Chapter 28 #3
I wish I could say that the pain of the curse had slowed, but it hadn’t. It felt now as if birds pecked at my flesh, gulping back pieces of me then going for more.
Forcing my fingers to move, I cast a small rune within the curse. ‘Finders keepers.’ “The loophole,” I breathed.
I opened my eyes to see the little butterfly of light struggling to fly within the curse, its wings bogged down, the curse swirling tighter and tighter around it. But it pushed on, landing directly between us and House Wolven, then disappeared.
The loophole. Mallachtan was a one-man firing squad. He believed as Tarquinius did. Not as Sage Thalienne did. Which meant there was only one loophole that made sense.
I dragged my body around, never taking my hands from the curse, no matter that the movement ramped it up again. Cold now, so cold my fingers would freeze, and I wouldn’t be able to use them because they’d fucking fall off.
“Zeed, help me get over there. My arms must stay in the curse,” I gasped and struggled as I fought to stay conscious as we shimmied and fought our way to that side of our section.
My hands were now facing House Wolven.
“Gary.” I whispered his name and reached for that connection between us. “Come on Gary, get over here. You can do it.”
He and his friends were freaking out. I reached out even further, feeling Zeed’s hand on my shoulder, and knew he’d see what I had in mind. I gritted my teeth, unable to speak, but I forced a thought to the surface, praying he’d feel it with his Quirk.
Please work. We must reach for each other. We must do this together.
“Brilliant, Harlow.” He dropped to his knees beside me and drove his arms into the curse as well, his face twisting up with pain. “Gary, man, come on!”
After what could have been a minute, could have been an hour, I felt fingers wrap around mine from the other side. The curse recoiled from our joined hands, screeching like a stuck pig, tearing and thrashing.
At first, I thought it wasn’t magic, just good old-fashioned camaraderie that had beaten his vicious curse. That the love of friends, of not being alone was enough to take on a bully and stop him in his tracks.
But as the flames rose around us, I wasn’t so sure. The flames were black, blue, purple, not natural, as they ate up the curse, the shape of a bird whooshing through, dissolving the sticking sap of Mallachtan’s stolen curse.
And just like that the curse around House Phoenix and House Wolven dissolved.
Gary was on his knees, sweat and tears on his cheeks, “We did it.”
I grinned, and realized that I was crying too, my lips were parched, and my body ached as if we’d been sitting for hours. But the light spoke to it only being an hour since we’d gone into the challenge.
“Gary…Gerard.” I wobbled to my feet and put my arm around his shoulder. He hugged me back and the world was a little more all right. “Zeed, we have to get through to the other Houses.”
The rest of House Wolven stared at me.
“What in the seven hells was that?” Davy, one of the younger House Wolven members whispered. His midnight dark skin was slick with sweat, eyes wide. “What . . . what did you do? We were running out of air.”
I gave him a quick squeeze on the shoulder as I jogged past. “Same thing we’re going to do to the rest of the curse. We gotta reach through it to the others.”
House Wolven stepped back as I went to my knees on the far side of their designated area. I jammed my hands through and reached for . . . Caterina was here with House Kirinash. “Cat. Come on.”
A member of House Wolven went to her knees beside me, her red hair wild around her, the curls soaked against her face. “My cousin is over there. What do I do?”
I looked at her. “Reach through for her, call her to you, get her to take your hands.”
She didn’t question. “Annabeth! You get your ass over here right this minute!” She bellowed, a Scottish burr to her voice.
Two others from House Wolven joined us, and Caterina grabbed my hands first with a feeling that was very much like an apology. Then she reached for Zeed, and Gary grabbed hold of her too.
The flames roared once more, instantly burning the next section of the curse out.
House Kirinash and House Wolven had friends in House Unicorna. Caterina called to Ellie, and the flames scorched once more. It wasn’t quick, no matter that we were getting it done.
Each House we freed was in worse shape than the one before. “We should split up, meet in the middle,” Zeed said.
“No.” I grabbed his arm. “I want to, but it’s . . . it’s not right. We must follow this through, like with breaking a warding spell. There is only one way. Step by step, or it all falls apart.”
We pushed on because of a gut feeling. I didn’t know what would happen if we went the other direction, but I felt certain it was nothing good.
The last house . . . was House Kelpish, and I shoved my arms through along with several students from each of the other Houses. “Come on, take hold!” I yelled and the other students joined in, calling for their friends, for family in some cases.
For Marina.
Nothing. I looked up at my friends, fear spiking through them and into me.
“They’re too far gone,” Ellie whispered. “I can barely sense any heartbeats.”
No.
This couldn’t happen, not here. We’d just gotten Zeed back, we couldn’t lose Marina now. Even if she hated me forever, we couldn’t lose her like this.
I scanned the faces of the others and swallowed hard. “Together. We have to do this together. We bring her home.”
There was no hesitation. One by one they stuffed their hands into the curse, and our connection to each other redoubled.
“Marina! You get your ass over here!” I put everything into the words, and into the pull on her.
“Come on, beautiful,” Ross choked out. “Don’t do this to me, not when we’re this close to saving you!”
“You can do it, Mare,” Ellie whispered.
Gary chimed in with, “If anyone can, it’s you.”
Caterina sobbed her name.
“We aren’t doing this without you, Marina. It’s not a negotiation,” Zeed snapped.
Fable had her head bowed, her body shuddering.
And then . . . Ross’s head snapped up. “I got her! She’s got me!” The flames erupted, stronger than any of the previous times, all the colors of the rainbow – just like at the bridge in my dream with Typhon.
The curse came crashing down and Marina gasped, as Ross pulled her into his arms and the others of House Kelpish . . . they were alive but barely.
“We gotta help them.” Ellie snapped her fingers. “Triage. Tell me who’s in the worst trouble.”
The good thing? We didn’t lose anyone.
The bad thing?
The other students were looking at us in wide-eyed silence.
Seven of us, if they didn’t count Zeed, which they had no reason to do.
Seven had gone missing from Neverthorn, and obviously some knew about us, even if I didn’t know how.
Seven, standing here like pieces of a perfectly fit jigsaw puzzle.
If anyone had heard a rumor, or if they took note of when we’d arrived . . . I wiped my brow and looked around.
“Where are all the teachers? Shouldn’t they be here?”
“It’s another barrier.” Gary motioned to his feet where they butted up against another invisible barrier. “The outer line of the wheel is like a final edge of the curse.”
“They can’t hear us or see us?” Zeed paced in front of me.
“And what if Mallachtan is still out there? Should we wait, or?”
Once more I felt eyes settle on me. “You got us out of this,” Rylee, the girl from House Draconell said. “I’m inclined to let you lead us the rest of the way. Like House Phoenix is supposed to . . .”
And then she dipped her head at my friends, one by one. Gary. Zeed. Marina. Ellie. Caterina. Ross. Fable.
“You can’t tell them who we are,” I said. “Not even Sage Thalienne knows. We escaped Neverthorn and . . . we can’t go back.”
Rylee smiled and winked.
“She won’t hear it from any of us. You saved Bryony. You saved us. You might have come from Neverthorn, but you belong to Heathermoor. And we don’t give up our own – not for anything.”
Her words made my chest ache, and I nodded, trying to stay in control of my emotions. “Okay then, I think we should all line up, spaced evenly around the wheel.”
Again, this was going off feel, like Thalienne had said. The loophole in Mallachtan’s curse was that he was a lone wolf, full of hatred and no love for his fellow Dwimmer. The minute we’d worked together, the curse had no chance against us.
Linking arms, we stepped forward together, pushing ourselves through the curse fully.
It shattered, no flames this time, more like glass exploding as the world around us went from quiet, to shouting, torchlight, and teachers grabbing students as we emerged from the curse into . . .
Pure chaos.
“Gods, no!”
I wheeled around to look at Ellie, whose cheeks had gone chalky white.
Her eyes were fixed on a boulder ten yards away.
It took me a second to realize that she wasn’t looking at the decorative rock at all.
She was looking at the body lying face down beside it.
Dark hair, black jacket and pants, House Draconell etched on top of his hand.
My heart lurched into my throat as a scream broke from my lips.
“Typhon!”