Chapter 19
Veyyr must have seen me in that flash because the lightning completely dissipated as it hit me. “Tracker!”
“Storm Child.”
A growl in the darkness and then his hands found mine with an unerring directness that I wondered at. Had his bond to me made it that easy? Was there something I was missing.
His fingers slid over the backs of my hands, up my arms, over my shoulders, across the front of my chest and then up to cup my face, his hands big enough that he could slide his fingers into my hair and still hold me.
I couldn’t see him, but I could feel him and the tremors that rippled through his entire body. “Did you use too much power, bringing me back?”
“No.” His voice was rough, as if he’d been screaming. “No, the gorgon saved you.”
He drew me toward him and I went, like a lamb to slaughter.
Breath across my lips, the whisper of skin aching to be touched and his cheek was against mine. My hands found his hips, steadying myself under this onslaught of sensations.
Feeling him shaking as he held me, holding me tight to him, as if he were afraid I’d slip away.
It was all too much, too soon after…“Why did you try to kill her?”
“I thought you were in danger.” His voice rumbled in my ear as his hands slid until he was just holding me, his face tucked into the crook of my neck, arms pinning me to him, breathing me in as the tremors in him slowed, as he rubbed his face against my neck.
I was too tired to think fully straight, but I knew enough that I barely survived his recklessness. I closed my eyes and leaned into him as my legs threatened to buckle. “I’m tired, Veyyr.”
He scooped me up, again as if it was nothing to him. He carried me out of the tunnel and the bright light kept my eyes shut. I tucked my face against his neck, breathing him in, pretending for a moment I was safe. That he would protect me if I needed him to.
“Is she okay? What the fucking shitballs on a long-haired dog farm happened now?” Lucky’s bellow was matched only by Harrison yelling.
“Veyyr! What happened, is she okay?”
Sorrow screeched and tugged at my hair as he flew by. “Wake up, wake up!”
“She needs to rest,” Veyyr said. “Both of them do.”
I was lifted into the back of the truck, and I finally was able to open my eyes enough to see Rana curled up in the back of the truck bed, her eyes closed, but her chest rising and falling smoothly, the black lines that had etched across her skin, gone.
Veyyr had done what he’d said he would. Rana would be okay.
On my knees, I touched a hand to her ankle that was peeking out from under the blanket. There was no pain or fear. Whatever Thorn had done, whatever the cost had been to Veyyr (and I was sure there would be one) Rana was healing.
Sorrow landed next to me and hopped around, screeching. “Bad snake, bad snake!”
I put my back to the cab of the truck and motioned for Sorrow to hop on my lap.
Harrison joined his brother in the front of the truck and Lucky climbed in the back with me, Rana, and Sorrow.
“Seriously, what the fuck happened?” He sat to my left, the truck bed groaning as he settled.
As the vehicle lurched forward, I shook my head, not sure I wanted him to know about Stheno. “I got hurt; it was an accident.”
I mean, it was an accident—the blade had not been meant for me. But I couldn’t get over how fearful Veyyr had been, how damn well fucking tender he’d been with me after, and I wasn’t sure I liked it.
I preferred it when we were just running on chemistry and nothing else.
Tenderness was an area I didn’t want to explore with a man that I was quite sure was going to hang me out to dry the minute he no longer needed me. It was a way to have my heart broken.
“Damn. Good thing Veyyr went in for you then.” Lucky leaned his head back.
He might have been talking to me, but I closed my eyes as I hung onto Sorrow.
The fear of falling asleep and waking up with no memory hit me harder than usual, no doubt the near death experience not helping.
I held onto the sorrowbird harder, but he didn’t protest. He just played with the ends of my hair, as if he were grooming me.
I needed to stay awake…at least until the fear slid away.
As the daylight faded, I realized just how long we’d been in Stheno’s tunnel. Hours had passed while Veyyr and Stheno had fought to keep me alive.
I circled back through my brief time with my father. He’d said there were others, alive and out here in this world looking for me. That I wasn’t alone. That I was loved.
I touched my finger to the ring on my left hand.
Stheno had not even been able to tell me about the ring, other than it was the binding of the spell that had been woven into me.
The spell was a fucking beast and the way she’d spoken to Veyyr made me think that if the wrong person came into my circle, Thorn, I could still be bound to them—because she was the one who’d cast the spell over me.
Rolling the ring with my thumb, I forced myself to think about it. It was the item that carried the spell…if I cut it off, would that be the end of it, or would I just lose a finger?
I’d never even tried to pull it off. It was the only connection I had to my past.
Spinning it, I tugged it up toward my first knuckle, but there was no movement. Spin it, yes, tug it off?
Not a chance.
Now…well now I had to wonder just how I was going to deal with the spell.
I ran a hand over my head. Maybe a more pressing question than wondering just how I was going to survive working with Veyyr for three-fucking-years. I frowned, thinking about how he’d deliberately fooled me. Banking on me not knowing how the moon cycles worked anymore.
Sorrow cocked his head, swivelling so he could peer up at me with one eye. “Liar liar, pants on fire.”
“Exactly,” I ran a hand over his head and stifled a yawn. “But I’ll deal with that later.”
Lucky grunted. “Freaky bird, freaky girl reading the freaky bird’s mind, but I’m glad you’re okay.”
I smiled and closed my eyes, the fear slipping away as we bounced along. If I woke up tomorrow with no memory of the last week, then perhaps I wouldn’t feel so conflicted about Veyyr.
One could hope.
The next two days we drove north and west, avoiding another swarm of bleeders, a skirmish with a small band of men who thought they could take us—I hadn’t even had to get out of the truck before Veyyr sent a storm rolling over them, blocking them from getting to us as we continued.
Veyyr ignored me.
Harrison hovered.
Rana woke, ate, and slept, but didn’t talk much.
Sorrow and Lucky were the chattiest of the bunch of us and like Rana, I did little but sleep and eat what little I could stomach.
As much as I trusted Stheno, my body was healing almost as slow as a normal person. It wasn’t until the night of the second day that it felt as if something clicked inside of me, and the fatigue was gone.
Veyyr stared across the small campfire we all sat around, his eyes flicking over me. “You’re healed?”
My eyebrows rose. “You can tell?”
“Yes. The timing is good. We go down into the mineshaft tomorrow.” He tipped his head to the right of him.
With the fatigue gone the world snapped back into sharp relief. About thirty feet beyond us was the wide mouth of an old mineshaft. The top of it had been capped at some point, but now it was half ripped open. I stood and walked away from the fire to get a better look at it.
Bones of a hydra. They were a massive piece of the resurrection spell that Veyyr wanted to use on someone. What had Stheno said?
Read it when you reach the mineshaft.
I dug out the piece of folded paper that had been under the two vials of her blood and the three remaining pine nuts that dulled pain. The paper was from her huge book, and yet it folded down to a two by two square.
“Don’t go in!” Lucky shouted.
I waved a single finger back at him which only made him laugh.
I paused near the edge of the mineshaft, the square of paper fluttering lightly in my hand.
The air that rose up and out of the mineshaft came in waves, as if the space were breathing. Or maybe the breathing was from that of an animal.
A very big animal. Like a hydra that wasn’t dead perhaps? That would be a serious case of the shits.
The light wasn’t great, but I unfolded the paper and tipped it, so I caught the meagre light from the fire.
It was not a spell.
But a written note from Stheno.
“The ring will not come off as you likely know by the time you read this, but the numbers etched into it, I am not sure they are dates.
They could be a great many things. Bound as you are now to the Storm Lord, you need to find a way to convince him to go where you need to go.
A master of runes and symbols, perhaps even an alchemist could help you decipher them.
When I touched the ring, it held two magics within it.
One dark, perhaps even that of an old god, or demon.
The other was Witchborn. The Witchborn magic wove the numbers.
As to the Storm Lord, be careful. The bonds between you are strong and will only grow stronger but that does not mean you should consider it real.
If he dies, then you are free. Let him die, should the time come, Tracker.
My words here will fade and the spell will appear.
I blinked and that was exactly what happened. Her words were slipping off the page, as if they were melting and in their place was a spell of resurrection with the items Veyyr already had acquired struck through.
I touched my finger to the paper. There were only two items left.
The hydra bones and Water from the Heart of the Veil…
I frowned. Because it wasn’t the Water from the Heart of the Veil that had drawn my eyes.
The lines at the bottom regarding needing a Tracker to find the body of the one you wished to resurrect certainly were. He needed me to find a body.
The body of someone he obviously cared deeply about, and didn’t know where they were buried?