Divine Rivals: Part 3: The Words In-Between: Chapter 42

Iris woke with a splitting headache.

Her eyes cracked open; late afternoon light played over her face. Branches swayed in the breeze above her. She watched them for a moment before realizing she was surrounded by trees and the air smelled like evergreen and moss and damp earth.

She had no idea where she was, and her hands reached out, passing over pine needles and leaves. The stained linen of her jumpsuit.

“Kitt?” she rasped. It hurt to speak, and she tried to swallow the splinter in her throat. “Attie?”

She heard someone shifting nearby. They came into her field of vision, hovering over her.

She blinked, recognizing the wavy chestnut brown hair, the wide-set hazel eyes, the dusting of freckles. They were so much like her own features. They could have been twins.

“Forest,” she whispered, and he reached for her hand, gently helping her sit forward. “Where are we?”

Her brother was silent, as if he didn’t know what to say. But then he brought a canteen to her mouth. “Drink, Iris.”

She took a few sips. As the water washed through her, she began to remember. She remembered mistaking her brother for Roman and how he had been determined to drag her away from town.

“Kitt,” she said, pushing the canteen aside. She was worried, hungry for answers. “Where is he? Where’s my husband?”

Forest glanced away. “I don’t know, Iris.”

It took everything within her to stay calm, stay calm as she stated through her teeth, “You saw him in the market. He was shouting for me then, wasn’t he?”

“Yes.” Forest’s tone was unapologetic. He held her eyes, his face emotionless.

“Why didn’t you tell me who you were, Forest? Why didn’t you let Kitt join us?”

“It was too much of a liability, Iris. My only plan was to get you out of there safely.”

She began to rise. Her legs were shaky.

“Sit down, Little Flower. You need to rest.”

“Don’t call me that!” she snarled, reaching out to balance herself on the nearest pine. She blinked and studied her surroundings. The woods stretched on and on, and the light looked older, richer. It must be late afternoon. She took a step toward the west.

“And where do you think you’re going?” Forest asked, standing.

“I’m going back to the field to find Kitt.”

“No you’re not. Iris, stop this!” He reached out to grasp her arm and Iris jerked away.

“Don’t touch me.” She leveled him with a glare.

Forest let his hand drop. “You can’t go back there, sister.”

“And I can’t abandon him. He could still be in the field.”

“Chances are, he’s not. Listen to me, Iris. Dacre will have stormed into Avalon Bluff by now. If he catches sight of us, he’ll take us as prisoners. Are you listening to me?”

She was walking toward the west. Her heart was pounding, aching with possibilities, when she tripped over something soft. She paused, glancing down at it. Two dash-packs. The two that Marisol had been missing.

So it had been him. Her brother had tromped through the garden and trespassed into the B and B, stealing two of the bags and Roman’s jumpsuit.

She felt betrayed. She felt so angry she wanted to strike her fists against him. She wanted to scream at him.

He appeared before her, holding his hands up in surrender.

“All right, I’ll make a deal with you,” he began. “I’ll take you back to the field to look for Kitt. But we can’t go beyond it; we can’t stray into the town. It’s too dangerous. And after we search the field, you will agree to let me take you somewhere safe. You’ll follow me home.”

Iris was silent, but her mind was reeling.

“Do you agree to my terms, Iris?” Forest prompted.

She nodded. She had every faith Roman was still in the field, waiting for her to come to him. “Yes. Take me there. Now.”

They reached the field by evening. Forest had been right; Dacre’s forces now ruled Avalon Bluff. Iris crouched in the grass, staring at the town. Fires were lit and music was pouring like a stream. Smoke still rose from the ashes, but Dacre was celebrating. His white flag with the red eithral eye was raised, flapping in the wind.

The gas was long gone by now. As if it had never been.

“We’ll have to crawl through the grass,” Forest said, his words clipped with tension. “It looks like Dacre isn’t expecting any retaliation from Enva’s forces. I don’t see any sentries, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t stationed as snipers. So move very slowly, and stay down. Do you hear me?”

She nodded. She didn’t spare her brother a glance. She was too focused on the sway of the grass as the wind raked over it. On the place she believed Roman to be.

She and Forest crawled side by side through the field. She moved gentle but swift, as he instructed. She didn’t wince when the stalks cut her hands, and it felt like a year passed before she reached the place where she had fought her brother, hours ago. She recognized it easily. The grass was broken here, trampled by their boots.

She swallowed the temptation to call for Roman. She remained low, crawling on her belly. The stars were beginning to wink overhead. The music from Avalon Bluff continued to echo, a fierce beating of drums.

The light was almost gone. Iris strained her eyes, looking for him amongst the flax.

Roman!

Her breaths were shallow and painful. Perspiration dripped from her brow, even as the temperature dropped. She searched for him, knowing this had been the spot. She searched, but there was no trace of him. Only his blood, staining the grass.

“We need to go, Iris,” Forest whispered.

“Wait,” she pleaded. “I know he has to be here.”

“He’s not. Look.”

Her brother pointed at something. She frowned, studying it. There was a ring drawn in the dirt. It encircled them both as they paused, still lying low.

“What is this, Forest?” she asked, finding more of Roman’s blood on the ground. It looked like spilled ink in the dusky light.

“We need to go. Now,” he hissed, grabbing her wrist.

She didn’t want him touching her, and she lurched away. Her hand still ached, as did her neck. All due to him.

“Just a minute longer, Forest,” she begged. “Please.”

“He’s not here, Iris. You have to trust me. I know more than you.”

“What do you mean?” But she had a terrible inkling. Her heart was beating, hummingbird swift in her throat. “Do you think he’s in Avalon Bluff?”

Guns fired in the distance. Iris startled, pressing deeper into the earth. Another round of shots, and then came peals of laughter.

“No, he’s not there,” Forest said, his eyes sweeping their surroundings. “I promise. But it’s time for us to go, as you agreed, sister.”

She glanced around the grass one last time. The moon hung above, watching as she sagged, as she crawled back to the woods with her brother.

The stars continued to burn as the last of her hope waned into despair.

He chose a place deep in the woods to make camp, where the mist curled around the trees. It gave Iris the chills, and she remained close to the small fire he built.

They had put several kilometers between them and Avalon Bluff, but Forest was still on edge, as if he expected Dacre’s forces to emerge from the shadows at any moment.

Iris had endless questions for him, but the air between them was tense. She held her tongue and accepted the food he handed her—food from Marisol’s kitchen—and she ate it, even though there was a lump in her throat.

“Where is Kitt?” she asked. “You said you know more than me. Where can I find him?”

“It’s not safe to talk about it here,” Forest said tersely. “You should eat and go to bed. We have a long walk ahead of us tomorrow.”

Iris was quiet, but then murmured, “You should have let him come with us.”

“This is war, Iris!” Forest cried. “This isn’t a game. This isn’t a novel with a happy ending. I saved you, because you are all I care about and you were all I could manage. Do you understand me?”

His words pierced her. She wanted to remain frozen and guarded, but she felt incredibly fragile in that moment. She kept seeing Roman rise from the grass. The way he had looked at her.

A sob hitched her breath. She drew her knees to her chest and began to weep, covering her face with her dirty hands. She tried to suck everything back in, to press it down to her marrow where she could handle it in private. But it was like something had broken in her, and things were spilling out.

Forest sat across from her, deathly quiet. He didn’t offer her any comfort; he didn’t embrace her. He didn’t speak kind words to her. The things he would have done in the past. But he remained near her, and he bore witness to her grief.

And all she could think through her tears was He feels like a stranger to me now.

He was paranoid about something. He had Iris up and walking early the next day, and by the slant of the sun, she judged they were traveling east.

“We could go to the road,” she suggested. “We could catch a ride with one of the lorries.” She wanted, more than anything, to find Attie and Marisol. To continue her search for Roman.

“No.” Forest’s reply was curt. He quickened his pace, glancing behind to make sure Iris was still following him. Twigs cracked beneath his boots. Iris thought the jumpsuit fit him poorly, and she wondered how she hadn’t seen it before.

“So we’re going to walk all the way to Oath?” she asked, a bit snidely.

“Yes. Until it’s safe to board a train.”

They traversed the next few hours in silence, until her brother was ready to make camp.

Perhaps Forest would finally explain himself here.

She waited for it, but her brother remained quiet, sitting on the other side of the fire from her. She watched the shadows dance over his lean, freckled face.

Eventually she could bear it no longer.

“Where’s your company, Forest? Your platoon? A lieutenant wrote to me, explaining that you joined another auxiliary force.”

Forest stared at the flames, as if he hadn’t heard her.

Where is your uniform? she inwardly added, wondering why he had gone to such lengths to steal one of Roman’s jumpsuits. Although it was becoming more evident that her brother was a deserter.

“They’re gone,” he replied suddenly. “Every last one of them.” He threw another branch on the fire before lying down on his side. “You can take the first watch.”

She sat quietly, her mind racing. She wondered if he was speaking about his Fifth Landover Company. The one that had been slaughtered at Lucia River.

She didn’t feel it was right to press him for clarity, and so she thought of other things.

Attie and Marisol most likely got away in the lorry. They would be driving east. Iris knew she could eventually find them at River Down, with Marisol’s sister.

But she wasn’t sure about Keegan’s fate.

She wasn’t sure about Roman’s.

Her stomach ached. Everything within her ached.

The fire was beginning to burn low.

Iris stood and brushed pine needles from her backside, looking for a new stick to add to the flames. She found one on the edges of the darkness, a shudder racking her spine as she returned to the camp, feeding the fire.

Forest was awake, staring at her over the sparks.

His gaze startled her at first, until she lowered herself back down to the ground. Her brother shut his eyes again.

She realized he thought she was attempting to run.

Dear Kitt,

I returned to the field to find you. I crawled through the gold, felt the grass cut my hands to ribbons. I strained my eyes for a glimpse of you, and only found traces of your blood and a circle in the dirt that I can’t explain.

Are you safe? Are you well?

I don’t know what happened after my brother took me away from Avalon Bluff. I don’t know if you survived the gas, and while it seems impossible, I feel like you did. I feel like you are sitting somewhere safe, wrapped in a blanket and sipping a bowl of soup, and your hair is even more tangled than before, bordering on rogue at the moment. But you are breathing beneath the same moon, the same stars, the same sun as me, even as the kilometers are growing between us.

In spite of all of that hope, my fear is sharper. It’s a knife in my lungs, cutting me a little more, a little deeper with each breath I take. I fear I will never see you again. I fear that I won’t get the chance to say all the things I never said to you.

I don’t have my typewriter. I don’t even have pen and paper. But I have my thoughts, my words. They once connected me to you, and I pray that they’ll reach you now. Somehow, someway. An old trace of magic in the wind.

I’ll find you whenever I can.

Yours,

Iris

On the fourth day of traveling with Forest, the road came into view. Iris tried to tamp down her excitement, but it must have been evident when she suggested they walk along it.

“It’ll be faster, Forest,” she said.

He only shook his head, as if he was loath to be seen by anyone but her.

He made sure to pull them deeper into the woods. And while they could hear the lorries rumbling by, Iris couldn’t see them.

Attie and Marisol.

Their names rolled through her like a promise. She hoped Attie hadn’t waited too long for her. That Attie had sensed the awful truth—that she and Roman weren’t coming—when the minutes had continued to pass without them appearing. Or perhaps Attie had found Roman, and he was currently with them.

I will find you at River Down, Iris thought, watching the wind whisper through the trees. Keep going, Attie. Don’t slow down for me. Don’t worry about me.

That night, Forest moved slowly when he built the fire. He moved like he was wounded, and when patches of blood began to seep through the chest of his jumpsuit, Iris jumped to her feet.

“Forest … you’re bleeding.”

He glanced down at the bright red spots. He winced but waved her away. “It’s nothing, Iris. Eat your dinner.”

She stepped closer to him, dismay eclipsing her thoughts. “Let me help you.”

“No, it’s fine, Iris.”

“It doesn’t look fine.”

“It’ll stop in a moment.”

She bit her tongue, watching him touch the blood. “I didn’t know you were wounded. You should have told me.”

Forest grimaced. “They’re old wounds. Nothing to worry about.” But his voice was ragged, and she was sorely worried about him.

“Sit down,” she said. “I’ll fix your dinner.”

To her relief, Forest heeded her. He settled close to the fire, his shoulders hunched as if he was holding the pain close.

Iris opened a tin of beans and found a wedge of cheese in the dash-pack. She thought of Marisol, and her eyes stung as she brought the food to her brother.

“Here. Eat this, Forest.”

He accepted her offering. His movements were choppy, as if the pain in his chest was overwhelming. Her eyes drifted to the chords of his throat, to the open collar of his jumpsuit. She could see a flash of gold around his neck.

Iris paused. Her eyes narrowed, watching the necklace gleam in the firelight.

It was her mother’s locket. The one Iris had worn ever since her death.

“Forest,” she breathed. “Where did you find it?” She reached out to touch the taunting gold, but Forest leaned back, his face pallid.

He said nothing as he stared at Iris.

She had lost it in the trenches. When the grenade’s blast had pushed her to the ground.

She had lost it in the trenches, which meant Forest had been there. He had found it after she had retreated, and the truth unfolded with a brutal, cold scrape to her ribs.

Iris met her brother’s bloodshot gaze.

At last, she understood his hesitance to be seen by Enva’s army, his constant worry. Why he stole Roman’s jumpsuit. Why he was running. Why he had never written to her.

He had been fighting for Dacre.

“Forest,” Iris whispered. “Why? Why Dacre?”

He pushed upward to his feet, trembling. She remained on her knees, gazing up at him, incredulous.

“You don’t understand, Iris,” he said.

“Then help me!” she cried, throwing her arms wide. “Help me understand, Forest!”

He walked away without another word.

Iris watched as he melted into the night. Her breaths turned ragged as she slid to lie facedown on the ground.

He walked away, but he soon returned to her.

She was lying next to the fire when he came back to the camp. Her eyes were closed, but she listened as he settled on the other side of the flames.

He sighed.

And Iris wondered what her brother had lived through. She wondered what other wounds he was hiding.

Dear Kitt,

I should have known my brother wasn’t you. I should have known the moment he took hold of my arm. His touch was too hard, too firm. As if he was terrified I would slip through his fingers. I shouldn’t have taken the mask. I should have insisted we give them to the soldiers who actually needed them, using them to draw survivors from the gas. I should have insisted that my brother stop his frantic running. I should have looked behind me.

I am broken, full of contradictions.

I wish I were brave, but I am so afraid, Kitt.

They boarded a train, but not before Forest took a day to wash his jumpsuit in a river.

Iris caught a glimpse of his bare chest as he scrubbed the blood from the linen. She saw the scars on his skin. They didn’t look like recent wounds, and yet they had bled the other night. She counted three of them, and she could only imagine what it must have felt like to have those bullets pierce his skin.

Once the jumpsuit was clean and dry, they walked into a town on the other side of the woods. To any observer, they were two war correspondents heading back to Oath. Forest held her hand, his palm clammy. Iris had a creeping feeling that he was worried she would make a run for it.

She didn’t.

She had given him her word, and he owed her more answers.

She sat across from him in the train compartment. And while she kept her gaze on the window, watching the land pass by in a blur … she thought about Forest’s scars. One just below his heart. One where his liver rested. One even lower, striking his intestines.

They had been fatal wounds.

He should be dead.

He shouldn’t be here with her, breathing the same air.

She didn’t know how he had survived them.

Dear Kitt,

I never told you how relieved I was to discover you were Carver.

I never told you how much I loved those morning runs with you.

I never told you how much I loved to hear you say my name.

I never told you how often I reread your letters, and how I now feel agonized, to know they are lost to me, scattered somewhere in Marisol’s B and B.

I never told you that I think the world of you, that I want to read more of your words, that I think you should write a book and publish it.

I never thanked you for going to the front lines with me. For coming between me and the grenade.

I never told you that I love you. And I regret that, most of all.

Oath was exactly as she had left it.

The streets were crowded, the pavement gleaming from a recent rain. The trams ran their courses, bells ringing. The buildings were tall and the shadows were cold. The air smelled like a rubbish bin and sugared bread.

The war felt distant, no more than a dream.

Iris followed her brother to their flat.

She was exhausted. They had been traveling in near silence for days now, and it had worn her down. She hadn’t told him yet about their mother. The words suddenly beat in her chest, frantic to find their way out.

“Forest.” She took hold of his sleeve, stopping him on the pavement before their building. “I need to tell you something.”

He waited, his eyes on her face.

It began to rain softly. Mist beaded in their hair, gathered on their shoulders. It was eventide, and the lamps began to flicker to life.

“Mum’s not here,” Iris said.

“Where is she?”

“She passed away, weeks ago. It’s why I left Oath. It’s why I became a correspondent. There was nothing left for me here.”

Forest was silent. Iris dared to glance at his face. She was terrified she would find blame in his eyes, but her brother only sighed and pulled her close. She was stiff until his arms wrapped around her, enveloping her in a warm embrace. His chin rested on her head and they stood entwined as the last of the light dwindled.

“Come on,” he said, relinquishing her when he felt her shiver. “Let’s go home.”

Iris found the spare key, hidden behind a loose stone in the lintel. She was reluctant to step into the flat’s empty darkness first. She gave that honor to Forest, who instantly reached for the light switch.

“The electricity’s off,” he mumbled.

“There are a few candles on the sideboard. To your left,” Iris said, closing the door behind them.

Her brother fumbled in the dark, finding the matches from one of the dash-packs. He struck a flame and lit a host of candles. The light was weak, but it was enough.

Iris glanced around the room.

The flat was just as she remembered, only dustier. More cobwebs hung in the corners, and it smelled musty and sad, like spoiled paper and drenched wool and decaying memories.

The box with her mother’s belongings still sat on the tea table. Forest noticed, but he didn’t touch it and he said nothing as he collapsed on the sofa with a groan.

Iris remained standing, feeling strangely out of place.

“Do you want to sit down?” Forest asked.

She took that as an invitation to finally talk, and she gingerly crossed the room, sitting beside him.

The silence was awkward. Iris cracked her knuckles, wondering what she should say. Her hands were still covered in small lacerations, from when she had crawled through the rubble of Avalon Bluff, the grass of the field. She stared at the silver ring on her finger. In some terrible way, it felt as if Roman was nothing more than a feverish dream. This ring was the only proof she had, the one tangible thing to whisper to her, Yes, it happened, and he loved you.

Forest thankfully broke the quiet.

“I found the locket in the trenches,” he began. “I was with Dacre’s forces. We were driving forward, and I nearly passed over it. The gleam of gold caught my eye at the last minute, and I stopped, to see what it was.” He paused, pulling a loose thread from his sleeve. “As soon as I recognized it, I knew you had been wearing it, Iris. It devastated me in a way I can’t describe. And I was determined that I would find you and we would both escape the war. I was … I was so tired and exhausted. It took everything within me to break away from Dacre’s command. If not for the locket, I don’t think I could have done it.”

Iris was quiet. She watched her brother closely in the candlelight. The emotion he had been burying for days was stirring. She could hear it in his voice, see it in the deep lines of his brow.

“I made it my mission to find you,” Forest continued in a hushed tone. “It was surprisingly easy. After I deserted, I fled to Avalon Bluff. I caught wind that correspondents resided there and that’s when it hit me. You weren’t fighting as a soldier, but as a reporter. But I couldn’t simply walk up to you and announce myself. I knew I would have to wait and bide my time. That I would most likely have to wait until things got bad, when Dacre tried to take the town. And so that’s what I did. I lived on the outskirts, but I kept watch over you. I saw you that afternoon, in the garden with Kitt.”

Iris flushed. Her brother had seen her on Roman’s lap, kissing him. She had no idea what she thought about it.

“I know he means a great deal to you, Iris,” Forest whispered. “And I’m sorry, Little Flower. I’m sorry I couldn’t save him as I saved you. But I need you to understand that it took every fiber within me to desert, to defy Dacre’s command. It took everything within me to run to safety with you.”

He met her gaze. Iris glanced away, unable to withstand the pain in his eyes.

“It wasn’t your choice to fight for Dacre?” she asked.

“No.”

“I … I still don’t understand, Forest. I received news that you had been wounded, but evacuated in time. That you were fighting with another company of Enva’s.”

“Part of that is true,” Forest replied. “I was wounded at Lucia River, so badly that I was supposed to die in the Meriah infirmary. I held on for days, but was too weak to be evacuated, and when Dacre came to take Meriah … he healed me before I died. He held me by the debt of my life, and I had no choice but to fight for him.”

The words chilled her. They suddenly spun strange thoughts in her mind. Images of Roman, wounded. Struggling to breathe in the cloud of gas that had swarmed him in the field. Would she rather him dead or taken by the enemy?

“I’ve done things, Iris,” Forest continued, bringing her back to the present. “I’ve done things that I can barely live with. And I know you may want to leave me. I can see it in your eyes; you want to find Kitt and your other friends. But I need you. I’m asking you to stay here with me, where it’s safe.”

She nodded, even though her heart was sinking. “I won’t leave you, Forest.”

He closed his eyes, relieved.

He looked like he had aged an entire decade. She caught a fleeting glimpse of him as an old man, worn and weathered and somber.

“Get some sleep, brother,” she said. “We can talk more tomorrow.”

She rose and left Forest on the sofa. The very place he had once slept before the war, when he was a horologist’s apprentice with bright eyes and a quick laugh and bear hugs that always made Iris feel better after a hard day.

She took a candle and retreated to her bedroom, leaning against the door for a moment. She had to drop these fears about Roman, captured. Roman, dead. Roman, suffering. She had to have faith, and she needed to sleep. She needed her mind sharp and her body rested so she could forge a new plan to find her way to him.

She soaked in the forlorn truth that she was back where she started. She was “home,” and yet she felt like a stranger here. She felt like an entirely different person. Iris shut her eyes, listening to the rain tap on the window.

Slowly, she took in her old room.

The blankets on her bed were wrinkled. Books were strewn over her desk, which was draped with gossamer. Her wardrobe door was open, revealing a glimpse of the clothes she had left behind.

And there, on the floor, was a piece of paper.

Iris froze, staring at it.

She had left it there, untouched. She had chosen not to read it months ago, fearing Carver would alter the course she was determined to take.

She walked to the folded paper. She bent down and picked it up from the floor, carrying it to her bed. She set the candle aside, the light flickering around her.

Iris stared at the paper, nearly holding it over the flame to burn. She didn’t know if she was strong enough to open it. She worried it would break the last of her, to read his words now.

In the end, she couldn’t resist.

The paper unfolded like wings in her hands.

His words met her like a blade. She bowed over them.

Iris! Iris, it’s me, Kitt.