9. Chapter Nine
Chapter nine
C onsciousness wrests back control and the night sky fills my vision. The stone walls of the prison hallway reaching out towards the stars. But it’s blurry and I can’t hold the shape of the sparkling lights. The sting in my stomach has turned to a dull burn that radiates across my abdomen and down my leg.
My head bumps against something hard and I peel my eyes open again, the night sky still spinning above me. But there’s something else and I turn my head into it to get a clearer picture. It’s round, and slightly shiny. And so close.
I squint.
A button.
I push back, only to hiss in pain at the movement. So I take the coward’s way out and curl into the person that carries me, my cheek resting on the firm expanse of their chest.
I close my eyes and try to expel the pain on my exhales.
Eventually, I’m jostled slightly as the person – man – lies me gently on a high surface and I struggle to prop myself up on one elbow and look around, holding my stomach with my other hand.
The wellness centre.
Its roof isn’t open to the sky here, being on one of the lower levels, but the large arch windows set into the walls normally let in a lot of light. At this time of night it’s lit with only the soft bulbs that run the perimeter of the room.
A man, the one I assume carried me here, stands at the bench that lines the wall of windows, his back to me. I glance around again, waiting for the healer on call, but when they don’t appear my gaze travels back to the man. The shape of him is broad and strikes a small note of recognition, but I can’t place who he is – either prisoner or concierge.
I watch his back as he washes his hands in silence, an unusual, but welcome, sense of quiet falling over my mind with the rhythm of his movements.
As he turns to face me, I notice the dark mark on his neck, just above his right shoulder, and a flickering tendril of a memory sparks something in my stomach – strong enough to paint my cheeks with warmth.
Just like the green of the forest is inky in the night, so are this man’s eyes as he looks at me. The hard lines of his face turn harder when he focuses on the hand I still have clutched at my stomach. Slowly, he approaches where I half sit, half lie, on the bench.
‘Can I have a look?’ he gestures to my middle, and I swallow.
Giving myself a moment before I take my hand away and look at myself. The ivory fabric of my dress is now sticky with an expanse of blood larger than my hand, the fabric cleanly sliced. It sticks to my leg where blood has run there, too.
My palm and between my fingers are wet.
I swallow the bile that starts to rise, the room beginning to spin again.
‘Easy,’ he says, taking my shoulders. ‘How about you lie down?’
I try to nod but my head slumps forward instead and he moves me himself, placing a hand behind my head as he lies it down on the bench.
‘I’m going to take a look,’ he says, and I groan my consent.
Keeping my eyes closed, promising myself I will not be sick, I feel him tear apart my dress a bit further. Exposing more of my skin, but giving me the dignity of not raising the dress up my legs. I wince as he gently prods around my stomach, palpitating the soft tissue there.
A sudden loss of warmth prickles my side and I open my eyes to find him gone. Scanning what I can see of the room quickly, I find him opening and closing the overhead cupboards on the walls that run back towards the door.
The deep brown skin of his arms is the same as when I met him in the clearing, but the shimmering on his neck is all but invisible in this light – as if I have imagined it and am trying to will it back into existence.
I watch him as he approaches me again – also watching me but saying nothing. A warm cloth drags on my skin as he clears away the blood and around the wound. Then he holds his hand there, a grounding weight just inside my hip. He pulls himself up short as if he’s just remembered something.
‘I can get you a professional healer if you prefer? Or a magically gifted one?’ he asks softly. ‘I assume you have very talented Arkanans here.’
‘Do you know how to do it well?’ I ask.
He nods. ‘But manually. Mostly.’
‘Okay.’
I close my eyes again and listen to him breathe in and out, imagining the creases I now know exist at the corners of his eyes and not really understanding why I didn’t request one of the magical healers I know. Perhaps because Blossom and I got drunk with one once. But we do actually have very talented healers – Arkanans – here. Or if it’s because, for some unidentifiable reason, I feel like I can just be me in this moment. I don’t need to have all the answers or make the calls, and he won’t judge me for it. I don’t need to be the unruffled concierge. Nor the second best option for everything.
A little voice wants to scoff at me that I don’t actually know this man, but I drape an arm over my face and push the thought away. If I don’t have to look at my stomach again, I will take whatever help I can get.
‘I will use some numbing gel and help it along myself, but this still might sting a bit,’ he warns.
A moment later a cold and, yes, stinging sensation burns its way along my lower stomach. A heartbeat later it’s tingling instead.
‘I’m going to stitch it, okay?’
‘Fuck,’ I mutter as my gaze flies open to see if he’s serious. ‘Do you have a drink?’
He grins and my heart just about stops.
‘You won’t need it for this, promise.’ He looks at my middle and then back up to my face. ‘How about after you get through it?’
A small smile tugs at my own mouth and I pretend it’s because of the hot tingle on my stomach and nothing at all to do with the weight of his hand on my middle. Or the dimple in the left side of his face when he smiles. Or the deep green of his eyes.
Nothing at all.
A gentle, but slightly uncomfortable, pulling starts in my lower stomach. Towards my belly button, but also near my hip. The tugging seems to be everywhere and in a single place all at once. And it brings a swell of nausea stemming from wherever it begins and up my throat. I slam a hand over my mouth and swallow hard.
‘Breathe through it,’ he says, his voice gentle and rough at the same time. ‘There’s not too many, I’m almost done.’
Tears leak down my cheeks at the discomfort and I inhale and exhale deeply, as instructed, through my nose because I don’t dare remove my hand from my mouth.
Several minutes, and countless breaths, later he announces we’re done and gives my stomach a final wipe that I can only partially feel. My hand is small in his when he takes it and helps me sit up, lifting the top portion of the tall bed for me to lean against.
Just like in the clearing, our hands stay linked for no apparent reason.
He looks down at where I sit on the bench, towering over me. A ripple travels through the green of his eyes and into the set of his shoulders.
‘I’m sorry,’ he says. ‘About the cut.’
I look down at the blood on my dress, still not quite believing how it got there. I frown, why would he apologise?
The shape of his shoulders as I watched him in here starts to overlay with what I could see in the grandroom. Behind the massive grey wings.
‘Oh,’ I say as a weighted uncertainty starts to take the place of the jitters that have been dancing under my skin. ‘You’re the new—’ I start, but realise I have a better question and look him straight in the eye. ‘Why did you do that?’ I look at my stomach again. ‘ How did you do that? You cut me.’
He looks genuinely pained. ‘It was … a reflex. I don’t normally have them out when there’s no direct threat. But I was ordered that they be … on display.’
He drops my hand.
‘But it shouldn’t have happened. I-I wasn’t expecting anyone to touch me. I’m sorry.’
He doesn’t look away as he apologises for the second time and the intensity in his stare burns into mine. As it did at the mourning ceremony. And in the meadow when he came to check on me, gave me the flower.
My stomach does a strange little flop as that look of his calls to something in me.
‘How bad is it?’ I ask, unable to break his gaze.
‘Ten stitches,’ he says solemnly. ‘It will heal neatly but you will likely have a small scar. I’m—’
A small laugh escapes me and he stares at me, brows lifting ever so slightly.
‘Sorry,’ I let out a final, breathy laugh. ‘That’s just … not as bad as I was expecting, given how much blood there was. I thought I might have been ripped in half.’
It’s his turn to laugh in surprise. ‘I do have some self control, you know.’
‘The next time I’ll try to remember I won’t be severed and not pass out on you.’
Seriousness descends, darkening his features.
‘It won’t happen again,’ he says. ‘I don’t make a habit of hurting innocent people.’
I nod and the room falls quiet as we watch each other, my mind starting to swirl with the implications of a new Warden. Of this man being Warden. That, on one hand, I will be working to make sure his takeover of the prison is smooth and, on the other, working to directions by his predecessor – ones that put me in direct contact with a prisoner from Vana and crossing the forbidden line between our prisons. I swallow.
‘Given we’ll be working closely together,’ I say slowly, ‘I think that’s a good thing.’
He cocks his head in question and my tummy spins under the cut as I follow the action. Remembering that we didn’t introduce ourselves in the meadow and he has no idea who I am or what my role is here.
‘Are you not the new Warden?’ I ask, the doubt clear in my voice and the pulling of my brows I can feel.
‘I am, and you are Lu—’
‘Luka, yes.’
His face lightens. ‘I was told about you. Now I understand why it was you who spoke at his send off.’ He smiles slightly and my stomach continues its merry-go-round at the dimple that tries to appear. ‘I think you’ve just made this job a bit more interesting, Luka.’
His dimple is a little too captivating and I slide off the bed and stand, a fraction shaky, and he grips my elbow to keep me upright.
The door to the wellness centre flies open and I flinch, the new Warden pulling me into him slightly.
‘Luka!’ Blossom says as she runs into the room, her hair flying everywhere. ‘I’ve been looking all over for you.’
Her mouth drops open when she joins us, her focus bouncing between the new Warden – even as she appears to not quite be looking straight at him – and the blood on my dress.
‘What the fuck—’
‘I’m fine, Bloss,’ I say, fixing her with a look. ‘The new Warden fixed me up.’ I frown at her and then look back at the new Warden taking Blossom in as he lets me go. ‘Did no one else notice?’
‘I think it happened faster than you realise,’ he says. ‘Anyone who saw you probably thought you’d just had too much Silver Sparkle.’
‘Oh.’
‘Exactly what did happen?’ Blossom asks, her eyes narrowing and subtly trying to move closer to me.
He looks at me, ready and waiting for me to tell her. Almost as if he’s waiting for my open condemnation. Which seems … a little excessive.
‘An accident Blossom, I’m fine.’
‘It was my wings,’ he says, surprising both Blossom and me. ‘She bumped into them and—’
‘Your blades came out,’ she finishes for him.
He nods.
‘Okay,’ she says slowly. ‘Makes sense … I suppose. I know how sensitive you Karaylia can be.’
Karaylia. That does actually make sense, my father would have been mortified I hadn’t thought about that detail when evading Nix’s reach. River, too. He was so proud to have that magic line surge through his system to the surface. Even if I did worry my father would use him for some kind of research. She looks at me again and lifts her perfectly arched brows. ‘I assume your aversion to blood didn’t make this any easier?’
I grimace, remembering being carried by the new Warden. ‘Possibly not.’
She looks between us, visibly exhaling but still carrying tension in her shoulders. ‘I’ll give you a moment to finish up while I call off the search party.’ She points at me before flicking him a pointed look. ‘And then I’m taking you home.’
I wait until she’s left the wellness centre before I turn back at the new Warden and find him already looking down at me with a searing gaze that seems to strip me bare. Is breaking the law under his nose something I will be able to do? I’m not even sure I want to go against everything I have been trying to support in my service. But, at the same time, the thought of leaving Nix and River here without me – at least without their own exit firmly in place – claws at my mind. And I trusted Claudius, I just can’t believe he would tell me to do something so wrong if there wasn’t a really good reason. I just wish I knew what that was.
‘It’s going to be strange calling you Warden,’ I say. ‘The other one – he was—’
‘Don’t call me Warden,’ he says. ‘I’m Quillian.’
Blossom watches me intently as I leave Quillian in the wellness centre and walk with her down the hallway.
‘I need to swing past Nix’s to let him know I’m okay,’ I say.
‘ Are you okay?’
There’s an angry sort of uncertainty in Bloss’s tone I don’t hear often and I brush a hand over my cut, gently touching where Quillian has stuck a white gauze bandage.
‘I truly am,’ I say. ‘It wasn’t his fault. I was behind him and, as Nix reached for me, I overcompensated. I wouldn’t have wanted to touch them even when they were feathers, but it might have been handy to remember they’re lethal on a hair trigger as well.’
She laughs, but it’s a little grim. ‘You need to stop ignoring all you know about magic manifestations, even if we are on dampeners.’
‘What’s wrong?’
A loud exhale leaves her lips. ‘I … don’t like that you got cut, even if it was an accident.’
‘Bloss,’ I say in a placating tone. She has a low tolerance point for the mistreatment of women - something I greatly admire but I don’t want misplaced. ‘It was an accident. I would tell you if it wasn’t.’ I almost want to smile at the knowledge I now have a team of people here with me. ‘I’d even let Nix and River at him if he’d done wrong by me.’
I glance sideways at her and her shoulders lower a fraction at that statement. But looks sideways at me, an unspoken acknowledgement that she’s not particularly happy with the knife situation, either.
We arrive at Nix and River’s door, knocking this time as we glance back down the hall. Although, now that other prisoners and concierges have seen Nix and River are here, and Blossom and I are together in our uniforms, I feel a fraction less worried about being seen here. It’s not unusual for concierges to be visiting the prisoner rooms for all manner of reason, but I don’t want to make it obvious that this one holds particular significance.
The door all but jerks off its hinges as Nix answers the knock. His hair is on end and his mouth agape as he looks at my torn, bloodied dress.
‘Fucking bastard ,’ he spits, as Blossom and I walk past him and into their living room. My stomach shifts uncomfortably at the fire in Nix’s tone.
River sits on the decadent, pale couch and glances between us.
‘I’m fine Nix, it was an accident. I came to tell you as much,’ I say gently.
‘My ass, it was an accident. He injured you!’
Blossom stands opposite River and they share a look before returning their attention to Nix and me. The worry in her features is clear – as is her rising anger. I fight the heat that races across my face. The tremble in my fingers that screams this isn’t like him – he’s protective, yes, but not so … aggressively so. This isn’t what I want her to see. What I want to see. But there’s no surprise on River’s face. Just a … watchful sort of weariness.
‘And he apologised, and helped me,’ I say gently, pushing away the disappointment in Nix that is spreading. The little bubble that appeared somewhere near where my heart lives when I’d opened my eyes to Quillian is taking the brunt of it. A tiny, happy little bubble.
‘I don’t want you near him,’ he says and I take a step back.
No. Nix might be angry that I have been hurt, but he doesn’t get to take it out on me.
‘He’s my boss, Nix,’ I snap, ‘and since when do you call the shots on who I go near?’
He presses his lips together and clasps his head in his hands. It’s clear there’s so much more sitting underneath his anger than tonight. Something that’s causing him constant pain. My heart aches.
I sigh, taking his hands. ‘Nix, I’m fine. It’s fine. I will heal. He helped. End of story. But he’s my boss and I need to work with him if I’m to have any hope of seeing out my duty, helping the two of you, and fulfilling Claudius’s wishes, okay? What have you got against him, anyway?’
He looks at the still silent River, an unusual thing for him, and nods reluctantly – only answering one of my questions.
I give them both another beat of silence to explain what tonight was all about, one neither of them bothers to fill, and I sigh inwardly. Willing myself to be patient with them. To not press Nix into an even longer standoff for what he will and won’t share.
‘I’m exhausted,’ I say, ‘and I have things I need to do before sunrise, including sleep.’ I look at the three of them, unnaturally quiet, the weight of spending the best part of the first half of the night in the grandroom, and then the wellness centre, dragging at me. There’s an undercurrent between Nix and River, and Blossom is observing them closely. I don’t tell them part of my exhaustion is trying to work out all the things they’re not saying. ‘I need you to hurry this up.’
Slowly, Blossom rises and joins me back near the door. I didn’t even get to sit down.
‘He’s the reason we’re here,’ Nix says from where he now sits next to River.
River punches him in the arm and Nix curses, but it’s nothing compared to the freefall that’s begun through my centre.
‘How is that …’ I trail off, knowing they can’t say. They just watch me, the words unable to leave their mouths. But I don’t miss the suspicion in Nix’s almond eyes. Like he can see on my face Quillian has had more of an impact on me than he’d like.
‘I’ll be extra careful,’ I say quietly. Unsure what of.
Only that I need to find that woman of the Warden’s and find out why she’s so important.
Quickly.
‘We’re going to Vana tomorrow,’ Blossom says, looking at me as if hoping I might contradict her.
I nod.
With the Warden’s mourning ceremony now over, I will have as much time as I’m going to get to slip away. As soon as Traelen and the Hunters have left the island, I will be heading to the other side. Exactly what I will do there still feels a little … uncertain. But I will find whatever I can.
The room is silent for a moment, the only movement Nix’s hand through his hair. But he doesn’t voice any of the objections he clearly has. As if he’s resigned to the fact I will follow through with the task Claudius gave me. At least for now. I know him well enough to know this isn’t necessarily the end of it. And it’s certainly not the end of his views on Quillian.
‘That’s good,’ River says carefully. ‘Just before dawn, go to the perimeter – there’s a cut out in the wall where you can take cover. It’s to the east side. Cortane should be there – she goes as many mornings as she can. She’ll meet you there.’ A rush of cool relief washes over me even as it leaves a crawling sensation in its wake. Just how much do these two know? ‘Ask if she likes strawberries. And do whatever you can to get her to trust you – it will be hard won, but worth it.’
My bed is a sanctuary I can’t deny after I’ve peeled my ruined dress from my skin and washed the remaining dried blood off. I slip my gold sleep dress on and settle myself in. My mind whirls as I think through all the possibilities of what Nix could have meant. What role Quillian had in them being here – was it their sentence to Vana, or their unexpected appearance in this prison he is referring to?
But he doesn’t trust him. That much is abundantly clear.
Which means I shouldn’t either.
Even still, as I roll over and sleep finally starts to close over the plans Blossom and I have been making to go to Vana following River’s instructions – slip out in the night, get across the band of light without being seen, wait in the space he told us, win over the prisoner – the last thing I’m aware of is the red flower beside my bed.
And the memory of the weight of Quillian’s hand on my hip.