Chapter 71
August’s control returned all at once. Then came the pain, sharp and white-hot. He folded forward, cradling the injured hand as blood streamed from the place where his finger should’ve been. He blinked hard, struggling to stay upright.
Someone shouted Felix’s name.
Sebastian snatched something from the ground, then turned and ran. Lark sprang to her feet, fury contorting her face as she threw up a handful of lead balls and flung them out, striking one of the guards.
Sebastian and the others were already gone.
August swayed, disoriented and nauseous. His entire world felt off balance, and he searched desperately for something to hold onto. For something to keep him from spiraling.
For Felix.
His eyes slid across the square, catching on Marlow hunched over a body on the ground.
Gideon, August remembered. He’d killed Gideon. He swallowed hard, forcing himself to look at the damage he’d caused. But it wasn’t Gideon’s body beside her.
No.
Marlow pressed her hands against the sides of Felix’s head, her eyes glowing. She folded forward to touch her forehead to his, and her lips moved quickly as she spoke to him.
He’d hurt Felix. Given the darkness back. But it would be fine. He could fix it.
He called on his magic as he rushed forward.
There was so much blood. It wasn’t Felix’s. It couldn’t be. The darkness couldn’t have caused this.
August dropped beside him, knees hitting the stones hard.
No no no.
Felix’s blue eyes stared blankly at the grey sky. Blood threaded through his light hair from the dark hole in his temple.
A ragged sob tore out of Marlow. Her body shook as she pressed her hands to his chest, trying to heal him again. But there was nothing to heal. He was already gone.
Her hands curled into fists, slamming into his chest over and over.
Felix was dead.
August felt himself shattering.
He couldn’t lose Felix. Not now. He couldn’t.
He squeezed his eyes shut, met by the violent stream of freshly returned memories.
The pain of the scalpel down his forearm. The warm spread of blood.
Too much.
The ache of drawing in power from the veil when his entire body was wracked with exhaustion.
“Once more, Mo Aesling.”
Too much.
His mother’s unforgiving scowl. “I’ve given you a task. You will complete it.”
“No, I don’t want to!”
He could see the corpse in the training room. He felt the scream that tore free from his chest, the magic buzzing angrily in his fingers, beneath his skin. The desperation and pain and resentment.
The memory burned through him like fire. He felt the weight as he sent the anchored forward. He hadn’t meant to hurt her. He’d only wanted her to stop. She fell, and panic, grief, regret tightened around his throat like a noose.
The scorched handprint on her arm. He remembered now. It was his. He knew how she got it. And he knew how to save Felix—but he’d have to be quick.
August’s eyes snapped open. “Back up,” he whispered, and when Marlow looked up at him with a frown, dirt stuck to her wet cheeks, he tried again, louder. “Back up!”
She flinched, but complied.
He didn’t wait to see if she was clear before yanking the edges of the remaining tear around them. The cold settled over him like a sheet.
August closed his eyes and reached out with his magic, feeling the places where the anchored made the air shiver, desperately searching for the right one. He wasn’t sure how long it took, but when he found it, he knew.
He clenched his fists and drew the mist in, then pressed his hand to Felix’s chest, fingers splayed as he forced it back where it belonged.
Felix’s skin turned painfully cold beneath his touch, solid like ice.
August took a shaky breath, then drew in the inky energy of the Hollow Dark, and set to work on healing the wound.