Chapter 39
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Emmeline
Emmeline barely held it together as she got Roremar into her room at the Chancellor’s manor.
They’d had to ride here and evade the guards patrolling the grounds, all while he could barely hold himself upright.
Luckily, as if the Fates had orchestrated this for her, Graves wasn’t waiting outside her door.
She dragged Roremar toward her bed, bumping into the dresser and sending a lantern shattering to the ground. Roremar groaned, his blood flowing steadily.
It wasn’t stopping.
Why wasn’t it stopping?
“I’m sorry,” she whispered, her throat cracking. “We’re almost there, Roremar. I need to get you on the bed. Please stay with me. Please. I need you.”
She didn’t know if he heard her desperate confessions as she laid him down, crimson stark against her ivory bedding. Coating her gown, rain and dirt mixing with it.
Roremar groaned again as she shifted him onto the pillow, louder this time.
“Shh,” she soothed. “You’re okay.” Her voice cracked, tears threatening to overflow as she took in his grimace, the sweat coating his face. “You’re going to be okay.”
The door flew open, and Emmeline spun, kneeling on the bed before Roremar and reaching for the dagger she kept beneath her pillow. But she froze when Lola and Desmond appeared in the frame.
She knew she looked crazed—hair soaked from the rain, cloaks abandoned on the floor, and blood, so much blood everywhere—but all she could force out was a whimpered, “Help.”
Lola and Desmond jolted into action, shutting the door and racing to her side.
“What happened?” Lola asked as she rolled her sleeves up, feeling her brother’s pulse.
“We were attacked. Someone followed us into underground catacombs, and we thought they were gone, but when we were leaving the graveyard, we got jumped.” Emmeline’s hands fluttered over Roremar’s chest, finally ripping a tear down the center of his tunic.
He groaned as the material pressed into his skin, veins standing out in his neck.
“I’m sorry,” Emmeline whimpered again.
“He’s conscious,” Desmond rushed out as Lola disappeared into the bathing chamber to get fresh towels and a bowl of water.
“That’s good—woah.” His words broke off when the garish slice to Roremar’s side came into view.
But it wasn’t only the stab wound—it was the blue-black lines that webbed out from it.
“What the fuck is that?” Desmond breathed.
“Charming,” Roremar slurred, eyes still closed and head rolling back against the pillow. But that one sound—one almost-word—was enough to spur Emmeline into motion.
“He was stabbed, but there must have been something on the blade. He’s been in and out of consciousness since.”
She took a wet towel from Lola and gently cleaned the wound, forcing her hands not to tremble as she touched him.
“Fates, his skin is hot,” Emmeline said.
She lifted her gaze, searching around them, the plants she’d purchased since arriving in Valyn adorning the shelves and balcony.
“I can—I can make some sort of tonic or antidote, but I’ve never seen a wound react like this.
I don’t know what it is.” Her breathing turned shallow and rushed, but she felt for the beating of Roremar’s heart, still there, and tried to time her own to it.
“It will probably only buy us hours if that.”
“There’s someone I can ask,” Lola said, voice as harried as Emmeline felt. “But Emmeline, they’re going to have to come here. We’re going to have to let them help.”
Her blue eyes were wide, imploring as she looked between Emmeline and her brother. Understanding that Emmeline was guarded but begging her to, for once, let someone in.
“Of course,” Emmeline breathed, trusting Lola Silventa with her life—her heart. “Hurry.”
Lola dashed to the desk and scrawled a Mystique ink note to whoever her contact was, the blood smearing the parchment visible in the mystlight even from across the room.
A firm hand gripped Emmeline’s wrist where she was still trying to clean the abundance of blood off Roremar’s body, and her gaze snapped up to Desmond’s amber stare, softer than she’d ever seen it.
“Let me,” he said.
Emmeline’s mouth was dry, jaw trembling, but she swallowed and nodded. Desmond took the bloodied towel from her and replaced it with a new one, the white cotton quickly eating up the bright red.
Body wrung dry, chest nearly convulsing, Emmeline crawled up the bed and curled around Roremar, pulling his head onto her lap. She didn’t think as she leaned forward and pressed a kiss to his forehead, right against his sweat-and-rain-soaked hair.
He hummed, or maybe it was another groan, weaker than the last. Emmeline slipped her hand over the wing tattoo curving around his shoulder, palm on top of his heart, and the crease between his brows softened as his cheek rolled against the ruined fabric of her dress.
“I’m here, Reckless,” she whispered.
And Emmeline swore, as he’d sat with her all the times she’d been lost and breaking, she’d stay with him now.
Lola’s contact was Cyren, the General who had saved Emmeline when she’d been attacked and become one of the few potential council members who treated her like a person.
And while Emmeline would have allowed anyone into her suite in her desperation, she was grateful it was someone she knew at least a little bit.
The Starsearcher General showed up in casual leathers carrying a pack clinking with glass vials and got to work mixing a paste to spread across Roremar’s wound with no unsolicited questioning. They covered it with damp strips of linens and wrapped more around his ribs to secure it.
“That will stop the bleeding and leech out the infection,” Cyren said. Their hair, usually in a coronet, was secured in a messy braid down their back, like they’d been suddenly disturbed to come here. Gratitude burst in Emmeline’s chest again. “I can’t sew it up until that’s done, though.”
“How long will it take?” Lola asked, standing stoically at her brother’s bedside. Desmond was behind her, a hand on her shoulder.
“Should be okay by morning. He’ll be in pain, though. And even with blood-replenishing tonics, he’ll be weak.”
“Will he be able to compete in the second trial?” Emmeline asked without taking her eyes off Roremar’s peaceful expression. She hadn’t seen him look like that in…Fates, since they swam in the ocean at his family home.
Cyren had given him enough sedatives that he should sleep soundly until the morning, and Emmeline hoped he’d get a few hours of rest.
“He’ll have to participate. Withdrawing isn’t an option for any contestant, let alone him,” Cyren said. The resignation in their tone didn’t comfort Emmeline one bit.
If a man wanted to withdraw from the tournament, they wouldn’t only be forfeiting their chance for her hand. They’d be killed.
No matter what state he was in, Roremar would have to compete the day after next.
“Thank you, Cyren,” Emmeline whispered. And because this was now the second time the General had come to her aid, Emmeline forced herself to voice another vulnerable question. “Can I ask you something else?”
“Sure.”
She thought about how Roremar had told her to come to Valyn in the seeing chamber, how he continually reminded her she needed to find her sister.
She’d failed miserably at finding leads since arriving in the capital. She had tidbits through the trade routes of the Averian and the Temple of Selene, but she needed something concrete.
Something she was beginning to realize she couldn’t find on her own. At least not with how watched she was and how demanding Rocarri was of her schedule. Though they didn’t know who was responsible, this attack tonight was a wakeup call.
Emmeline trailed her fingers through Roremar’s hair as she chose her words carefully, not giving up every piece.
“Back on Lyra, I was doing research on the history of corruption in the temple network on the continent for a…personal project. Do you…Is there somewhere I can get information? Maybe names of those who were involved in Valyn so I can continue the…research? And anything related to a place called the Temple of Selene.”
Cyren blinked at her curiously before saying, “We keep all accounts related to that in the private government Archives.” That explained why she couldn’t find much the other night.
Emmeline’s heart deflated for a beat, but Cyren added, “I have clearance for certain records, and I have a friend who works in that department. I can ask them to pull ledgers with pertinent names and players.”
“Thank you. And if you don’t mind, I’d like to keep it between those in this room,” Emmeline said, unable to summon the energy to ask for any more specifics.
“Of course.”
While tonight had been a wreck, at least she’d taken a step toward that goal. Had allowed a new person in to do it, too. When Roremar woke, he’d be proud.
For now, she had to focus on getting him through this tournament. Even if that meant setting aside the hunt for her sister until she got records from Cyren.
It pained her to make that choice, but what in this city hadn’t ripped her apart so far? They were taking everything from her, piece by piece. It was only a matter of time until they took this, too.
The General and Lola spoke in hushed voices over the desk as they mixed the tonics Roremar would need for the next day. He’d have to stay here to recover, but Cyren said they’d tell the guards at the barracks he was in a warded infirmary in the city due to whatever illness Lola had contracted.
And given everyone in the manor thought Lola and now Emmeline were sick as well—including Graves and Eston—they should have bought themselves the time they needed to lay low until the second trial.
The poison trial.
“Myrella’s at the apartment?” Emmeline asked Desmond as he approached the bed.
“She wrote that she’d stay there and work on the scroll.”
At least she was safe.
“It’s ironic isn’t it,” Emmeline thought aloud as she traced the scar above Roremar’s eyebrow, “the second task has to do with poisons and someone attacks him like this.”