Once Mishtaw determined that no more death bringers were going to stab us in the back while we were focused elsewhere, she focused on what needed to be done next. First, escape. Petra got up on Creed’s shoulders and, with her arms outstretched, she was able to hook her fingers over the top lip of the hole in the cave ceiling. From my spot on the floor I didn’t get a good look at how she did it, but it didn’t take her long to pull herself up onto the mountainside and get a rope tied and dropped down for the rest of us.

Mishtaw went up first with Eliss, and I wouldn’t be surprised if they immediately started contacting the other whisper women once they were up in the wind. The death bringers would be easy prey while they were still under the effects of the poison.

It wasn’t clear if Dahrii had signaled the death bringers so they could attack Mishtaw and Eliss while they were separated from the other Peacekeepers or if the death bringers had come up with the ambush on their own. A rash bit of revenge for the band members the Peacekeepers had already taken care of. Revenge that they would likely sorely regret now because there was no way the Peacekeepers would be lenient with those that had went after their own.

Nor could anyone be sure if the goddess would involve Herself or not, moody as She could be. Mishtaw and Eliss and the rest of us weren’t Her trees or the Beloved or even one of Her Chosen. We might be Hers, marked for life, but from what I’d seen we were more important in function to the goddess rather than as individuals. As long as the Sects still functioned as they should and none of Her favorites were injured, it’d be a surprise to me if She came raging down on the death bringers when the Peacekeepers were already taking care of their punishment. But the goddess was also not known for being predictable.

I was the first of the injured to be hoisted up by the rope. I would have preferred to climb it on my own but between all the injuries to my back and weakness from the poison and blood loss, I had to accept the indignity. Creed got two loops tied in the rope so that one went behind my knees and the other around my armpits. I still had to use one hand to keep a little distance from the wall but it was a much easier assent than it would have been otherwise.

Eliss hauled me up and gave me a stiff nod as Petra helped me out of the rope. It was more acknowledgment than she had given me in a long time, but there was also still something in her eye, a bit of judgment or reservation, that made me think that was all the improvement to our relationship I’d be getting.

Petra guided me to an open space to sit in the middle of the group and patted me on the shoulder. “We’ll get you to a healer soon.”

She went back to keep helping Eliss with the rope. I stayed where I was and resisted the idiotic urge to touch the spear that was still sticking out of my back. The mountainside was a study in contrasts with the moon rising overhead now and the dark shadows the forest cast on the ground. A good night for shadow walking.

Mishtaw strode over to me with Prevna and a whisper woman I had never seen before in tow. The new whisper woman was tall, possibly as tall Creed despite having the frame of a bunch of sticks tied together. Her hair was gathered in a wide braid on the top of her head before it fell in a thick, straight line down to the middle of her back. Her face added to the impression of harsh angles and lines between her deep set eyes and sharp chin, sharp cheek bones and long nose. Her bless mark blackened her bottom lip and cut across the left side of her chin in two diagonal lines.

“Sonya will be taking you and Prevna back to the Seedling Palace for healing,” Mishtaw said. “Esie wants to meet with you too. When you’re recovered I’ll let you know what the plan is.” Her features hardened. “Likely this will turn into a full purge now.”

I focused on Prevna as soon as Mishtaw said she was also going back for healing, but as far I could tell she didn’t have any major injuries. She rolled her eyes at me with a pained smile. “Just a few cuts and bruises.”

Mishtaw made a hurry up gesture. “There’s not much time left.” Her gaze cut to Sonya. “You know where she is?”

Sonya cocked her head like whisper women did when they listened to the wind. “She told me.” Then she folded her tall body down until she was crouched in front me. “Best if we hurry, little diver.” Apparently, that particular nickname had stuck and spread farther among the whisper women than I had thought. “Can I carry you?”

I wanted to say no. To insist that I could walk, especially when I didn’t know what the hurry was. Didn’t want someone I didn’t even know touching me, holding me close, but I also knew Mishtaw wouldn’t say there was need to hurry for no reason.

I directed my question at her, “Why the rush?”

My mentor looked both unsurprised and exasperated by the question in equal measure. “You have a spear sticking out of your gut and Corrin agreed to a favor.”

It took me a long moment to place the name before I remembered the cool, unflappable woman who had used her blessing to return me to health after Jin opened up my armpit in a bid to test my blessing. If she used her blessing on me again I could skip the long weeks of recovery that the spear wound would required otherwise.

I swallowed down any other questions or protests and gave Sonya my assent. She picked me up carefully before rising back up to her full height. Even held in front of her chest, in much the same way the rope had held me while I was being lifted out of the cave, I was farther from the ground than I was used to being.

She carried me over to the closest shadow with more ease than I had expected. It was deep and dark and more than wide enough to fit all three of us within its edges. Prevna held her hand from where it stuck out beneath my knees and then Sonya stepped forward.

The shadow paths hazed in around us. Silver and gray mist creeping by and oil slick floor beneath. For a moment I thought I imagined it, the transition was so smooth. There was no sense of a drop or sinking into a pool of water or even a long moment of preparation.

No, just the simple fact that between one breath and the next we had gone from the mountainside to shadow paths as simply as stepping through a doorway. Blink and you miss it.

It was the smoothest transition I had ever experienced. Not even Hana, the best shadow walker as far as I knew, had managed such an easy transition. Of course, she didn’t have the highest opinion of me, so she simply might not have bothered to make the effort.

Sonya seemed to read my thoughts as she strode forward on the path only she could see. “Many of the others like to compare me to Hana—she is always the first to come to mind with shadow walking. And she does win out when it comes to distance and making the shortest paths, but I think she rarely bothers with the transition. Especially when it comes to others.” Sonya smiled softly. “I tend to think it’s the most important part, but that might be because I have a tendency to transport the injured.”

Prevna looked up at her with wide eyes. “How many have you brought through the shadow paths at once?”

Sonya thought for a moment. “I think the most I brought along at once was…eight people. Two different squads had been badly injured by the Devouring Blue’s fish, but it was a short journey. I had good shadows to work with and none were quite as formidable as Mishtaw’s Creed.”

Prevna seemed ready to pepper her with more questions but Sonya stopped her with a quiet, “One moment.”

And one step later we were in the Seedling Palace with blue-black and purple pine needles all around, twisting branch walkways, and pine cone lanterns lighting everything up overhead. However, rather than the healers’ nests I had been expecting, Sonya had delivered us to a private dwelling.

Pine needles obscured the view of what else might be around us and they also seemed thick enough to muffle noise. A dome of golden sap filled the landing in front of us before it butted up against the trunk of one of the great trees that made up the Seedling Palace. Soft looking leather covered the dome’s entrance. There wasn’t much room around the home to move, but this also wasn’t the best place to take in a view. I looked back, past Sonya, and saw that she had stepped from the trunk’s shadow just in front of where a symbol was carved into the wood, bloodied red. I wanted to ask about it and learn why the goddess wasn’t upset about someone carving into the tree, but now wasn’t the time.

Sonya whistled and Corrin stepped out of her home. She was a dark skinned woman with black hair braided back into a thick plait and an exasperated expression, though her voice was as mellow as I remembered it.

“You’re lucky your mentor cares about you so much.” Corrin gestured for Sonya to set me down and, once I was back to sitting on the ground, without preamble, she braced one hand against my shoulder and jerked the spear out of my back with the other.

I screamed. My throat immediately protested and I fell into a fit of coughing even as the pain radiating from my wound insisted I should keep screaming.

Prevna stepped forward, hands out. “What are you—”

Corrin cut her off with a look before she touched my forehead and asked, “Cutting it close, aren’t you?” She didn’t seem to expect an answer and I didn’t have the breath or voice to give her one. “Be as you were.”

The line activated her blessing and a cool sensation flooded through me. It was impossible not to relax into it even it ignored the cuts on my back and my throbbing throat—those were beyond the time limit on Corrin’s blessing. I had a brief moment of panic at the thought of what would have happened if her blessing had reverted me back to before I had cleansed Dahrii’s poison before the pain in my throat eased the fear. I had no desire to go through that ordeal again.

The spear closed and disappeared as if it never happened and the cool, refreshing sensation vanished just before Corrin took her palm away from my forehead. I was still tired and stiff, just like I had been after I purged the poison with the cureall, but I no longer had to worry about the damage and recovery from the spear wound.

Corrin stood up and shook her head slowly at me. “You’re lucky no one else needed my blessing today and that it’s so close to the next.” So she wouldn’t have agreed to Mishtaw’s favor if she thought there was a chance someone else would need her. The next was directed at Sonya, “You’ll take them to the healers?”

“Easy enough to do.” Sonya held out a hand and pulled me to my feet. “Tell Pounce hi for me.”

Corrin flushed slightly as Prevna asked, “Pounce?”

Sonya nodded. “A forest cat she raised up from a kitten. ‘Bout as big as your arm, ignoring his tail, and fluffy enough to be a cloud.”

“Sonya.”

Sonya wasn’t remotely affected by the censure in Corrin’s tone. “There’s no harm in telling them. I heard one of the Sprouts in their group has a bird.”

“Chirp,” Prevna provided the name. “He’s Wren’s companion. Be careful if you try to feed him though—he won’t leave you alone if he gets a treat from you once.”

While I wouldn’t blame Prevna for continuing the pointless conversation, I was glad when Corrin ended it. “I need sleep. She’s as recovered as I can make her, so you might was well get her to the healers to do the rest of the work.”

Sonya offered us her hands again and as soon as we took them she stepped into the shadow paths. After two steps in the shadow paths we were back out and at the healers’ nests. The trip was so short and easy that it felt more like a dream, like she hadn’t taken us through the shadows at all, though there was no denying that we were no longer at Corrin’s home.

A healer spotted us and led us over to his dome. Sonya waited until we were settled inside and the black handed healer was gathering his supplies to say her goodbye. “Recover well. Perhaps I’ll see you back on the mountain.” Her expression darkened before it cleared so quickly that I questioned if the change had been real. “Though perhaps it’ll be best if you miss that bloody business.”

The healer fussed over Mirabeth’s treatment of my cuts, though I could tell he couldn’t find anything truly wrong with her work, which was annoying in its own right since she handed me off to Dahrii not long after she took care of those wounds. Then he fussed over my throat and double and triple checked my symptoms to make sure I wasn’t still poisoned before he moved on to Prevna. Once he had treated every ailment he could find on both of us, and we were deemed not to be in critical condition, we were ordered to return the next day and let go to make our way to Mishtaw’s place.