The endless days of grief were almost unbearable for them as time stretched on.
But the announcement that Foxfire would resume was not a relief, not a welcome distraction from the pain: if anything, it felt completely wrong.
Going to school was difficult—most especially for Keefe, Fitz and Biana, though Keefe could see the toll it was taking on Sophie and Dex's other friends as well. He briefly wondered if he should say something to Marella, who looked particularly downcast, but he just couldn't summon the energy.
He was learning just how exhausting grief was.
Most students and Mentors were subdued—death was so uncommon that it shook even those who didn't actually know Sophie or Dex.
But seeing life go on—seeing people talk and laugh and study—it made him want to scream.
Sometimes, he felt angry that the sun had the audacity to continue to rise each day.
As though the world shouldn't dare to continue on with Sophie dead. And Dex, Keefe chided himself. I may not have known him much, but he deserves to be remembered. Especially since he only died because he'd gone to check on Sophie.
How did humans deal with this so much? Death and loss? How did they just accept it as normal? This was unnatural.
And along with fighting his own grief, Keefe found himself hurting for the Vackers too. He was spending as much time as he could at Everglen—which wasn't that unusual, because he already did that—but it was different now.
He felt like he needed to be with Fitz and Biana so they could endure their grief together.
Sometimes Alden and Della were there, and sometimes they were at Havenfield. Fitz told Keefe that they were trying to comfort the Ruewens and keep them from slipping into seclusion again, but that they seemed to be fighting a losing battle.
"Dad feels awful," Fitz admitted to Keefe one day. "For the same reason I do—we are the ones that brought her here. Honestly if he weren't so focused on keeping Grady and Edaline from letting their feelings of guilt shatter them, I'm not sure he'd be able to avoid those feelings of guilt himself." Fitz paused. "It's hard not to feel guilty," he added quietly.
"Don't," Keefe told him. "I feel guilty sometimes too. I ran into her that day and could tell she was upset and almost followed her home to make sure she was okay. I can't stop thinking about how things may have turned out differently if I'd been there. But I'm having to remind myself that really, none of us had any control over this."
It was true, but he still felt like the world might never be a happy one again.
"You're right. It's just this grief. It makes me think the strangest things. Sometimes..." Fitz sighed. "Sometimes it's like I can still hear her voice. I keep imagining things."
"I get that. I keep seeing her face."
"Me too," Biana said in a dull voice. She sounded like she had a perpetual head cold these days, since she cried so much. But then, she wasn't the only one. "Except I just keep seeing the devastated look on her face after Stina made her think..." Biana let out a little sob and couldn't finish.
Fitz immediately reached for his sister's hand and squeezed it.
Keefe reached out and brushed his fingers against her arm. The guilt and bitter regret were overwhelming.
"Don't," he told her. "We can't lose you too. The only person to blame for that situation is Stina Heks. And as much as I can't stand her, I don't want her feeling guilty either—not that there's much chance of that. She doesn't care."
Fitz squeezed Biana's hand again. "Keefe is right."
Keefe raised his eyebrows and attempted a smirk. "Well, it was bound to happen eventually."
Fitz and Biana both managed small laughs. And it gave Keefe a flicker of hope that maybe, somehow, they'd eventually figure out how to go on living when people they knew were dead.
But then Fitz suddenly paled and turned away as though someone behind him had called his name. Before Keefe could ask him what was wrong, he reached over and grabbed a stuffed Albertosaurus. What Keefe could see of his face was suddenly in agony. He turned and looked at Keefe, his eyes wild.
"I heard her again," he said in a choked voice. "I swear it's like she's really transmitting to me." He looked conflicted.
"Transmitting to you?" Keefe asked.
Fitz glanced at Biana and back to Keefe. "Sophie is...or was—" his face twisted in pain—"a telepath like me."
Keefe jumped up. "Are you saying what I think you're saying?"
Fitz shook his head. "It can't be. You have to be close to transmit, and if she really were alive she'd be really far away. Even when she transmitted to me from across Foxfire that was unheard of. I have to be imagining it."
"Are you sure? What if you're wrong?" Hope had begun to flare up in Keefe's chest against his will.
Because if anyone were capable of doing incredible things like transmitting impossible distances and being alive when presumed dead, it was that beautiful, mysterious girl.
"We have to try," Biana said. "We have to try to find her. What is she telling you?"
Fitz took a deep breath. "She said she and Dex were being held---like they'd been kidnapped. And then that she was somewhere else. At one point she said she was going to die soon and I just thought...it's my grief and guilt talking, it can't be her, I can't let myself hope--"
"We have to," Keefe said. "I'm sorry, but we have to. Wouldn't you rather get your hopes up and find out she really is gone, than risk her being alive and end up dying because we didn't go find her?"
"Yes," Fitz whispered. "But I have no idea where she said she was. Or it if exists at all. It sounds familiar but I don't know." He repeated Sophie's description.
Shock.
"That's the Four Seasons Tree!" Keefe exclaimed, talking fast. "And I doubt she'd have had any clue about it, and if you didn't know what it was either, then the only way you could be hearing her voice describe it in your head is if she really is there."
So the three of them raced for the Leapmaster. The second they were in Lumenaria they took off running, Keefe in the lead to show them where the tree was.
"She's trying to say goodbye," Fitz cried out. "She says she can't hold on anymore."
Tears stung Keefe's eyes and he pushed himself to run faster.
As they drew nearer, Keefe saw something that filled him with elation and terror in equal measure.
There was Dex, lying unconscious and pale, next to what was left of Sophie.
She was fading away. And it was horrifying.
Fitz collapsed on the ground next to her, begging her to hold on, to stay with them, not to let the light carry her away. He looked up at Keefe. "We need Elwin."
Biana stood up from where she had knelt next to Sophie and Dex. "I'll go." She pulled out her home crystal and was gone in an instant.
"Can you get Dex back to Everglen?" Fitz asked. "I'm going to keeping trying to get through to her. I don't think we should move Sophie unless Elwin says it's okay."
"She looks so..." Keefe said, tears starting to stream down his face as he gingerly bent down to pick Dex up.
But Fitz said nothing, just kept looking at Sophie (what was still visible, anyway) intently. He heard Fitz talking to her as he held the crystal to the light, and thought he heard Fitz laugh as he stepped into it.
He hoped that meant Fitz had reached her.
The next hour or two passed in a blur. Alden was there to let Keefe in, his face registering nothing but shock as he looked at Dex. Keefe helped him get Dex settled in one of the guest rooms as he explained what was happening. Della went to try to contact the Dizznees and the Ruewens.
When Elwin arrived with Sophie, they got her settled into another room. As they were heading up the stairs, Fitz gave Keefe a small smile. "I got through to her," Fitz told him. "She's still there, she's holding on."
But when Elwin brought Bullhorn in, the hope that had sparked to life was crushed again. The banshee was screaming his head off at the sight of her--and then went to lay down beside her.
"No, no, no," Fitz moaned.
"She's tough," Keefe said, mostly to himself. "She's tough. She'll hold on. Sophie, please hold on."
The Vackers made them leave the room, leaving her alone with Alden and Elwin as Elwin began to check her over--at least what he could see.
So much of her was fading away. Keefe could only desperately hope that Elwin could give her enough Fade Fuel to bring her back.
They couldn't lose her again.
When the Ruewens arrived, Alden left the room to give them some privacy with Sophie and Elwin. Fitz and Keefe headed towards Dex's door--Biana had taken one more look at Sophie and then run to her room, sobbing as she went.
Dex's parents were there, checking him over and waiting for Elwin.
"I'm sure Elwin will come in soon," Fitz said quietly. They jumped slightly, as they hadn't heard him and Keefe approaching. "Sophie looks..."
"That's what Della told us," Kesler said. "She's in far more danger than Dex is now."
It was strange to see this funny, quirky man so serious and withdrawn. Keefe knew they had to be thrilled that their son was alive, but the implications behind what must have really happened to Dex and Sophie that day they disappeared hung heavy in the air.
She said they'd been kidnapped. That they were going to kill her and Dex.
No elf would be capable of doing that, would they?
Eventually, Elwin made his way to them at last. He looked grim, but his face was set in determination. "It doesn't look good in there," he admitted. "But I'm not losing that girl again."
Any hope Keefe had that they hadn't been captured and tortured was erased after Elwin's assessment.
Dex had bad burns on him, and it looked like some intense after effects of a Melder. And Elwin told them that Sophie had similar burns on her as well.
But why?
Dex was left alone with his parents and Elwin, but Fitz and Keefe waited downstairs for news.
It didn't take long for Dex to be ready to go home. But the account he had given his family of what the last ten days had held for him and Sophie made Keefe's blood boil.
Dex seemed very uncomfortable at Everglen. Keefe suspected that the Dizznees didn't care for the Vackers on principle--but also couldn't help but wonder if Dex's hatred of Fitz had something to do with Sophie as well.
But Keefe vowed to himself to try to get to know Dex a little better in the coming days and weeks.
Time passed, Keefe usually coming to sit with Fitz as he watched over Sophie.
Her color slowly started coming back, and eventually Bullhorn moved away.
Finally, they heard the news they'd been waiting for--Sophie was awake!
At first it was just Alden and Elwin in the room with her. Keefe, Fitz and Biana stood outside the door waiting to be let in. Dex was anxious to speak with her too. Keefe had no doubt that this shared trauma would deepen their bond.
Keefe thought he heard her voice--weak, but begging them not to give her medicine. He looked over at Fitz, whose sudden anger showed that Fitz had heard too.
Dex had told them they'd been drugged. And now Sophie was terrified of being given anything.
Terrified of elixirs that could help her because of what those monsters had done.
But after a few minutes, they were allowed to come into the room. Fitz and Biana ran in ahead of him. Keefe lingered behind, letting them go first, just staring at that mysterious girl and thanking the stars that she was alive.
Even still partly faded and impossibly white, she was beautiful.
And he swore to himself, in that moment--even before speaking a word to her--that he would never again let her walk away upset. He would always be there to follow her and convince her to trust him.
He wasn't losing this girl again.