CHAPTER 9 CALLYN
CALLYN
Back in Briarlock, a fox once got trapped in a broken and splintered part of my barn wall.
The wood had pierced its body, and the animal’s terrified snarling spoke to something inside me, reminding me that it might be injured, but it was still a predator that could bite my hand off.
Right now, the scraver’s vicious growls are doing the same thing.
My heart won’t stop thumping against my rib cage, as if it’s willing to abandon this whole venture whether I want to or not.
But as I walk toward the creature in the shadows, I realize he’s only making noise. His claws have curled against the ground, and every muscle on his frame is flexed as if ready to spring. But really, he’s barely lifted his head.
And then, as I get close, I catch a whiff of the infection.
That is almost worse than the growling. My insides want to recoil.
“How long have you been like this?” I whisper.
He says nothing. Somehow, his gaze turns more threatening. Against my will, my feet stop.
“Since the attack on the palace,” Igaa says behind me.
That was weeks ago. I glance back at her, surprised to find that Alek has followed, waiting in the shadows. His arms are folded, but much like Nakiis, every muscle is taut and ready.
I think of that moment we were on the path and Igaa landed in front of us. He tried to jerk me behind him.
It’s hard to reconcile with the man who flinched away from me when we were riding in the trap.
That’s too complicated to examine right now. “What happened?”
“Xovaar came after him,” she says. “He has weapons of Iishellasan steel. Nakiis cannot heal the wounds.”
I touch a hand to my pendant, which is also of Iishellasan steel.
Igaa watches the motion and nods. “Yes, magesmith. Like yours.”
I swallow and turn back to the injured scraver lying curled in the dirt.
He hasn’t stopped growling, but it’s as if the effort to scare me off has worn him out, because the sound is no longer loud and threatening.
Instead, it’s a bit pitiful, like when that fox’s threatening snarls turned to painful keening.
I stop beside him and drop to one knee, just out of reach. His claws scrape against the ground, and I freeze.
Alek must be able to see the motion, because his voice is just as low and threatening when he says, “If you hurt her, scraver, I’ll rip you apart in a way that can’t be healed.”
My traitorous heart skips a little, and this time it has nothing to do with fear.
No, I tell my heart.
But then I remember him spinning with Nora in the arena, the way his voice was almost encouraging. I think about the joy on her face.
No. No, no, no.
My heart doesn’t care. It skips again anyway.
Nakiis has given up the growling, and now he’s all but panting against the ground.
There isn’t much light, but I’m close enough to see the wounds, and the infection seems profound.
He looks like he’s been stabbed in the shoulder, or maybe shot with an arrow.
There’s another puncture wound through his arm, and I can’t entirely tell, but it looks like there’s a tear in his wing.
As my eyes scan his form, I find other wounds. Claws have slashed across his abdomen, and those ridges are crusted with pus and dirt. Something impaled his thigh, too. He’s wearing trousers, but the bloodstains are thick, the injury still seeping.
“Clouds above,” I breathe.
“I do not want your help,” he says, and these words are spoken in a plaintive whisper. “Please.”
Instead of threatening, he’s turned to begging.
“I know,” I say. “But you definitely need it.” I hesitate, my gaze skipping over the wounds again. I might have saved Alek’s life, but that was nothing like this. “You should know,” I begin, “I’m not very practiced in healing—”
“Keep your magic,” he says. “I don’t want it.” But his head falls back against the ground, his eyes slipping closed.
I reach out, but my hand stops before touching him. I caught a glimpse of his fangs when he was growling, and they looked razor sharp.
— Please, Igaa says, the words carrying to my thoughts silently. Her begging is completely at odds with his. — Please save him.
I take a long, slow breath, then steel my nerves and reach for his arm. When my fingers brush his skin above the injury, he flinches a little, but his eyes don’t open.
“If you’re going to force me,” he says breathlessly, “just let the man kill me.”
That makes me go still. I don’t want to force him.
Igaa says something from behind me, and I don’t understand the word, but it sounds like profanity.
“You should have allowed Tycho to tether his magic to yours,” she snarls.
“Then he would still be here, and you would not be in this condition. Now you have left him at risk.” She swears again.
“He could be dead. He could be fighting Xovaar this very moment. And you will do nothing because you refuse to move past old harms.”
Nakiis says nothing. He doesn’t even move.
I don’t know what a lot of that means— tether his magic?— but something in the scraver’s silence makes me think he agrees.
Especially when he lets out a heavy breath and says, “Fine. Do it.”
I slide my hand down his arm until I find the first swell of infection. The cave is so cold, but his dark skin is unnaturally warm, especially around the wounds. I try to summon the magic, but nothing happens.
A cool breeze swirls through the space, and I shiver. Igaa’s voice speaks to my mind again. — You cannot force it, she says. — Have you no training?
“No,” I say. “None.” I glance back. “The only time it’s ever worked on other people was when I was afraid.”
“Close your eyes,” she says. “Think of those moments. Allow the magic to respond.”
I obey, feeling a bit foolish— and a bit afraid, considering I’m not sure I should trust Nakiis. But I think of Nora bleeding in the underbrush of the forest, choking on her own blood. Dying.
My chest clenches. The memory is too hard. I don’t want to think about that. The sparks and stars that usually signal magic in my blood are nowhere to be found. I shift my hand, desperate, and the scraver jerks away, making a sharp sound of pain.
“Sorry,” I say quickly. “It’s not working.”
“Good,” he hisses.
But it’s not good. I can see why Igaa is so worried.
“It worked when you saved me,” Alek says from behind me, and I realize he’s come closer. “Why?”
It’s a probing question, and I don’t really want to answer it.
Because the truth is that I’d begun to care for him. I’d begun to fall for him.
But maybe thinking of that moment loosens whatever blocked my magic, because the sparks and stars flicker in my veins. As I watch, some of the infection melts away.
Under my hand, the scraver lets out a breath. Some of the tension eases out of his muscles.
“Yes,” Igaa breathes from behind me. “You’ve found your magic.”
The wound itself doesn’t fully heal, but when the pus and swelling are out of the way, I can see that the puncture is half- closed— and it’ll likely heal altogether now that it can. I shift my hand to the next injury.
I wait for Alek to make another dig, or to possibly probe for an answer to his question, which I’ve left unanswered.
But he says nothing, so I glance back over my shoulder.
He’s standing in the shadows, his arms still folded.
His eyes are locked on what I’m doing, and it’s clear that the tension hasn’t left his frame.
I’m so unsettled by everything between us, especially since I don’t know if he’s an adversary or an ally. Sometimes I think he’s determined to be both.
“Scared?” I say.
A muscle twitches in his jaw, and his gaze darkens. He probably is scared.
But then I consider what he said earlier, when Nakiis was flexing those clawed fingers in the dirt.
If you hurt her, scraver, I’ll rip you apart in a way that can’t be healed.
It’s vicious and terrible and so very Alek. He’s terrified of magic. He’s terrified of these creatures.
But he still came with me. He’s standing there ready to fight for me.
And I don’t know what to do with any of it.
So I turn my gaze back to my task and let my magic do the work.
Once I’ve healed as much as I can, Nakiis is asleep— or possibly unconscious. Every muscle is slack, his wings a bit splayed in the shadows. When I express concern, Igaa says, “He has been suffering for weeks. He is exhausted.”
I wipe my hands on my trousers, looking past her for Alek, but I realize he’s no longer in the narrow cave.
“I sent your companion to fetch water from the creek,” Igaa says. “He did not go far.”
“I’m surprised he came,” I admit. I’m also surprised he willingly accepted a task, but I don’t say that.
“Did he truly try to kill Tycho?” she says.
I hesitate, then grimace. I remember the day Jax came to my bakery to tell me what had happened between Lord Alek and Tycho— but it was the morning after Alek had also come to see me, with burns on his arms and fury in his eyes.
Did he attack? Or did he defend himself? As usual, he always seems to be the villain and the savior simultaneously.
“I don’t know,” I say. “But maybe.” I study her. The purple and gray of her coloring is so different in the darkness of the cave, and it’s fascinating. She could melt into the wall if she needed to. “What did you mean about tethering their magic?”
“A magesmith can take hold of a scraver’s magic,” she says. “It allows a sharing, of sorts. Nakiis would have been able to heal the damage caused by the Iishellasan steel. He would’ve been able to stand against Xovaar.”
My eyebrows knit together. “Tycho refused?”
She shakes her head. “Nakiis was the one to refuse.” She lets out a sigh, then reaches to touch the pendant that hangs over my heart.
“As I said, our history with magesmiths is quite long and complicated. It is one thing to draw our magic through steel. It is quite another to take our magic directly from the source.”
Her voice is grave, and I think again of the way I learned that Tycho had access to the king’s magic.