40. Chapter 40
Chapter forty
C orrosive terror sluices through my veins as Niko’s legs buckle, sending him crashing against the shining deck of the Indomnitus. His head cracks against the ground and his eyes roll, as black blood begins to leak from his eyes and nostrils. Some of his ribbons writhe frenetically over him, while others reach toward me like they mean to pull me to his side. But I need no urging, already throwing myself down next to him, as his jaw grinds together and his body begins to seize.
“Niko!” I cry, gripping his face between my hands. Blood stains my fingers, an onyx as abiding as his eyes, and a wave of nausea surges up my throat as I realize his skin is ice cold. Not his usual ice of a winter’s night, but clammy. Drained. His body contracts beneath my fingers with vicious tremors, wave after wave of them.
His teeth clack, and spittle begins to foam at his mouth, as I helplessly try to hold him somewhere that won’t cause him more pain. But there is no place that isn’t rigid, no part of him that isn’t overcome.
When he’d seized on the beach, the spell had only lasted a few moments. But as the minutes drag on, the attack only grows more violent. Panic squeezes my throat and constricts my ribs. My mind races through the past few days, and my fear becomes a physical thing pressing against my lungs as I realize Niko hasn’t used his magic. Not even teasingly in the privacy of our bedroom.
Not once.
His pain shouldn’t be like this; something is wrong. And there’s no one here to help us, no one who will hear my screams from the bowels of the Crocodile. Dragging him onto the beach will only leave him out in the open, vulnerable to attack. And that’s if he even survives that long.
Only Niko can take a life, but what about his own? Is he as vulnerable to his magic of death as everyone else?
I need to get him back to the Lunaedon.
Swallowing the knot lodged in my throat, I take a leveling breath and hold Niko to me. His body jerks in my arms, but I dig my fingers into him, holding on tightly as I close my eyes. Feeling for that shimmer of power, the endless colors glittering behind my heart.
I breathe in deeply, attempting to smooth the jagged edges of my thoughts enough to concentrate. It hardly takes a moment to find my magic. Dipping into it like a pot of ink, I slowly draw out the dream on the blank canvas of my mind. Beginning with larger strokes and blocks of color just like I’ve practiced with Sam, the image slowly begins to take shape. Unlike when I use a brush, this painting is not crooked or blurred or miscolored. It is crisp lines and smooth strokes. The shadows and light of my heart.
It’s the intricate spires of the Lunaedon—the towering windows, the crisp rock path, the ominous stone gates—but it is more than that. It’s the warmth of sitting in the courtyard beneath the stars with Tiernan’s wry laughter. It’s the shy smiles from Sam as he examines my newest painting. It’s the cutting remarks of Marina as Niko and I spar in the throne room.
It’s home.
You are my sanctuary. You are my freedom.
I hold my breath, finishing the painting in my mind stroke by stroke. And then with a wild laugh, I let it all go.
It spirals from me in a radiating wave, and when I blink open my eyes, I already know what I’ll find.
Niko in my arms, in the entry hall of the Lunaedon.
Spittle flies from his mouth, and a strangled groan erupts from him chest. A horrible, hollow sound, ripped from the depths of him as his body tears itself apart. Every muscle is pulled so taut, I’m sure his bones will fracture with the pressure. Blood streams from his eyes in black rivulets, staining his pale skin like ink splashed across parchment.
My own tears pour down my cheeks, as screams echo off the high chamber ceiling and reverberate against my ears. I don’t understand they’re coming from my own mouth until Marina is at my side, taking my hands in hers, her face white with terror.
I fight against her in a blind panic, not wanting to leave Niko, even for a moment. I’m the only one who can touch him, the only one who can comfort him. He needs me by his side. Marina’s touch is soft but firm, as she pulls my hands away from where they’ve fisted into Niko’s shirt, and she motions to where Sam kneels down on the other side of him.
With a hiccupping sob, I let Sam work. His magic flows over Niko, relaxing each muscle in turn. Sam’s face pulls tight with pain as he absorbs as much as he can, wave after wave of agony. And though it’s enough to draw a deep groan from Sam, it isn’t enough to cease the flutter of Niko’s lashes or the grind of his teeth. As though, despite the stillness of his body, his mind still tears itself apart from the inside out.
My throat is raw, and my eyes sting, as I dare a glance at Sam. “Is he—is he going to be okay?”
The question comes out unbidden, and I almost laugh at the pure ridiculousness of it. Of course he’ll be okay. He’s the King of Carrion, all-powerful ruler of the land of dreams. He is the lord of pain and death, and there’s no way either will ever fell him.
There’s no way the universe would give him to me, only to steal him away.
Sam doesn’t meet my gaze, nor does he answer my question. He only holds his hands above Niko with a furious concentration, like the smallest deviation will cause Niko’s seizures to begin again.
An unsettled dread descends above me, starting at my scalp and trickling down my spine. “Sam!” I shout, trying desperately to hold on to my sense of reality as the world begins to spin around me.
“Sam.” Not a demand this time, but a plea.
Though time neither pauses nor races forward, it feels hauntingly similar. Like whatever tethers us all to reality has come undone, and we’re all left to grasp at the broken bonds that once held us so tightly. My anger, which has kept me so faithfully effective all these years, has disappeared. And all that’s left in its place is fear—the sharp feel of it, the acrid taste on my tongue.
“He hasn’t used his magic. He hasn’t used any power!” I’m telling Sam, but I’m also saying it to myself. He hasn’t used his power. It shouldn’t be like this. He shouldn’t be like this.
And beneath it is the worst thought of all, the one I’ve been trying desperately to stave off, lest it burn me alive. It balloons around me like a thick shroud, inundating me in its flame— this is my fault.
I know it in my bones; feel it in the way I feel the island. The balance Niko’s held for two centuries is crumbling and it’s my fault. The strain of being the anchor, the pain, the agony—it’s finally overwhelmed him. If only I’d agreed to stay sooner; if I’d focused on mastering my power instead of cowering; if I’d just realized that every time Niko crawled beneath my skin, every time he’d pushed me until I shattered—it was because he saw something in me I’ve never been able to see in myself.
He loved me for the person I was, but also, the person he knew I could be. And I fought him at every turn.
“How do I fix this?” I demand, grabbing at my anger. Pulling it up like iron armor, until it’s impenetrable.
Sam finally meets my gaze, and I nearly snarl at what lies in the warm brown irises. Defeat.
“Willa—” he begins, but I’ve already pushed myself up to standing.
“No!” I shout, half-wild. “ How do I fix this?”
Sam only shakes his head, and returns his focus to his king.
I round on Marina. She gazes up at me with a torn expression. Between pain and regret. Between what Niko would want, and what he needs. Which means whatever I have to do to fix the mess I’ve made is something terrible.
I plant my feet. I’ve spent a lifetime enduring horrible things, and then a lifetime after running from them. For Niko—the man who’s accepted the dark and the selfish, and taught me how to accept them in myself—I can endure them again.
When I told him I wanted to stop running, I hadn’t truly understood what that meant.
I understand now; understand why Niko tried to send me away. Running is easy, but staying—staying costs everything you have. Blood, sweat, sacrifice.
“Tell me.” My voice is steady now.
Marina glances at Sam. At the strain evident in his face as he tries to keep Niko comfortable at the cost of his own wellbeing. Then she begins to sign.
You have to break his tie to the island and fully become the anchor.
“Marina!” Sam scolds, but his words are drained and weak.
I narrow my eyes on the fallen pixie. “How?”
Marina’s hands hesitate midair, and her mouth presses into a thin line like she’s already said too much.
“Marina, if there’s a way to save him, you need to tell me—” My voice breaks. “—I won’t…I can’t lose him.”
She takes a deep breath, her eyes flickering uncertainly at Niko’s sprawled form. At the once strong King of Carrion, dying on the floor before her. Then she squares her shoulders, and her face goes blank and I know, I’m no longer looking at my friend. I’m seeing the pixie she was as the Aeternalis’ right hand—the one capable of making decisions that would tear another person apart.
Using your magic has already begun the process, but there’s a way to speed it up. Your magic runs through your heart and so it becomes ingrained in your blood. If you bleed into the heart of the island, you will become irrevocably tied. You’ll become the true anchor instead of Niko.
“And he won’t be in pain anymore?”
Marina’s mouth presses thinner. Finally, she replies, the island will no longer siphon his strength. It will feed from yours.
I stare at her for a protracted moment, wondering if it will hurt me the way it hurts Niko. Wondering if I’ll be paying the price he pays every day—wondering if I’ll be brave enough to keep paying it the way he has.
But I don’t voice any of my fears. Instead, I ask, “Where?”
Where Niko took you this afternoon.
My eyes widen in realization, even before Marina finishes her sentence. The heart of the island lies in the Crocodile. Beneath the Indomnitus, in the cradle of death.
Niko’s ship. He’d said the island had resurrected it as a reminder of what killing the previous anchor had cost him—had cost everyone. A constant reminder of the place where he slayed the Aeternalis. Where he’d taken a life and lost his own. Where he’d damned all of his people.
“Willa—” Sam begins, his face twisted in agony.
I shake my head, hardly noticing the sharp look Marina shoots him.
“I meant it when I told Niko I was staying…that I was brave enough to be a hero if he was behind me as a villain. If this is what it takes—” Another steadying breath. “So be it.”
Sam opens his mouth vehemently, but whatever he’s going to say is lost as Tiernan and Adira burst through the palace doors. The Princess of the Wild appears entirely out of place in the dark lines of the castle, and Sam seems to agree as her appearance in his home has him gaping at her in shock.
“Addy!” he exclaims breathlessly. “What are you doing here?”
Her stormy gray eyes are wild as they find mine. “The Strayed are at the gates.”
There is no more oxygen in the room. There might not be any in the entire world for how desperately agonized my breaths now come, like my lungs have been filled with cement.
Tiernan is red-faced, panicked, as he takes in the state of his king on the floor. “They’re coming for the wards. They’re coming for you, Willa.”