CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
ALYSSUM
Iwas in a frenzy, but the arms that restrained me may as well have been made of stone for all the good my thrashing did. Even with one palm over my mouth, silencing the screams that tore through me, my assailant still had little trouble carrying me away from the commotion.
“Will you—stop—”
Oh, I’m sorry. Am I making it too difficult for you to kidnap me? How I wished I could have barked my scathing retort. Instead, I had to settle for digging my nails into the thick arm that carted me through the air as though I were inconsequential.
The grunt that sounded in my ear was less than impressed.
Depths. I had to relax. With my lips covered, I couldn’t gasp for air the way my body urgently needed.
The desperate breaths I managed through flared nostrils were too shallow, and I feared I might lose consciousness any moment.
A limp body was supposed to be harder to carry, yet I doubted that would make a meaningful difference given the strength of my captor.
My dagger. Why hadn’t I thought to bring my dagger? I’d never successfully used it before, but as fear jolted through my limbs, I cursed myself for not keeping it on my person regardless.
Just then, my assailant’s boot caught on a root of some kind, and they stumbled forward a couple of steps before regaining their footing. I took the opportunity to yank my head back, freeing just enough of my mouth that I could sink my teeth into the finger of the beast that held me.
Unfortunately, the howl they emitted—while satisfying—did not loosen their grip.
“Damnit, woman! It’s me, Winnie!”
My body hesitated as recognition flooded me.
“Yes, it’s me,” she continued through heavy breaths. “We should be far enough away. Promise me that you won’t flee or scream.”
With a steadied inhale, I nodded once. The moment Winnie released me, I took several steps away from her, clutching the bark of a nearby tree to hold myself up.
“I… am going… to murder you,” I seethed, wiping away the saliva that had dribbled down my chin. “My heart nearly stopped! Why would you do something like that?”
Winnie looked rather guilty as she studied the forest floor. She had brought me into the woods, but as I squinted at our surroundings, I suspected we were closer to the village than we had been in the clearing.
“Well?” I demanded.
“Because I needed to get you out of there as soon as possible, and there was no time for a debate.” Winnie assessed her scratched arm and bitten finger with a grimace.
“Why?”
“I just told you why.”
“No—why did you specifically need to get me away from the blood pit?”
It was this inquiry that Winnie avoided entirely. Instead of responding, she cast her wary attention to the surrounding wood. “We’re going to Catrin’s shop.”
“Answer my question,” I demanded.
“No.”
“Well, I want to go back to the Ugly Tankard, then,” I said indignantly.
“Well, you can’t,” Winnie said, returning my indignation in kind. “You’re coming with me.”
My mouth went agape; that was not the response I had expected.
Having gathered my bearings, I assessed Winnie with a once-over.
Her outfit matched Vayen and Berig’s. She must have been prepared, just as Milo had been, for Gavner to cast Berig’s attempts at volunteering aside.
I wanted to ask, but I recognized the resoluteness of her dark, narrowed eyes, only barely visible thanks to the slivers of Naeno’s moonlight sifting through the leaves above.
She had no intention of answering my questions.
Depths, I doubted I would be able to reason with her, given that all traces of the guilt that had softened her features had dissipated. But I had to try.
“What if I don’t want to?”
Without hesitation, Winnie snarled, “Oh, drink piss.”
The tone of her voice hitched my breath. Her jaw tightened as she bared her teeth, once-relaxed lips now disappearing into a thin, unforgiving line. The kind, composed woman I had interacted with day in and day out at the tavern did not stand before me. No, this was someone else entirely.
“You might be surprised to hear it,” Winnie began, her words clipped in irritation. “But I’d also rather be at the Ugly Tankard right now, consoling my inconsolable wife. Want to hazard a guess what she is doing right this very moment?”
I didn’t, but I had the distinct impression she did not want my answer regardless, so I focused my energy on holding the death glare she’d pinned on my slowly withering face.
“She’s curled up in the tub contemplating whether or not to drown herself if I don’t survive this blood pit.
But I can’t be with her, because my—” Whatever word had very nearly fallen from her mouth was bitten back, instead replaced with, “—because Vayen and Berig? Catrin, and Milo, and the rest of our people? They need me. They need me to be there with them, as I have for every other blood pit, because that is our burden to bear. Yet here I am, Lyssa. Here I am, in this fucking forest, looking after you! All because…”
The trailing off of her voice was maddening.
“All because why?” I begged.
Winnie threw her gaze to the stars, a silent curse cast out in desperation. With a dramatic inhale that she puffed out with force, I was met once more with her cold, resolute expression.
“You can walk or you will be carried. The choice is yours.”
In the end, I had decided to walk. There was little dignity in being forced to accommodate your jailer, but I imagined there was even less dignity in allowing them to carry you off like a child. So I walked alongside Winnie quietly, an inescapable scowl pulling at the corners of my mouth.
Fortunately for us both, as I doubted she sought a meandering stroll any more than I did, Winnie’s assessment of our general location had been correct.
We had made our way through the thick forest in short order, arriving at a path of misshapen stones I immediately recognized as Catrin’s.
If we went to the right, we would arrive at her garden.
But of course we veered left, Winnie all but barging through the back door.
Why did I climb out that damnable window? I thought as I followed after her, arms crossed and sour expression on full display.
Winnie stoked the herbalist’s hearth, her movements devoid of the ease that usually befell her.
I’d never seen her brow so pinched, her shoulders so rounded.
She wielded the iron poker as though the now-sputtering logs had wronged her in a past life.
Once the fire revived, she was on the move, fluttering about the shop with purpose.
The rusted chandelier, and the half-melted candles oozing wax onto the shelves—all were lit, defeating the shop’s darkness.
She filled a carafe with water and retrieved clean rags.
Various vials, seized with care, now lined on the table before the hearth, their contents unknown to me.
Finally, she laid out a set of blankets, meticulously sprinkling herbs over the thinning cloth with a furrowed, concentrated expression.
I could not make sense of her actions, and I was done asking questions I knew would provoke no answer.
Absent of all reason and patience, I approached the stone table I had found myself atop of after my unveiling.
I hopped onto it unceremoniously, inhaling deeply the scent of herbs and flowers that I now associated with Catrin.
But calm could not seep into my frantic nerves, for the second her face entered my mind, those silent tears began dripping down her full cheeks.
The pain she must have felt, watching the arms that protected and loved her assault a woman they both seemed to care for very much.
Cross if necessary.
Why, Vicar? What had you witnessed here that compelled you to write the three words that would unintentionally set ablaze my understanding of the world around me?
What were you hoping they would find here that they didn’t have in Lunamor?
Because the more I observed, the more I was having difficulty identifying the superiority of Grenythwood Village. Even as a princess seeking refuge.
A sudden ruckus on the street straightened my spine. I hopped off the stone table, instinctively fleeing deeper into the shop until my shoulder brushed against Winnie’s.
“What is that?” I asked, hyperaware of the hurried beat of my heart.
“They’re coming.” Winnie’s voice cracked. “Stand back, and don’t get in the way.”
My fearful eyes narrowed into a scowl. I wasn’t a child, I desperately wanted to remind her, but when the front door burst open, her tone was all but forgotten in the ensuing chaos.
“Winifred!” Catrin screamed from the doorway, nearly crumpling under the weight of the person she and Milo carried.
I readied myself to see Vayen’s bloodied face, but as they stepped into the light, it was Berig’s hulking frame that came into view. As did the state of him, which had me combating the bile bubbling up my throat. It was now my own palm that clamped over my mouth, refusing the sickness.
Berig was destroyed. His face, which hadn’t been touched when Winnie carried me off into the wood, was barely recognizable.
Both eyes were swollen shut, his nose was obviously broken, and both his upper and lower lips had been split on opposite sides.
His jaw appeared dislocated, and a nasty cut above his right eye leaked a steady current of blood onto his face and the floorboards.
If it weren’t for the way his feet shuffled as Catrin and Milo attempted to haul him past the doorway, I would have never suspected he was conscious.
The pain must have been excruciating, but I could not discern an expression amidst his swollen, bloodied features.