14. Chapter 14
Chapter fourteen
“ T hey’re getting bolder since Willa’s arrival,” Sam muses, surveying the five sleeping bodies around us.
I jostle one of them lightly with the toe of my boot, a blonde I’ve never seen before. I tell myself this doesn’t mean anything—there are thousands of Strayed living in the underground tunnels of the Hollows, it’s not like I’d be familiar with all of them. But his foreign appearance unsettles me nonetheless, because it’s a stark reminder of what will happen if they ever get their hands on Willa.
More depravity. More death.
In the two centuries since their king’s death, the Strayed have been festering quietly beneath the earth, an evil I’ve never had the strength to entirely eradicate. It’s a delicate balance—using enough of my power to scare them back into their holes, while not destroying myself in the process—one that is on the verge of collapsing entirely. Before Willa, just the threat of my magic was enough to keep them at bay, but now, they’ve glimpsed a way to return to their former glory.
Using Willa to overthrow me.
I scrape my fingers roughly through my hair, releasing a breath through my teeth. The throbbing in my head has risen to an untenable degree and my muscles are so fatigued, it’s a miracle I’m still on my feet. It’s been so long since I’ve been forced to use so much magic in a such a short amount of time, and after the events in Caelum harbor, and Willa’s beast afterward, I’d been hardly fit to do more than collapse on my bed and sleep away the pain.
But then Adira sent the signal that the Strayed were in my forest, far too close to the precious children hidden in the Grove, and I couldn’t let it stand. I hesitate to think what would have happened if Sam hadn’t been with me this time, able to knock them out cold with his power—what would have happened if I’d been forced to use my magic again.
“What do you want me to do with them?” he asks, gazing down at the little girl nearest him. I turn away at the devastation reflecting in his eyes, swallowing down a similar ball of emotion in my own throat.
Children always appear so innocent when they’re sleeping, even these ones who are not actually children at all, but older than I am. It’s better not to see them as young—or even as human—if we want to survive any of this. But one of the best and worst things about Sam is that he sees the humanity in everyone. Even when, like me, they don’t deserve it.
“Bring them to Adira for questioning.”
Sam grimaces.
“They aren’t just getting bolder, Sammy. They’re getting more reckless. The kingdom is terrified as it is. If they figure out how Willa broke through the wards and use her to lure more children here—” I cut myself off with a violent shake of my head.
That won’t happen. I’ve shredded myself apart to keep the balance for more than two hundred years. I won’t lose it now. “We need intel, and as unfortunate as it is, I’m not up to torture tonight. So, Adira will have to do.”
I’m asking too much of my friend. I know it and can’t change it, not when things are as tenuous as they are. Relations between Sam and Adira have been strained for years now, and I’ve done my best to studiously avoid asking anything about it. I can hardly bear the weight of my own pain—I’m in no condition to offer to shoulder another’s.
Sam twists his hands in front of him hesitantly. “I don’t think she’ll like me marching into the Grove in the middle of the night.”
“No one appreciates anyone marching through their home while they’re trying to sleep, Sam. Perhaps you could try more of a gentle walk.”
He sets me with an unamused look. “You know what I mean, Niko.”
I only grin, pleased I’ve annoyed him enough to ditch the titles. “Adira will understand. She knows what’s at stake better than any of us.”
Sam hardly appears convinced.
“Star above, have some courage, would you? Do you think she’s just going to hex you on sight or something?”
“If she was capable of such a thing, I think that’s exactly what she’d do.”
“What in the second star did you do to the woman?”
Sam shoots me a dirty look. “You’re really going to lecture me about how to treat women, when you’ve got one locked inside your house right now?”
I roll my eyes. “Not locked. Sleeping. ”
“Against her will.”
“Semantics, Samuel. And I did warn you of Adira’s nature years ago. Tempestuous on her best days. A literal tempest on her worst.”
A knowing smile tugs at the corner of Sam’s mouth. “And if I were to warn your ship away from the hurricane of Willa Darling?”
I’d stand on the deck and let her consume me, I think ruefully, before changing the subject. “You can take the carriage. I’ll walk."
Annoyance prickles hotly down my neck at Sam’s worried glance at my fingers. The tremors in my hands have grown increasingly violent in only the few minutes we’ve been standing here. I ball both hands into tight fists, and glare at him hatefully.
“Do you think your king isn’t powerful enough to walk in his own kingdom?”
The soft look in Sam’s eyes immediately shutters, and I’m both thankful and ashamed. I hate reminding him of the power dynamic between the two of us, hate that it exists at all, but I’ve no tolerance for pity. It only makes the pain of my condition more unbearable. On a different night, I would have the capacity to tread more carefully, but I’ve nothing left now. Wrung out and ragged, I’ll be lucky if I make it back to the gates without collapsing. I don’t have the energy for anything else.
“You’re a real bastard, Your Majesty,” he says with a sigh, before turning to haul the first body into the carriage.
I don’t bother to disagree.
By the time I make it back to the Lunaedon, the tremors in my fingers have grown so frequent, I can no longer manage a fist at all. The stiffness in my limbs weighs down my every step like I’m wading through waist-deep mud, and the pounding in my head is now akin to being stabbed through the eyeballs. Even the dim light of the torches lining the path home is torture, and for a wild moment, I consider collapsing right here and sleeping away the pain.
Only the thought of another of Willa’s imagined beasts keeps me trudging miserably forward until I finally reach the front steps. Marina is huddled up against one of the towering front doors, an emerald-green cloak wrapped around her like she’s been waiting awhile.
She immediately leaps to her feet, hurrying forward to meet me on the bottom step.
“Sam and I are both fine,” I assure her listlessly. I know Marina worries, but just like I didn’t have the energy for Sam’s kindness, I’m not in the mood for hers either.
You look like shit, she signs.
I laugh weakly. “Well then, I look exactly how I feel.”
Marina doesn’t respond, her eyes darting behind me as she dances nervously on the balls of her feet. An immediate wariness threads through me. The little pixie is rarely quiet, and even more rarely is she nervous. “Out with it, Rina.”
Her hands explode in a fury of movement. Willa woke while you were gone and left in one of the carriages.
I stare at Marina’s fingers for far too long as my death begins to writhe and tremble around me. It lashes against my skin like shards of glass, and black edges my vision as I struggle to remain conscious; to not give myself over to the bliss of darkness.
“When.” It’s more of a growl than a word, but Marina answers anyway.
About an hour ago, she signs solemnly. She was determined. I figured it was better to show her the carriage house than to let her leave on her own with nothing. Her hands hesitate as sudden fury sparks her eyes, and she glares at me. I would have knocked her over the head and tied her to the chair, but someone ordered her not to be harmed.
The accusation is clear in Marina’s eyes and absurd laughter bubbles in my throat despite my exhaustion. “While I appreciate your fervor, if we begin walloping people over the head every time we don’t agree with their choices, I’m afraid we’d have time for nothing else.”
Marina shrugs as if to say she’d greatly enjoy passing the time that way. You’re getting soft in your old age, Niko.
I don’t feel soft; I feel wrung out. Like a dry sponge being squeezed for its last drops.
Collapsing onto the closest stair, I squeeze my eyes shut and allow my death to spiral out from me. Not only the power contained in my ribbons, but the death trapped in my heart the moment I was bonded to Letum. The magic of the island, woven into the very thing which keeps me alive. That ties me to this kingdom and everything in it.
It flashes outward, and I gasp, for a moment overwhelmed by the pure magnitude of life in Letum. The pixies in their refugee camps in the city. Adira’s people, the Silva Lucai, and the island’s children hidden in the Grove. The sirens in the water and the beasts of the forest. The will-o-wisps in the leaves and the spirits in the wind.
And there, shining brighter than the second star, is Willa.
On the same beach she first appeared to me.
She’d been talking to one Strayed that night, na?ve as she was. As I see Willa now, the death in my heart burns so cold, I think it’ll pierce straight through my chest. Fierce, terrified, and surrounded by fucking Strayed.
My own terror drips over me in slow, viscous drops, as I realize how much danger Willa is in. And I’ve got nothing left in me to save her.