Chapter 39 #2
With the last glimmer of fury in my veins, I slammed my palms over the soil, and the same as the other assassin, barbed roots pierced through their boots, pinning them in place. Alive but screaming in agony as the bloody jagged roots tore through their toes and feet.
I slumped back, then forced my limbs to keep moving and crawled to the king.
The sword remained lodged in his back, and the soft bronze tint to his skin had gone pale. Blood soaked his tunic and the soil beneath him. Too much blood.
Erik let out a curse when he tried to shift. He’d taken a strike in my place. Teeth clenched, I leaned behind him and took hold of his shoulders. When I tried to lay him back, Bloodsinger leaned forward. “Don’t.”
“Stop shifting,” I urged softly. “You’ll cause more damage.”
For a few moments he resisted, but soon enough, pain or exhaustion took hold, and he slumped onto his side, his head on my lap. Mindlessly, my fingers raked through his thick hair with one hand while my other kept a hand on the hilt of the blade, trying to keep it from sinking deeper.
“I mean what…I say, love.” Erik lifted his dazed eyes to mine. “Shouldn’t…touch me. Not with all the blood.”
Three hells. I closed my eyes, desperate to steady my pulse. His blood was poison, and here I was practically bathing in it.
He coughed. “Don’t get…any inside you.”
I nodded briskly, shifting my legs to avoid the open wounds of my thighs touching him. He would fight me off if he knew there were gashes on my skin, and if he fought me off, he’d bleed out, no mistake.
“I’ll do my best not to eat your blood, Bloodsinger.”
Another cough, but it sounded more like the bark of a laugh. He winced. “I should’ve…filled your…ass with sand, love.”
I placed a palm on his cheek and forced a smile. “You should’ve, you stupid fool.”
“Erik!” Tait’s rough voice came from the bedchamber.
“Out here!” I shouted.
Tait filled the garden doorframe, shirtless, and his dark hair wilder, as if he’d been sleeping. Perhaps not alone. Two guards had blades raised at his back, and behind them, Celine and Larsson tried to get a look.
“Get your hands off him.” Tait’s face twisted with rage.
Well, damn.
How it must look. Blood all over my hands, my grip around the blade stabbed into the king. One dead man, and two more impaled by roots.
In quick steps, Tait was at my side, and yanked my hair. I cried out against the burn, but kept a tight hold on Erik’s shoulders.
“Release her, Cousin,” Erik slurred. He tilted his chin toward the guards. “Look elsewhere for your king’s killers.”
You’re not going to die. I repeated the thought over and over, afraid to speak it out loud.
“I might,” he whispered, glassy eyes on me.
“No. I’ve seen worse wounds,” I whispered. “It’d be a shame to die over this one, Bloodsinger.”
“Right.” He closed his eyes, a sly grin twisted in the corner of his mouth. “I…forgot you were the one…with a blade in your gut.”
I snorted. My fingers stroked his hair swifter, as though the race of my pulse determined the speed of my touch. “It’s not in your gut; it’s lower. Quit making this worse than it is to get sympathy.”
“Bring Murdock,” Tait snapped at Celine and Larsson in the doorway.
“He’s drunk,” Larsson said. “I mean it. Bastard is passed out in the great hall with his hands on the bare breasts of Sheeva.”
Larsson shuddered and grimaced.
“Then get him a damn tonic to clear his head,” Tait snapped.
“No time.” I tugged on Tait’s arm and pointed to the blood pooling under Erik.
Tait’s skin deepened to a heated red.
“We need to remove the blade,” Larsson said. “It’s too near the spine.”
“He’ll bleed too swiftly,” Tait insisted. “Send for the boneweavers in the vales. We will tend to it until they—”
“I can help.” I blinked, stunned to realize the words had come from me. But now that they were there, I lifted my chin in a show of determination. “I’m bonded with the king. He takes properties of my fury—wouldn’t I take properties of his?”
“She knows he doesn’t need a tree, doesn’t she?” Celine muttered to Larsson.
My cheeks warmed. “Not earth fury, his…healing blood.”
No one spoke for a moment, until Erik grunted. “No.”
I ignored him and implored Tait. “I can help him.”
“You do not have the voice of the sea, Lady,” Larsson offered, but his head tilted with a bit of curiosity. “Perhaps your blood might poison him.”
Ulterior motives, Songbird?
I pointed my glare at Erik. His brow was coated in sweat, and he tried to grin at his own tasteless sense of humor.
You die, then you take my heart to the Otherworld. Feel that, Serpent.
Erik’s eyes darkened against the furrow to his brow. When I tightened my hold around his shoulders, one of his hands gripped my wrist, squeezing gently.
“He can help me,” I whispered. “He cannot heal himself, but what if my blood could if he sang?”
“We’re running short on time, then.” Larsson shoved his hands in his pockets. “I say give the woman a chance. Might be the only way to deal with the king.”
“No.” Tait shook his head. “There’s too much risk.”
“Fine, if it doesn’t work, then I’ll use my earth fury,” I said.
“Again, the king needs a boneweaver, not a shrub,” Celine insisted.
“My magic connects to the properties of each plant,” I said. “Are your boneweaving herbs not plants? I might be able to sense those that can heal him.”
“Erik’s blood is different, earth fae,” Tait snapped. “His blood is not only poisonous, it thins too quickly. Bleeds too much.”
“Tell her all my weak…weaknesses, Cousin.”
Damn fool. I glared at Erik. I hoped he sensed that thought. If his smirk was any clue, I guess he did.
“And he’s bleeding too much now.” Larsson removed his hat and scratched his sweaty head. “Let her try.”
“You’re mad.” Tait scoffed. “You think I’d let her put hands on my king under the guise that she’s healing him?”
I gestured to Bloodsinger’s wound. “Do you have a choice?”
“No,” Erik warned. “It’s too…great a risk.”
Tait ignored him and glared at me. In the next breath, he had one palm covering my face. I let out a muffled shout but broke it off soon enough. Tait wasn’t attacking; he was…doing something else.
A slow, gentle hum rolled over his tongue. Tait had a beautiful voice, and the more he sang, the more warmth coated his palm and bled into my skin, and in the next breath it was over.
Tait wrenched his hand away. He flicked his gaze to Erik, then to the guards. “Bring her whatever stores of medicinal herbs we have, and get the king into the room.”