Chapter 16 #2
It was the irony of all Sorcerit that they couldn’t heal themselves.
There was no give and take in that lack of transaction, no balance.
A tonic or feeding was the only way. If the wound was dire, blood needed to be gifted straight from the source—sharp fangs sinking into willing and welcoming veins.
No goblets or flasks of day-old offerings.
And outside the Divine Right of Mates, forget taken blood. Not even the Elder Council would do such a thing. It didn’t work, and only the vilest of Nachthellians had ever dared to steal a gift.
Fucking bastards.
“That’s it, just breathe.” Nyri was already tugging at her dress buttons, popping them open as she chattered encouragements. “It’ll be fine. Promise. Think tonic-y thoughts.”
“This will be much easier if you let me stand, Nyriadne.”
“Oh! Yes, silly me. Obviously.” She gripped both of Lunara’s hands in her own. “Here we go. We’ll just—”
Sisters save Lunara from grabby Demons that insisted on yanking her all over the place.
“There’s a snack here, by the way, if you’re interested,” Nyri said.
She gestured over to a gilded tray on the bedside table.
Between the bowl of strawberries and goblet of blood was a single bloom, its stalk rising from a porcelain vase.
She’d never seen it’s like, with three white petals arranged in a trifecta, larger green leaves in the spaces between, yellow stamens jutting proudly from the center and tipped with pollen-laden spheres.
The first flower she’d ever seen with her own eyes that wasn’t glowing, or luring winged prey, or trying to bite her as she passed by.
The sight of it momentarily stole her pain. “What is that?”
Nyri followed her look and grinned. “Trilliatum. My favorite.” She started tugging Lunara’s sleeves down her arms. “It grows like a carpet at the base of the red balstrae, just behind the castle. You know, the primordial tree that Lyriat’s throne was carved from.”
“Stunning.” Lunara’s voice was reverent as she skimmed her fingers over the velvety surface of one petal.
“I can take you to see them later, if you like! Though, you probably won’t want to be alive by then.
Hedda has a habit of making people wish they were dead.
At least for the first couple days. Or weeks.
I can’t remember. It’s all a blur, honestly, even though it was only last year that I started myself. ”
With a tug, Lunara’s dress fell to the floor, Nyri chit-chatting away while she helped Lunara step from the pile of silk.
By the time Nyri had shoved her into billowing grey trousers that flopped around her ankles and a strange matching tunic that wrapped and tied around her waist, Lunara was sweating. Teetering. Ready to call it quits and head straight for the Veil.
Maybe there’s trilliatum in the Blessed After. That’s probably the only way you’ll be seeing it today.
Which was fine. What good was living when every step felt like dying, anyway?
Nyri brought the goblet to her lips. “Just a bit. We really don’t have much time.”
Lunara tried to deny her, but Nyri was already tipping the cup.
The first tentative sip exploded on her tongue and she nearly choked on it, gasping, power surging into her veins. Nyri tried to offer her more, but she clamped her mouth shut and pulled away. It was too much, too intense. Not safe.
Shitting stars.
Unfortunately, her unwillingness to take more meant that it wasn’t enough to take away the bone-deep soreness of her muscles.
Maybe just a little bit more.
“Was that—”
“Time to chew and walk, walk and chew. Let’s go!”
A strawberry was shoved into Lunara’s mouth before she could finish asking whose blood she’d just taken into herself, but she didn’t even taste it. Not after the potency of that gift.
Nyriadne’s. It must be. She’s the one who brought it, after all.
Lunara eyed the young Demon beside her as she hobbled through the door. She didn’t look like she held that much power.
She’s so young, and probably still coming into it.
True. And she was part of Lyriat’s family. A royal of the Montrealm.
“Hurry up!” Nyri grunted a few minutes later, dragging Lunara’s stumbling body down the corridor.
“You’ve only got a couple of minutes left and we still have two turns to make and Hedda doesn’t like it when you’re late.
She’ll have you doing something humiliating like scrubbing the the floors in the main hall at the height of the luncheon service. ”
“Ach, away! Lyriat’s not going to let Hedda force one of his respected guests into doing anything of the sort.
” Caius appeared out of nowhere and sidled up to Lunara, grabbing her firmly around the waist and hoisting her up straighter.
“Come on, then, lass. Put your arm ‘round my shoulder. That’s it, nice and easy.”
Lunara choked back a sob. She couldn’t decide whether it bubbled up out of gratitude because he was doing most of the work for her, or because everywhere he gripped and bumped against her hurt. Spectacularly.
Or maybe it was because he, of all people, was being kind.
”Weeping shite,” he grunted when Lunara tripped over her own, numb feet. “I knew she’d insisted on you learning some basics, but this seems a bit far.”
“I would say this is standard for the Hedda regimen,” Nyri chirped.
Think she’s skipping just to rub it in that she can?
Probably not, but it certainly wasn’t helping Lunara’s mood.
They finally reached the main hall, staggering in like a pair of drunken revelers. Caius’s laugh boomed when he plopped her down onto a bench at one of the long tables and, help or not, she definitely thought about kicking him in the shins.
By some cosmic blessing, only Hedda and Faldir were within. Then again, it was only just registering that the windows around them were still dark and the space was being lit by the stones, not Solyrian.
Lunara slumped back, the table’s edge digging into her spine. “Why?” she whined. “Why am I awake when it isn’t yet daytime?”
Hedda huffed as she swaggered over, a vial pinched between her fingers. “Because it’s train with us now or everyone else later. Three, or three hundred. Your choice.”
Lunara was just getting ready to say later! when she caught a glimpse of herself in the window, the sweating, unkempt, miserable reflection in its inky surface staring back at her.
Lovely. You know…
If she went later, it would mean Brand being there. Seeing her. Like this.
Take the tonic and get the bleeding fuck out of here.
“Now!” Lunara winced when her voice echoed, piercing. Clearing her throat, she managed a far more collected, “Now is wonderful.”
Hedda smirked and uncorked the vial. “Cheers, Sorcerit. You made it through your first day of endurance training. Now, we teach you how to fight.”
Every morning, Nyri woke Lunara up, pulled her out of bed, and helped her change clothes.
Every morning, she brought a tray with that same blood, and that same single flower. She still hadn’t gotten to see the trilliatum where they lay beneath the tree in their blanket of white and yellow and green, but she didn’t quite mind.
Because every morning, Lunara felt a little bit better.
It may have been Nyri’s blood. She’d managed to coax Lunara into accepting more and more with each day, but Lunara secretly hoped the young Demon’s gifted offerings weren’t the reason.
That, instead, she was feeling stronger because of her own hard work and dedication.
That the mornings spent falling on her arse and the evenings spent heaving into the grass were amounting to something more.
She was dodging at least half of Faldir’s punches in their hand-to-hand sessions, even landing some of her own blows here and there. And she’d improved in her nighttime endurance trainings—sprinting faster, lasting longer, her stomach starting to behave despite how hard she was pushing.
At first, all she’d been capable of between practices was sleeping, passing out face-down on her mattress and wanting nothing more than to never move again.
Yesterday, everything had changed.
Lunara had been trudging to her rooms after training with Faldir, half asleep already, when she’d come upon a Demon limping in the opposite direction.
He’d offered her a pained greeting and lazy wave, and continued on.
She might have dismissed it as nothing out of the ordinary for the male if she hadn’t spotted the bloody footprints trailing behind him.
As ever, new energy had lit her veins at the sight of active suffering. There was no part of her that had been capable of ignoring him then.
Aldiat had shattered his kneecap falling from a ladder, a jagged laceration at the site.
His second serious injury within a couple of weeks, apparently, and a fact she’d had to pull from him after discovering the shoddily healed fracture in his wrist. In order to keep his new mate from worrying, the foolish male had sucked it up and kept going.
Lunara was starting to suspect that was true of most Demons.
While tending to him, she’d learned from Aldiat that, with preparations for the Occurrence taking place, injuries were piling up left and right.
Which simply wouldn’t do.
It had almost been too easy to commandeer a corner of the great hall afterwards, enlisting Nyri’s help to secure a set of large chairs and a table for her “supplies.”
News that a healer was in residence had blazed through the Horned City like a wildfire. Before Lunara had even finished setting up, a line of Demons long enough to span the room had formed.
Hands crushed by hammers, and bodies bruised by the stone. Splinters the size of her fingers. Shattered bones. Slices and gashes and scrapes.
Their enthusiasm might’ve had something to do with the fact the she refused to accept payment, but no matter.
The normalcy of it soothed something in her, filling a hole that had been missing since she’d agreed to Lyriat’s bargain, and she’d taken their pain into herself gladly.
It was worth it to feel like herself again.
Today was no different.
Her fake salves and useless bandages were strewn across the tabletop beside her, their herby scents wafting through the air.
She used them obsessively, excessively, to reinforce the illusion that she was just like any other Sorcerit healer.
Nothing out of the ordinary meant that there were no rumors to be spread.
She’d learned her lesson with Lyriat.
“You know, Gaulnir,” she chirped, “this is what shoes are for. Nails aren’t meant to go through the bottoms of feet.”
The old Demon grunted, lounging back in his seat with his legs stretched out to her. “We don’t wear shoes while raging, m’lady. ‘Sides, I hardly felt it ’til I left my form. Must’ve been one of the little’uns that left it there. They do try to help.”
Lunara gave him a genuine smile. “Well, worry not. By the time I’m done, it will be as though it never happened.” She threw Gaulnir a wink and got to work.
Her mind wandered while she carefully removed the spike of iron and set to mending him, her last healing for the day.
Stars above, what would it even be like to prepare for an Occurrence? To experience it? Be part of it?
No idea, but she’d give anything to feel the thrum of excitement growing with every day as it crept closer. To join together with her entire realm, her people. To welcome the power that the Sisters poured down, feeding her and the land.
The Occurrences only took place every fifty years. She should’ve had one under her belt and be preparing for another, but the last one in Nachthelliae had never happened. All because of—
No. Not that. Not him. Don’t think about him.
Lunara drew in a deep breath and willed her fingers to be steady as she reached across the table and grabbed a jar of cream.
Dipping her fingers in, she let the smell of night lavender reach deep and calm the raging storm threatening to break, rubbing it into Gaulnir’s foot as she pushed power out of herself and into him.
As the stories went, the Occurrence in the Evesong wasn’t all that different from the one here, or any of the other realms. Every half century, stunning celestial events took place throughout the year, power surging down from the cosmos.
In the Montrealm, it was a gift from Solyrian, the sunstar hitting a prism between the peaks of the Sacred Sisters and sending a beam of pure magic down through the Horned City and into their Solyr Stone.
Nachthelliae had Illamiata, the Tear Stone—though the jewel was small, no larger than a coin. Normally, in a few months, the Evesong would be readying for the twin moons to align above Starkeep, their power funneling down into Illamiata and whichever evil fucking creature was in possession of it.
No. No, no. You’re not meant to be thinking about him.
Another breath, another smile—that one nowhere near as authentic as the last.
She kept her hand over the Demon’s foot, so he wouldn’t see that it was healed already, and snatched up a roll of “enchanted” linen. After wrapping it carefully, she tied the ends in a neat little bow and gave Gaulnir’s leg a pat.
“The bandage may be removed tomorrow, my friend,” she said. “Until then, do try to avoid stepping on any other sharp objects?”
Gaulnir turned a fetching shade of pink above his greying beard. “I’ll do my very best, m’lady. I swear to the stars, it feels better already.”
Lunara bit the inside of her cheek as she nodded and waved him on his way.
The dwindling light outside told her it was nearing time for her to meet Hedda, and she sighed, stretching her own legs out.
This was the hardest part of starting the healings in between. She had to endure the pain she’d gathered over the hours while she ran and jumped and did whatever Hedda told her to. Thank the Sisters for Nyri and her blood gifts every morning.
They were the only thing keeping her going.