Chapter 9
The days of Aria’s journey were long. For the first few days, she walked through fields, keeping to the edges, cloaking herself as she walked in the direction she knew she needed to go. She had stopped wrestling with herself over why she was walking in this direction, how she knew exactly which way to go. She only knew, and it was enough.
She had practiced hiding herself for a while, after she realized she could feel Isika wherever Isika was, and that possibly people could do the same with her. She wanted to disappear. She had wanted to disappear for a long time.
She walked every day until she couldn’t go farther, ate a bit of the nut-rich bread she had taken, then rolled up in her blanket and slept. The fields grew farther apart. She hid from farmers, and finally she was in t
