Chapter Twenty-Nine
Andi
I try pushing up on my weary legs, but they have no strength in them. “Who are you?”
“Take it easy,” a soft voice says from beside the ajar door, half hidden in the shadow.
“Please. Where am I?”
My memory is fuzzy. I remember the festival, the disgusting drink, dancing and laughing with Megan and Eliza, then nothing. My mind goes blank.
The door squeaks open, and a familiar face rushes towards me, wrapping her arms tight around my neck.
“Can’t… breathe… Kali.” My shoulders relax seeing my friend's smiling face. Kali gestures for the unknown person standing at the door to come in, but they stay where they are, peeking past the door frame.
Kali gently touches my head and arms. “It’s about time you woke up.” Wrapping her arms around me with less force than before. “You’re alright, right?” Her brows crease with worry.
“I’m okay.” My voice comes out croaky. I force a smile, even my facial muscles are too tired to move.
Kali passes me a glass of water. “Good. Don’t scare me like that again. We thought you were a goner. Lura healed you, but it took a lot out of her; that poison almost killed you.”
Her sister. Could that be the voice hiding at the door? I smile towards the shadows, holding my hand up in a wave, but the figure shrinks further back. She seems much shyer than her sister, whereas Kali has no problems being in the spotlight.
I wrack my brain trying to remember what poison she’s talking about. Registering my confused face, Kali asks, “You don’t remember, do you?” I shake my head. “What’s the last thing you remember? You know me, so that’s a good sign at least,” she says with a wink.
“The harvest festival in Cyvail, but not much else.” I shrug, reaching for the jug of water, but Kali stops me and refills my glass.
“Where’s Myles?” Guilt rushes over me, not realising he was absent, not until the fog cleared from my mind.
My breath catches, panicking. Lura makes a strange noise at the door, then coughs loudly.
“Myles is fine, he’s making himself useful and hunting for us.
” Kali smiles at me reassuringly. “During the festival, guards from Zury appeared. You and Myles were taking off when I decided to join,” she says with a crooked smile.
“You said you needed somewhere safe. Cyvail was getting a bit boring for my tastes. I was thinking about leaving anyway, although I didn’t know where I would end up.
I had thought about maybe heading north to Yiren or exploring the islands, but I hadn’t decided when I would leave. ”
“Kali, please,” I plead.
“Fine. We ran, heading to Lura’s house through the woods. A shortcut I’ve used many times. But we were attacked by Hundicans. Terrifying beasts, I haven’t seen them in decades. It’s my fault, I didn’t realise it was a full silver moon.”
Wiping her tears away, she continues, “No weapon we have can hurt them, and their bite is poisonous. We ran, but they’re smart creatures. One stalked us after we thought we had evaded them. It bit you, nearly torn through your arm. It was disgusting.” Her body shivered at the thought.
I look down at my arm, at the bandage, and the still tender wound. “How did we get away? If it had my arm in its mouth?”
Kali lowers her gaze, her hands fidgeting on her lap, uncomfortably shuffling beside me. “Because of you,” she says so softly it was barely a whisper. “I’ve never seen anything like it. Your magic is…” Her words trail off.
I don’t know what to say to her. I don’t know enough about my magic to explain it.
In fact, I know nothing about it, how it works, or why I have this kind of magic.
Kali motions again for Lura to come, and cautiously, she concedes.
Skirting the walls, she keeps to the dark corners, but there’s just enough light for me to catch sight of her.
She is beautiful, like her sister, their faces almost identical.
Same shade of light blonde hair, they could be twins.
If it weren’t for the large burn scar that stretches across the right side of her face and down her neck.
At first, I thought her hair was braided tightly at the side, but as she nears, my eyes widen at her charred scalp.
I try to avert my gaze, but my eyes are fixed on the sheer size of the sear marks. What kind of fire makes a mark like that? My stomach drops at the vague recollection of fireballs flying from my hands when I was delirious.
No, I couldn’t have caused those injuries. Besides, those burns look old and healed. As if Kali can read my thoughts, she shakes her head with a gentle smile. Getting up from my side, she walks to her sister, taking her hand.
“Lura was injured years ago, during the elf wars. A blazer, fire wielder to you, tore through our home. Lura was too busy helping others and didn’t get out in time.
” She might be explaining the situation to me, but her eyes never leave her sister.
Squeezing her hand tightly. “Fire scares her. People scare her.”
“I’m sorry. I don’t know how to control any of it, the flames, the… other parts.” I look at my feet, rotating them in small, stiff circles, trying to gain some sort of movement again. “I need to learn before I hurt someone. I’m sorry about your walls,” I say, pointing to the burn marks across them.
Kali walks over to me, guiding her sister by her shoulders.
Lura leans against the drawers to give me space, either that or she is scared of me.
Kali sits at my side. “We’ll help,” she says.
“We’ll be safe here for a while. There are wards around the house.
No one will find us or track your magic.
Their little device won’t detect anything. ”
Lura speaks for the first time, her voice so soft and airy, I strain to hear her. “You’re welcome to stay until you’re healed and ready to leave.” I smile at her, thankful.
The contrast between Lura and her sister is abundantly clear.
Kali, the outgoing sister, is confident and sunny.
Lura is timid, troubled, and cautious. She picks her words carefully, watching for my reactions.
With tightly hunched shoulders, and hands continually kneading in front of her.
Both are a mixture of Elana. Kali, before everything happened, and Lura, after, becoming withdrawn and tentative.
A door slams shut inside the house, footsteps stomp on the ground, and a deep voice grumbles. A smile spreads across my face, feeling Myles’ presence. Kali and Lura stand up and head towards the door.
“Caught a good-sized deer, that’ll keep us for a little while.
Good job too. The weather is changing. Be snowing by the end of…
” Myles’ words fade off as he reaches the open door of my room.
He ambles into the room, trying to figure out if it’s really me.
His eyes flick to the sisters before kneeling, resting his head on my lap, muttering to himself.
Kali tugs Lura out of the room and closes the door.
Myles gently picks up my arm to inspect it. I flinch at his touch but don’t pull away. “Are you okay?” he asks, his eyebrows knitted together tightly. Noticing my pain, he eases his hold on my arm, allowing it to rest on his open palm.
“I am.” His face remains unchanged. “I promise, I’m okay. Arms a little tender, but I’m fine,” I assure him as he locks me in an embrace, hastily releasing me when I draw in a sharp breath as pain stabs my arm.
“Sorry,” Myles says, pulling away from me, gently laying my arm on my lap. “I’m sorry, Andi. I didn’t mean to hurt you. It’s been weeks, we weren’t sure you were going to wake up.”
Weeks. I’ve been out for weeks, no wonder my legs don’t work. That explains the dizziness when I first woke up. For weeks, I have been stuck in this room, in this bed. My stomach rumbles, breaking the silence.
Myles snorts. His face is gaunt, dark circles surrounding his eyes, his hair is longer with a little touch of grey showing through.
I can’t begin to imagine what the past few weeks must have been like for him.
Watching me lie here, unable to help me.
I can see him pacing the room, pulling at his hair, sitting at my bedside, urging me to wake.
“What happened with the Hundican?” I ask, patting some free space on the bed for him to sit, but Myles doesn’t budge. “Kali says we escaped because of me, because of my magic, but that’s it.”
Myles’ back tenses momentarily. “Lura said you might not remember, actually, she hoped you wouldn’t.
” His eyes move around the room as if trying to find the right words.
“You were bitten, I imagine Kali told you as much. That thing was hanging off your arm. But you… your magic… You grabbed the beast by its snout, trying to push it away, I think, but it recoiled to your touch. Its body melted. Yelping and squirming, its flesh was peeling from its body.”
I cringe at the thought, sinking into myself. Myles reaches forward, gently brushing my cheek.
“How did Lura heal me? Didn’t Kali say no one survives them?”
Sitting back on his heels, he combs his hands through his hair.
“That was difficult. Lura has healing powers, but her magic could only stall the poison for so long. She said it was a complicated poison. It would cling to your body, to your cells, corrupting you from the inside, if you weren’t given an antidote.
I went back into the woods to the dead Hundican or what was left of it and dragged it back with me.
Lura was then able to make an ointment to draw out the poison.
Maybe that’s why no one survives; no one has the skillset of Lura to create an antidote like that. She is magnificent.”
I hold up my hand to stop him. “You went back? You could have been hurt.”
Myles smirks, his dimples lighting up his weary face. “Kali said it would be fine. They disappear again once the full silver moon fades.” My stomach rumbles again. “Come on, we need to get you some food.”
I try to stand using Myles for support, but my legs give way, stumbling back to the bed, unable to hold my own weight. Myles places his arms underneath mine and gently hoists me up, holding firm until I find some stability.
With a shaky exhale, I find my feet. Now, to get to the kitchen for some food.
Myles wraps my good arm around his shoulder and bears my weight, walking out of my room into a small dining area.
Kali and Lura sit at the kitchen table, chopping vegetables and throwing them into a pan, looking up as we walk in.
Kali’s face is full of pride. Pride in me for walking, albeit not on my own. Lura’s face shows something different, worry, maybe.
For me. For her. I can’t tell.
Myles guides me over to an armchair facing a large fireplace. I sink into the warm, velvety, plush chair, embracing its heat against my skin. Myles grabs a blanket and lays it over my legs before heading into the kitchen.
Despite sitting across the blazing fire, an icy chill resides deep within my skin.
Pulling the blanket up around my shoulders, I scan the peculiarly decorated room.
The walls are a mismatch of floral wallpaper, like Lura couldn’t decide which one she preferred and chose them all.
Oddly shaped ornaments line a clash of colourful shelves, along with ceramic, curiously shaped vases.
Some in the shape of heads, others of body parts.
The fire is snugly surrounded by a large mantel, with pastel framed paintings spread out along the top.
I assume of Kali and Lura’s lost family by their similar features.
Kali said that only she and her sister remained, but she never did say how that came to be.
It didn’t occur to me that she and I were alike in that matter, at least she has her sister. No one from my real family survived.
Myles rustles about the small, quaint kitchen. Teapots sit charmingly on the shelf in a variety of animal shapes, the most unique resembling a tree, with the spout and handle decorated as branches, and the lid is a nest housing baby birds.
Gathering a small collection of food for me, Myles gently squeezes past the sisters. I’m surprised that he knows exactly where everything is, but I guess that makes sense if we have truly been here for weeks now. He looks at home here.
Lura’s kitchen reminds me of Mum’s. Carefully organised with everything in its place, pans simmering on the stove, billowing glorious smells through the air. My stomach agonisingly rumbles.
Myles places an assortment of bread, crackers, cured meat, and cheese on a table at my side. “Small bites. Okay?” he says, slumping into a chair opposite me.
I nod, picking at the arrangement, my eyes dipping in the warmth. Regardless of being unconscious for weeks, I am surprisingly tired.
Lura walks over with a glass, sitting it beside the plate.
“Have some more water.” She watches me carefully, I imagine she’s trying to figure me out.
Kali is her sister, and she has known Myles for weeks now.
I am the odd man out. Lura is cautious by nature, so it makes sense that she is wary of me.
“I’ll have a tea, if you have it?” I say with a mouthful of food.
Lura smiles with thin lips. “I wouldn’t recommend that.
” I shrug, scoffing more food into my mouth.
“You should slow down. Your stomach needs time to adjust.” I nod, knowing full well I’m not going to take her advice.
My stomach aches for more. If there should be consequences, I’ll deal with them later.
Kali squeezes in beside me, pulling the blanket over her knees. “Budge up.”
I’m glad to have my friend here, someone who understands magic. Maybe not my kind of magic, but more than I know.
“You’ll help me, won’t you?”
Kali stares into the fire, its light dancing in her golden eyes, making them glow like embers.
“We will both help where we can. Like I said, I’ve never seen anything like that before, I don’t know what we can do to help…
but we’ll try.” Touching her finger to my nose, she says, “Once you’re better. ”