his army swiftly across the continent?”

I looked back at the map, eyeing an expanse between Infernaterr and Morrighan. More words sounded in my head. Rafe’s words, chiding me as my sword blocked his.

Attack! Don’t wait for me to wear you down!

“What is this?” I asked, pointing to what looked like a V-shaped line of peaks at the end of Infernaterr.

Captain Reunaud stepped closer to see what I pointed at. “Sentinel Valley. Sometimes it’s called Last Valley.” He explained it was believed to be the last valley Morrighan led the Remnant through before they reached their new beginning. He had traveled through it a few times in convoys headed to Candora.

Keep on the move! Let surprise be your ally!

“Why is it called Sentinel Valley?” I asked.

“Ruins,” he answered. “They sit atop the high hills that hem in the valley as if they’re watching you. Light can play tricks there. It’s an eerie trail, and when the wind whistles through the ruins, soldiers say it is the Ancients calling to one another.”

I asked him specifics about the terrain, the height of the p

eaks, the length of the valley, and the multiple canyons that lay beyond the peaks.