“Why don’t we ask the Hawks to just fly us up?” I asked Benedict for what felt like the millionth time.
“What if we miss the jinn? If we’re with the Hawks we’re not going to be able to see properly,” he replied reasonably.
I glanced over at Zerus to see if he was listening in to our conversation, but he seemed more preoccupied with his hunting knife, sharpening it with a stone. The scene didn’t exactly make me feel comforted.
“Don’t you think he’s a bit of a liability, like he might snap at any moment?” I whispered.
Benedict contemplated the sentry for a few moments, and then shook his head.
“No. Not really—and what if he does? We’ve got Aisha, Horatio and Ridan here. They’ll be able to calm him. I don’t think he’s out to harm us anyway, he’s not like Jenus or anything.”
I looked up to the tops of the trees, searching for Field, Fly and Sky. They hadn’t been down for a while, not since Field and Fly had returned to us with news of the failed battle. It looked like all hope was resting on us bringing the jinn out of hiding, wherever they were, but we’d seen no evidence so far that the forest was populated by anything other than goblins and a loopy sentry.
“Get some rest, Julian,” Benedict yawned at me. Yelena had already fallen asleep in front of the fire, hogging the best spot, of course.
“You get some sleep,” I replied crossly. “I’ll keep watch.”
Aisha, Horatio and Ridan had already started to doze off, claiming that we were safe within their barriers, but I wasn’t so sure. One thing I’d learned about Nevertide was that you couldn’t be too careful—especially in the woods.
“Fine,” he replied lazily, “you keep watch. Wake me up in a couple of hours and I’ll take over.”
He curled up in his GASP-issue sleeping bag and almost immediately started snoring.
‘Wake me in a couple of hours?’ Yeah right. Once Benedict was out, he was out. It would be like trying to wake the dead.
The firelight was dying out. It was just Zerus and me left awake, and it made me uncomfortable. Every so often I would catch the sentry studying me intently, then he’d go back to sharpening his blade—a repetitive scrape of stone against steel that was starting to irritate the heck out of me.
“Will you stop that?” I asked eventually.
“Does it bother you?” he asked, surprised.
“Yes, it bothers me,” I replied, wondering if his dumbfounded expression was a trick or if he was genuinely a bit mad.
“I’m sorry, human creature,” he replied awkwardly. “It’s been a while since I was around anyone. Even back at the castle, I wasn’t that keen on companionship—I like to keep to myself, though I realize it can make me…off-putting to others.”
“It’s fine,” I grumbled, feeling a bit foolish.
He shrugged, putting the hunting knife away. He lay back, his hands crossed behind his head, staring up at the stars. A few moments later I heard the sounds of deep breathing. He too had fallen asleep.
The night was still. The Hawks didn’t return, and I imagined that they’d found somewhere more suitable to rest, probably up in the branches of some tree. The fire was smoking gently, with only dying embers left glowing on the ground.
My job as lookout was slow going. Occasionally I heard a crack of twigs in the distance, but if there were animals about they didn’t come any closer—either the barriers were doing their job, or we weren’t particularly appealing to them. The lack of any real threat had an annoying consequence—I started to imagine shapes in the darkness. Rocks became hunched men, watching us from afar. Gnarled trees became strange creatures, their twigs claws, their unearthed roots long-reaching tentacles waiting to pull me into seas of dead leaves.
I shuddered, trying to maintain my grip on reality, but every time I managed to calm myself down, I would see another shape out of the corner of my eye—another lurking thing, waiting to grab me.
Calm down, idiot.
I settled back against a rock, and stared up at the sky. It was more calming this way. We were sheltered from winds down here, but at the top of the trees there was a slight breeze, parting the boughs so that every so often I could see the multitudes of stars shining across the sky—millions and millions of light years away.
“No, I can’t help you, brother—no, please—no.”
Zerus was moaning in his sleep. He had been making small exhales of panicked breath on and off for a while now, but this was the first coherent thing I’d hear him utter. I watched him, waiting to hear more.
“I can’t—I don’t know how,” he cried softly. Clearly whatever he was dreaming about was causing him a lot of anguish. Why did he think that Tejus needed his help so badly? Was he somehow communicating with him? Was the entity back at the palace? His moaning continued, and I wondered if I should wake him. For all I knew, the mind-meld bond was stronger in relatives—maybe he was conversing with Tejus.