Victoria nodded even though she felt like she was drowning.
Three more potential locations. West toward the ocean. North toward snow. East toward desert.
One of them had to be real.
One of them had to contain Thalia.
"I should go," Victoria said. "Find somewhere to rest before I keep searching."
"Be safe," Elena said. "And Victoria....thank you. For doing this. For refusing to give up on her."
Victoria closed the mirror before she could cry.
She gathered Thalia's abandoned possessions....the cloak, the journal, the carved bone, and added them to her bag. Maybe they would be useful later. Maybe they contained clues she could decipher when she was not exhausted.
Victoria left the vine shelter and looked around the swamp.
She needed somewhere safe to rest. Somewhere she would not be eaten by whatever lived in these waters.
A sound made her turn.
Something was moving through the fog. Something large. Something that displaced water with each step.
