Lastlight Signed Paperback - Aenigma Lights Book 3

• Would you believe we’re STILL dealing with the puzzle box?
• And a VERY alarming elven queen.
• The ravine is still terrifying and inexplicably cursed.
• They’ve solved some secrets by now, but not nearly enough.
• Two women who go from fast friends to being close as sisters.
• Dwarf Twins, Elf Twins, a gnoblin, and a mage.
• And, as always, a mismatched band of adventurers who become a found family.

“Does everything seem too…” Kate crossed the snowy glade toward the massive frost pine, her eyes lingering on a deep shadow tucked into the branches above her. “Dark?” The word was woefully insufficient.

Venn faced a frost pine, her head bowed, her palms pressed to the white trunk. The vivid reds and golds of her hair blazed like an autumn maple in the gloom. “The sun is still low.”

The eastern sky was a pale lavender. The snow that chilled Kate’s feet and sat on the boughs gathered the meager light until it seemed to glow a soft bluish-white. Despite this, the trees themselves stood like brooding sentinels, trapping the last shadows of the night under their branches and between their roots. “Is there a certain height it needs to reach before we can talk about how useless this is?”

“Shh.”

Kate stifled a sigh of frustration and strode under the old pine’s branches, which were so thick that the ground beneath them was clear of snow. She pulled off her pack and sank down. “Because this is useless.”

Venn didn’t answer.

A deep knot in a pine across the clearing sat in inky blackness. The nagging sensation that it wasn’t empty crawled across Kate’s neck, and she scanned the forest, her heart beating too fast for the quiet morning.

She forced her shoulders to relax, but the rest of her body was still tense. She half expected that any moment an elf would appear out of thin air to force her back into some elven crisis that would almost kill her and Venn. Again.

A hollow under a fallen log was black as midnight, and Kate studied it, watching for movement. “And everything is too dark.” She glanced up at Venn. “I’d feel better if you loaded a dart in your crossbow.”

This earned her a sidelong glance. “Because we’re going to shoot the shadows?”

Kate gave a half-smile. “It’s worked before.” She sank back and surveyed the forest again. The trees themselves were anything but dark. Around the pockets of black, every trunk, branch, and needle shimmered with the elven queen’s golden remnant. Rich and full and vibrant, even though it didn’t banish a single shadow.

The trails of remnant she’d left in the past had been challenging to follow, but since Naevys had regained her full Warden powers last night, every inch of the forest glowed with it. Tracking her now was like tracking a drop of water through an ocean. An ocean that might arise at any moment and drown them. All in all, the golden lights felt…eerie.

And adding to that eeriness, the trees were merely silent pillars of wood and resin and needles, even though they should be more. They should be a massive, complex body. An overwhelming force of life and power, crowding around her with a warm vastness that welcomed and enveloped and consumed.

Instead, they were distant. Cut off.

Venn’s silver-green remnant flowed around her like a delicate mist, slipping into the furrows of the bark. But it didn’t seep into the tree like before. It merely hovered over the surface with a gentle longing. A finger of hopelessness trailed across the back of Kate’s neck. If she felt isolated from the forest after the few days she’d been connected to it, Venn’s isolation, after talking with the trees for centuries, must be… Kate shied away from the thought.

The distance between herself and the forest felt like a chasm of frigid night sky around her, leaving her with a hollow ache. A spike of fear rose in her at the terrible cost such a connection carried, but the longing for just a taste of it still gnawed at her.

She rubbed her face.

It wasn’t the forest she needed. It was the box, and she had no idea how to find it.

“I’ve searched everywhere around here, Venn,” she said, “and I can’t track Naevys. The fact that you’re still leaning against this same pine is leading me to believe you can’t either.”

Several heartbeats passed before Venn let out a long, controlled breath. Her jaw was set stubbornly, but there was something brittle in her expression. “It’s like I’m a child again. I can hear the trees talking, but they take no notice of me. I can’t ask them anything.”

“We’re never going to find Naevys or the box this way. We need a different plan. Or different tools. Or help from”—Kate winced before she continued—“someone who can still talk to the trees.”

“Ayen is in the same condition as I am, and there is no one else in the White Wood I trust.”

Kate’s wince turned to a grimace at the other obvious option. “You could ask Faron—”

“No.” The word snapped through the cold air.

“He’s king of the White Wood now. Maybe he can—”

“We are not trusting him again.” Venn held up a hand to stop Kate’s objection. “He looked for his mother for weeks, killing or hurting everyone—including us—in the process. And he never found her. He’s as useless as he is deceitful.”

Kate leaned her head back. “Well, we need something.”

Venn gave a frustrated growl and turned back to the tree. “Just…give me a minute.”

Kate’s fingers tapped on her leg, and she fought back her impatience. She opened her pack and rummaged in it, searching for some distraction from the waiting.

Bo’s journal was tucked along one side. She pulled it out and flipped it open to a random page.

Ria,

Do you remember that catapult Evan made that was impossible to aim?

I found another one! There’s a hermit who lives an hour’s walk outside a rather small, rather humble town. He lives in his tower, which is so rickety I made any excuse not to enter it. Mounted on the slightly listing wall that surrounds it is a catapult large enough “to send the head of any wild man stupid enough to attack me back to his worthless bandit brothers.” A gruesome but accurate description.

The hermit’s name is Peltz, so of course the townspeople call him Catapeltz. The only way to safely approach his tower and not be catapeltzed is by singing. The man loves a good song.

I chose “By Old Down Donny Mill” because it was easy to change “flung by the brave Helonthrone” to “flung by the brave catapult.” He loved it so much he gifted me a gnome made entirely of pine cones with a ghastly mouth made from a dead grub curled into a smile. It looks nothing like a gnome, but I named him Helonthrone. When I quit the area, I left him at the crossroads outside of town, his knobby twig arm pointing back toward Queensland, in case I ever lose my way home.

But after my song, Peltz invited me to stay a bit, and I spent a long afternoon flinging rocks from his wall. His catapult can be aimed, and after a few tries, I was able to hit a target—assuming that target was a very wide, not-too-distant tree.

I won’t hide from you that the entertainment of those hours was overshadowed by that almost-grief that thoughts of Evan always bring. My heart wants to grieve, but that feels too much like giving up, and so the hope always shoulders it away. At least, I call it hope. It’s far more painful than I think hope should be.

That familiar painful surge rose in Kate’s chest, and she closed the journal. Tucking it back in her pack, she took in Naevys’s golden shimmers running along the large root next to Kate’s boot. They moved with an almost mocking air. She cast out toward them, and the remnant itself didn’t change, but the root lit up, then the entire tree, warming into a tower of burning life. Bright rivers followed each root into the ground. Venn watched as Kate’s wave rolled away through the forest and lit every living thing for a dozen paces before fading away.

Kate reflexively searched for any sign of Naevys she could track, but everything, including the root next to Kate, was unremarkable. Full of life, just like every root of every tree in the world.

Kate spun around, clambering to her knees. “Venn!” She cast out again, this time focusing on the ground. The roots flared brightly, crisscrossing beneath the glade, filled with life and light and warmth. “Look!”

Venn frowned at the ground. “At the roots? They’re—” She squatted closer. “Kate—they’re normal!”

“Perfectly normal. Yesterday, there were thick veins of emptiness where the life of the forest had been drained away. But now…” Kate looked around the forest. “After all that effort to drain vitalle from the woods into the ravine, Naevys just…stopped?”

Venn’s brow creased as she took in the roots in the fading wave. “Let’s check. The ravine’s not far.”

They moved downhill, and the snow grew shallower. The white trunks of the elven frost pines grew more rare until they were far enough from the White Wood to be surrounded by only mundane, brown-trunked trees. Kate cast out every few minutes. The trees blazed into pillars, not as bright as elven trees, but still glowing with vitalle. Even the dangling moss that hung from their trees like old men’s beards lit with a delicate warmth. The hollow paths among the roots that had plagued the woods for weeks still existed here, but they were filling.

The sky was now a bright pale blue, the sun only hidden by the ridge of hills to the east. Instead of the daylight banishing the shadows, they lingered under the thicker limbs and tucked in around the base of each trunk, watchful and waiting.

Kate peered through the trees, searching for a glimpse of the ravine where everything with Bo and the box had started. The fear that had wrapped around her like a fog since Naevys had stolen the box last night coalesced into a layer of ice-cold dread on her skin.

“Venn.” The word came out so quiet it was nearly swallowed up by the woods. Even so, it held an unmistakable tremor, and the rest of her question got caught in her throat. As though merely asking it would shatter whatever small hope she was clinging to.

Venn glanced at Kate. “Your brothers are alive.”

Kate stumbled to a stop, relief tangled with surprise. “How did you know I was going to ask that?”

Venn stopped too, and Kate closed her eyes, searching through the space around the elf for any sense of her. The connection the Elder Grove had forged between them had grown familiar enough over the short time they’d shared it that it felt isolating not to feel Venn’s emotions emanating from her. “Can you feel my emotions again?” She opened her eyes to see the ghost of a smile on Venn’s face, more resignation than amusement.

“No. Naevys damaged the connections I have with…” Venn gestured to the woods, including Kate. “But I’m still an elf and can still sense that everything inside you is humming with fear. I’ve only ever seen you really scared of two things.” She raised one finger. “The forest overwhelming your mind when Thallion bound you to it—something we don’t have to worry about since Naevys ripped you away from it too.” She raised a second finger. “And the safety of your brothers.”

“If she opens the box again—”

“Whatever Naevys wants it for,” Venn interrupted, “she hasn’t opened it.” She reached up and pulled a broken twig from where it dangled from some moss. “I can still feel Bo. He’s alive.” Her face was almost calm, but Kate recognized the tension around the edges.

“But in danger?”

Venn rolled the stick between her fingers. “He’s felt like he’s in danger for weeks. Ever since he went into the box.”

“Yes, but it grew stronger when Faron took it.”

“It did.” Venn met Kate’s gaze. “I assume—as you certainly do—that was because the drawer had been opened again without the amulet to protect it and the pocket world had been damaged. Seeing as time is slower for him inside the box, in the time it’s taken us to do the whole mess with Thallion and Naevys”—she gestured with the twig to the elven forest—“Bo has only lived a few minutes. Of course his danger level would stay the same.”

Kate folded her arms. “And now? Is it still the same? Or has it gone up? Because you’re being evasive.”

Venn tapped a finger against the stick with a sigh. “It’s gone up.”

“How much?”

Venn tossed the twig and brushed off her hands. “It’s not like there’s a way to measure this, Kate. I don’t know how much, but the life debt feels more urgent than it did before Naevys took the box.” Venn held up a hand to stop Kate’s next words. “No, I don’t know why. If she’d opened it, I think he’d be in such immediate danger from the pocket world collapsing that I’d barely be able to breathe. At least that’s how it felt when the shadow was chasing him and he called me for help.” She dropped her hand. “It’s not nearly that bad right now.”

“But it’s heavier than it was yesterday?”

Venn gave no response except a slight wince.

Kate looked up into the trees. “Why? What could the queen be doing to the box that makes it more dangerous for Bo besides opening the drawer?” She forced out the next words. “Or maybe she did, and you’re feeling him dying.”

“Did Renault’s description of opening the Runelight Drawer make you think their deaths would be drawn out?”

The words from Renault’s journal sprang to Kate’s mind. Massive destruction…destroy it completely.

“If it’s opened again,” Venn continued, “I don’t think anyone in there will survive long enough to…” She grimaced. “When a life debt snaps because the person you were bound to protect dies, it’s supposed to be like having something ripped out of your chest. I don’t think I’d confuse that with the debt just feeling heavy.”

Kate studied her. “You’ll tell me if it gets worse.”

The crease in Venn’s brow deepened. “Do you really want to know? You can’t do anything about it.”

Kate’s arms tightened across her chest, and she ignored the truth in the words. “I want to know.”

Venn studied her, then gave a reluctant nod. “It’s staying steady since last night. And I have no idea what to do about it besides find Naevys, hope she still has the box, and hope…”

Kate blew out a breath, trying to dislodge the tension inside her, and started downhill again. “And hope she’s lucid enough to reason with.” She looked up into the trees around them. “Is it safe to assume that Naevys can track us in the forest like Thallion could?”

“Far more comprehensively than he could.” Venn trailed her fingertips along a trunk as she passed, feeding a little vitalle into her tattoo. “When I lived with her, she could see any part of the forest and know what was happening there. But she could also see anything that had happened there.” Venn’s brow furrowed. “For most of my life, I’ve been able to ask the trees questions, but it can be tricky. They think a quick rain shower is as interesting as an elven council that happened beneath their branches. So getting them to focus on the right thing can be hard. But Naevys could do it easily. She said she could rifle through their thoughts and direct them to the thing she wanted.

“Her power lies in how connected she is to everything. Somehow, through those connections, she can almost read the trees’ minds.”

“Can she read elven minds?” Kate asked. “Or human?”

“Elven minds, to an extent. The more closely she is connected to them, the more she can sense. One of the Warden’s duties is to mediate conflicts, because she can sense the truth from both parties. She was incredibly good at it. There were times that before I’d even greeted her, she was giving me advice on whatever was troubling me.” Venn looked thoughtfully at Kate. “She might be able to do the same with a human mind. As the Warden, she’s bound to more than just the White Wood. She’s the heart of all the forests and growing things anywhere near here.”

Kate’s mind shifted from the queen to the box to Bo and Evan. Her fingers itched for the notebook she’d left in Renault’s cave. Last night, after fleeing the Elder Grove, she’d written down every question and idea she could imagine, but the thoughts refused to settle without being formed into a complete story, and none of the pieces seemed to fit together.

“Why did she take the box?” Kate asked finally.

Venn raised a single eyebrow. “Aside from the fact that it was Renault’s, and she’s been looking to replicate it for centuries?”

“Obviously because of that. But why? What is it about the box that she’s so desperate for? She was trying to recreate the Runelight Drawer where time was slowed, but what use is more time to an elf? You already have centuries.”

Venn moved quietly for several paces. “Maybe she wants something it holds.”

“Like what? I doubt she knows my brothers are in there, nor would she care. And there’s nothing else—” Kate stopped. “There is something else. Someone else. Or two someones. Renault’s wife and daughter are in the box.”

Both eyebrows rose this time. “I suppose if it’s been around three hundred years for us, it’s only been three hundred days inside the box. Depending on what sort of world Renault made for them, they could still be alive after a year.”

“With all the effort he put into making it?” Kate said. “I’m sure they could survive this long.”

“Why would Naevys want his family?”

Kate started walking again. “I don’t know. The idea doesn’t quite fit. Unless Naome knew more about her husband’s work than any of their journals make it sound.”

Low, rambling bushes filled the gaps between the trees, poking up through the snow with branches of dark green needles. A ripple of uneasiness crawled up Kate’s shoulder blades at the glimpse of sharp thorns the needles hid. She shifted her shoulders, trying to shake away the looming sense of dread that hung over her.

“Whatever Naevys wants,” Venn said, picking her way along a game trail, “I doubt she wants to destroy the box. She knows she needs the amulet, so why would she open it without it and risk destroying what’s inside?”

Kate straightened. “Maybe she already has the amulet!”

“She’s certainly searched more exhaustively than we have. And since she can’t have been after Bo for centuries, if we can find her, we can maybe—by some miracle—convince her to let Bo and Evan out. Assuming you’re good with her keeping the box for whatever she wants it for.”

“She can keep it forever, for all I care,” Kate said. “As long as we get my brothers back.”

A rustle broke the quiet on the ground ahead, and Kate froze. Venn’s arm with her crossbow rose slightly. Kate cast out, but nothing except low-lying brush lit up beneath the snow. It covered the ground ahead of them but concealed nothing. But the gaps between the snowy branches were thick with shadows as though they led into deep dark caverns.

“Venn, the elven wood has taken on a decidedly threatening feel in my mind.” Kate started down the path along the thorny plant. Her leg brushed one, and a thorn caught on her pants, stabbing through the wool and snagging on her calf. With a hiss of pain, she reached down to extricate the plant. The branch was so riddled with thorns she could barely fit her fingertips between them. “Possibly because it keeps trying to hurt me.”

Venn squatted down next to the plant, frowning at it. “Frenbrush doesn’t usually have that many thorns.” The bush filled almost every gap between the trees. “Or cover this much ground.”

Kate yanked the thorn out. A scrap of bloody flesh hung on it, and Kate funneled vitalle into her leg. The pain dulled as the skin knit back together. Just below the branch that had snagged on her, the shadows were almost black. “Why is it so dark?”

Venn set a fingertip on the needles. “I can feel…something.” Her brow drew together. “Anger. Just the barest hint of it, but I think the woods are angry.”

A flicker of wariness grew in Kate, and she backed away from the brush. “Because Naevys is angry?”

“That would be my guess.” Venn started downhill alongside the line of frenbrush. But before they’d gone a dozen steps, another patch of thorny brush blocked their path, forcing them farther to the left.

Kate searched ahead in the woods. “Was there this much of it a few minutes ago?”

“It can’t grow that quickly,” Venn said, but her voice was uncertain.

“Still,” Kate said, “let’s move along. Something about all this feels—”

A shout came through the woods from directly downhill, and they both spun toward it.

Another shout rang out. The voice was gruff.

And dwarven.

A third shout cut through the trees before it was abruptly cut off.

“Dangerous,” Kate said, breaking into a run toward the dwarves. “Definitely dangerous.”

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