“Aleks!” Hilda finally said. “I’m so glad you’re alive! You really got out!”

“Hilda! Kamila!” Aleks sobbed as Kamila pulled him and Hilda to their feet. He wiped at his eyes, uselessly. “I finally found you. We’re going to get out of here together.” As the initial rush of suppressed pain began to fade, Aleks could hear his own voice again, but it was duller than he remembered it, quieter and harder. He looked over Kamila’s shoulder to see his mother’s glassy eyes, leaking blood. Aleks shuddered and fell to his knees again, hands over his head.

After a moment, when he was conscious again, and Hilda and Kamila knelt next to him – watching with deep concern in their eyes – he shook his head quickly to clear it. “I’m sorry,” Aleks said. “I’ve been so irresponsible. But I couldn’t stop, I had to catch up to you two, but I was so afraid to approach.”

He wanted to reach for the Gift again, to wrap it around himself, but he denied himself, knowing he could not go back so soon to that shadow world of deep fog and distant lights, a world that he felt might turn his very soul to glass if he stayed too long. He looked at Hilda, who was struggling to climb back up to her feet and to stay steady on them. She swayed, stumbled a bit, and shifted her weight to one leg before coming to rest.

“What happened, Hilda?” Aleks stared down at the leg Hilda had shifted her weight away from – the one she’d been avoiding as she limped toward him only a few moments before. “You’re hurt bad.”

Hilda took a step away from Aleks, glancing down at her feet. Aleks turned and look at Kamila. His older sister’s face was grim, her jaw set, and she looked like she might shout out in frustration. Aleks’ heart fell into his gut. “You did this, didn’t you? I suspected, but…” It was a physical struggle for Aleks to raise his head to look Kamila in the eyes, but he did, and she didn’t shrink away from his appraising gaze. “Why? Why would you…”

Kamila shook her head. “I don’t have an excuse,” she said quietly. “But I’m going to fix this situation. I’m going to save everyone, Aleks. We’re going to save everyone.”

“She didn’t have a choice,” Hilda said. “Blame Zoe, not Kamila.” Aleks’ younger sister turned around and, not looking back at her siblings, began to walk. Her limp was barely visible now, though Aleks could feel ill-concealed waves of pain with each step that Hilda took. They were stronger than he expected, too – whether because the pain was more intense, or simply because of the aftereffects of keeping the Sower’s Gift in place for so long, Aleks didn’t know.

Hilda went on: “Let’s just go. I don’t want to talk about this.”

Kamila began to walk, one slow step at a time, behind Hilda, still staring at Aleks. Aleks stared back, struggling to find the words to say. He wanted to ask, what was happening here? One moment Hilda and Kamila had been relieved just to see Aleks alive, and now they were moving on as though nothing had happened? Aleks reminded himself that the eleven days he’d spent under the influence of the Sower’s Gift had been real, living days to his sisters – they couldn’t hide from the pain of loss, and they were moving on, simply because they had to.

Aleks began to follow Hilda, the world around him clearer and sharper than he remembered it. The color of the sky, he noticed as he walked, was too bright – the blue still streaked with traces of orange despite how late in the morning it had become. Aleks walked in silence for some time, trying to bring himself to speak up, to say something. Finally, he picked up his pace till he was shoulder to shoulder with Hilda. “I’m sorry for that,” he said. “I didn’t mean to make things difficult between you two again. But if you ever need to –“

“It’s fine,” Hilda lied. Aleks didn’t need magic to tell that much. “Don’t worry, Aleks. We’ll talk. I just need to think.” She turned toward him and gave a warm smile. Aleks couldn’t help but smile back, even if doing so felt like twisting a knife in his own heart. “Besides,” she went on, louder, looking toward Kamila, “we’re still being followed. I can feel it.”

Aleks and Kamila both came to a halt, as Aleks felt a sensation like freezing blood in his legs. He glanced over his shoulder, looking at the trees from which he’d come. In the distance, at the very edge of silence, he thought he could hear a faint rumbling – if it was truly there at all, and not just a trace of the cloak which he’d held between himself and the world for so long.