In that moment, a shape appeared before him, huge and dark, rising up like a behemoth roused from sleep to put an end to his intrusion. He stumbled backwards from it, surprised and terrified. As he did so, his hands brushed against his sister. He pushed his face close to hers to make certain he was not mistaken, calling to her. Her pale, empty features stared back at him. She was kneeling in the snow, docile and unbothered.
Tears of relief blinded him as he brought her back to her feet, holding on to her with both hands, then deciding that wasn’t enough, wrapping her with his arms. He wiped the tears away with his sleeve and looked for the phantom that had caused him to find her. It was there, just ahead of him, but smaller and moving away. Bek peered after it, sensing something familiar about it, something recognizable. It faded and then reappeared, prowling just at the limits of his vision, expectant and purposeful.
Then suddenly it turned and beckoned him.
Almost without realizing what he was doing, he obeyed. Both hands clasped tight on Grianne’s slender wrist, he started ahead once more into the haze.
“Which is how I found you,” he finished, passing the aleskin back to Quentin, the pungent liquid warming his throat and stomach as he swallowed. “I don’t know how long I was out there, but my guide stayed just ahead of me the whole way, obviously leading me toward something, keeping me on track. I didn’t know where it was taking me, but after a while it didn’t matter. I knew who it was.”
“Truls Rohk,” his cousin said.
“That’s what I thought at the time, but now I’m not so sure. Truls is gone. He’s become a part of the shape-shifter community, and no longer has a separate identity. Maybe I just want to believe it was him.” Bek shook his head. “I don’t guess it matters.”
They were huddled in a shallow cave hollowed into the side of the mountain. Bek had started a fire, and it burned with little heat, but a steady, insistent flame that illuminated their faces. Grianne sat to one side, staring off into the night, unseeing. Every so often, Quentin looked at her, not quite sure yet what to make of having someone who had tried so hard to kill them sitting so close.
Bek watched Quentin take another deep swallow from the aleskin. The color was finally returning to Quentin’s frozen body. He had been nearly gone when he had stumbled upon Bek and Grianne. Bek had wasted no time wrapping him in his cloak and finding shelter for them all. The fire and ale had brought Quentin around, and they had spent the last hour exchanging stories about what had happened since the ambush in the ruins of Castledown. They didn’t rush it, taking their time, giving themselves a chance to adjust to the idea that the impossible had happened and they had found each other again.
“I never thought you were dead,” Bek told his cousin, breaking the momentary silence. “I never believed it was so.”
Quentin grinned, a hint of that familiar, cocky smile that marked him so distinctively. “Me either, about you. I knew when Tamis told me she had left you outside the ruins, that you would be all right. But this business about you having magic, that’s another matter. I still can’t quite believe it. You’re sure you’re an Ohmsford?”
“As sure as I can be after hearing everything Walker had to say.” Bek leaned back on his elbows and sighed. “I suppose I really didn’t believe it myself in the beginning. But after that first confrontation with Grianne, feeling the magic come alive inside me and break out like it did, I didn’t have the same doubts anymore.”
“So she’s your sister.”
Bek nodded. “She is, Quentin.”
The Highlander shook his head slowly. “Well, there’s something we’d have never guessed when we started out on this journey. But what are you supposed to do with her now that you know?”
“Take her home,” Bek answered. “Keep her safe.” He looked at Grianne a moment. “She’s important, Quentin. Beyond the fact that she’s my sister. I don’t know how, but she is. Walker was insistent on it, when he was dying and afterwards when he returned as a shade. He knows something about her that he isn’t telling me.”