Witch Fall(92)

“Downstairs.” Doranna rested a hand on Lilette’s back. “Has it ever been this bad?”

“No.” Lilette struggled to smooth out the waver in her voice. She would not cry. “This isn’t the shifting of the elements to turn the seasons against themselves. This is using the elements as weapons.”

“But you’ve felt that before.”

Lilette nodded. “So why is this time different?”

Doranna’s eyes widened. “The potion I gave you last night, it would have cleansed the sleeping tincture from your body.”

“Creators help me, I cannot bear it!” Lilette pushed herself to her feet and started forward. She had no idea where she was going, only that the world was screaming its death cry and she had to stop it.

She stumbled down the stairs. Near the door, Han was sitting up, his gleaming chest laced with scars, some white with age, others a livid pink. Creators’ mercy, she’d felt them last night.

“What’s wrong?” He blinked up at her.

Lilette couldn’t look at him. But what had happened between them didn’t matter, not right now.

Doranna quickly filled him in while Lilette started toward the door. Han pulled his tunic over his head and grabbed his weapons and knives, struggling to juggle them while buckling them on. “Are they sinking Harshen?” he asked. His gaze locked with Lilette’s, and her resolve hardened within her.

“If they are, I’ll make them pay.” She wrenched open the door and trotted down the steps. The chesli flowers were still open, moths and other night insects dancing from one to the next. But the people were gone. “Where is everyone?”

“They clear them out of the inner city after the witchling hour.”

Using her witch sense, Lilette led them uphill, toward the source of the discord. “It’s nighttime—why isn’t it raining?”

“It never rains during the chesli harvest,” Doranna said.

The closer they got, the worse the hassacre became. Lilette pitched forward and vomited bile into the foliage at the side of the path.

Han stood beside her. She held out a hand, trying to keep him away from the sight of her spitting vomit.

“Can’t you help her?” he pleaded with Doranna. “Surely there’s some kind of tincture.”

Lilette shook her head. After what Pescal had done to her, she would never take a tincture again. She spit into the bushes and dropped her voice to a whisper. “Why? Why have you turned away from me—after everything we’ve been through?” She shouldn’t care about this now, but she had to know.

“Turned away . . .” His gaze darkened. “Is that what he told you?”

She realized that Han hadn’t even seemed to recognize Pescal last night. Pescal had lied about everything.

“I’m going to find him. And I’m going to kill him,” Han growled.

Doranna picked a handful of mint leaves and handed them to Lilette. “Suck on these.”

Shoving them into her mouth, she let go some of her shame about how she’d acted last night. It wasn’t her fault. And she hadn’t lost Han. She took hold of his arm. “Come on. People are dying. Creators help me, I can feel their screams.”

She staggered forward, picking up speed until she was running. Finally, they stepped into the ring of power. But it was empty. Lilette gripped the hair at her temples. “I don’t understand.”

Doranna took a step toward her. “Child, you have a lot of potions in your body. Perhaps—”

“No!” Lilette gasped for breath. “I know what I feel.”

“Lilette,” Han began. “There’s no one here.”

She turned a full circle in the moonlight. “Yes, they are. I can feel it.” She closed her eyes and spread her witch sense. The wind tugged at her hair, bringing with it the smell of something burning. And as surely as she knew this chanting was destruction made audible, she knew it was directed at Harshen. And it was the strongest at the tree beside them.

Squaring herself, Lilette marched toward a large tree. The smooth expanse of bark seemed to mock her.

“Lilette,” Doranna whispered, “we should go back.”

Closing her eyes again, Lilette pressed the flat of her hands against the tree. Her witch senses combed it, searching for something different. “It’s hollow.”

“Of course it’s hollow,” Doranna said. “All the trees are.”

Lilette opened her eyes. “This part of the tree isn’t alive.”

Han stepped up beside her. “What are you saying?”

Her searching fingers found a lip. “I’m saying this is a door.”