Chapter 65 #2
“They switched during the explosion. Did you see it? They’re like chameleons.
If I hadn’t been watching him, I’d never have known.
Why do you think they did it? Did they know the Smiths would try to kill the Bard?
Does he care so much about his principal he’ll die for him?
” She sounded disgusted by the idea. “I suppose he’s loyal.
It’s a good trait in a husband.” She turned her dark eyes to me. “Save him. Save him, or I’ll kill you.”
I gripped Luvic’s arm. His skin was cooling. “Why do you think I can save him?”
“I don’t. But I’ll be angry when he dies, and killing creatures always makes me feel better.”
The ground thrust upward again, and I held onto Luvic as the stone bucked and rumbled.
My hands were coated in his blood, but the flow had slowed. I could untie the illusion of the spear, but that would leave a hole in his chest. What could I do?
A quick chirp sounded. I looked down at the noise. There was a movement in my purse. The cricket had hopped inside it. Its brown skin was covered in sticky red. Its wings fluttered agitatedly.
I let out a harsh breath, but then my eyes widened as I saw a golden glint. The cricket was crawling over the “take in event of emergency” vial. A quick, hopeful bubble rose in my chest. I grabbed the vial and uncorked the lid.
“What’s that?” Last snapped.
I shoved the vial between Luvic’s lips and tilted the contents into his mouth. Some of it slid over his lips and dribbled down his chin, but most of it slid down his throat.
“What is it?” Last asked again.
I shook my head. “It’s for emergencies.”
The cricket jumped from my purse and back onto Luvic’s chest. Then his back arched, his eyes flew open, and he screamed.
As his roar ripped through the hall, the ground erupted, the stone cracked wide, and Jacob shot out on a wave of fire.
* * *
Luvic jolted upright as if he’d been pumped full of adrenaline. He gasped, clutching his chest.
“Get it . . . out!” He scraped at the spear. His brown eyes flashed orange, and he snarled, “Now!”
The hall was a battlefield. After Jacob had flown out on a volcano of fire, the two old Clarks had sprung after him. The old men—Celia and Ragnor—were blasting their way through the conjurers. Jacob, as far as I could tell, had decided his sole purpose in life was to cause chaos.
Celia and Ragnor had shot a hole in the wall and were fighting their way to it.
Jacob had conjured an army of flying metal pigeons.
They were diving through the hall, shooting streams of fire.
He looked like a mad conductor, waving a baton for his orchestra of psychotic flaming birds.
To everyone in the room, I imagine it looked like he was attacking indiscriminately, but the pigeons dove away from Celia and Ragnor at the last moment, and they completely steered clear of Luvic and me.
I yanked free the knots of the spear in Luvic’s chest. The spear disappeared, and he fell over, shuddering violently.
I leaned over, grasping his shoulder, “Are you all ri—?”
He clutched my dress and pulled me so close my nose pressed to his. “What did you give me?” he said through gritted teeth.
My eyes widened.
“Mari. What?”
His face was quickly filling with a red heat, and his eyes glowed—not jackaltooth-orange, but with fire.
“The ‘take in event of emergency’ vial,” I said.
He shuddered, his muscles spasming and growing. He swore, his jaw bulging.
“Luvic?”
“Get them out of here—”
He shook, seizing violently. Then Luvic whimpered, and a bright flame shot free from the hole in his chest. The fire solidified into three hideous creatures made of claws and flame and smoke.
They twisted around Luvic, snakelike and terrifying.
They turned their flat triangular heads toward me and pierced me with burning eyes.
I shrank away as their flames lashed my skin. These weren’t illusion. They were something horrible and frighteningly old. They smelled like fire devouring rotting flesh, hot and putrid.
Long, whiplike cuts bled on my arms. Luvic’s skin sprouted thin red lashes. These were the cuts I’d seen on Harry. This was what he’d been attacked by. It wasn’t Finn who’d cut gouges into the walls and streaked fire through the tunnels—it was these . . . things.
That must have been what Harry meant when he’d said a monster had killed him. And when he’d said “liar,” he was blaming me for the monster. Harry had said Finn had attacked. Had Finn killed it? And if so, how?
“What do I do?” I whispered.
When Luvic didn’t answer, I looked down. The brown of his irises was gone, and instead, his eyes were balls of flame. He stared unseeing at the ceiling, his muscles taut.
I shook his shoulders. “Luvic?”
No response.
The fire creatures sniffed the air, their forms crackling. One of them moved toward me, its long snout twisting into an eerie semblance of a smile. I braced myself, preparing for its lunge.
Then a flock of pigeons dove at it, tearing through the flame.
The creatures roared like a fire out of control and leaped across the pit. Primus laughed at their charge, conjuring a stone hammer to strike them with. The Bard screamed something, his face red as he sprayed water at the fire creatures.
The water steamed, shooting up clouds of angry mist. The creatures hissed and sped toward Primus.
Jacob threw a wall of wind at the fire creatures, but their forms only grew, raging higher.
Last shoved me aside. She’d run across the room when Jacob had leaped out of the earth. Now she was back, the Bard storming after her.
“Do it,” she said. “Nobody ruins my wedding. Nobody takes my groom. Finish it. Now.”
The Bard’s face stiffened, and I saw a flicker in his eyes as he considered killing Last. But then his gaze flicked to Luvic, and his upper lip lifted into a sneer.
The exposed skin on Luvic’s arms and neck had turned a brindled gray.
The hole in his chest had knitted together, but the raw skin was jackaltooth-gray as well.
The Bard gave his son a disgusted look. “He’ll likely be dead by morning.”
“If he’s dead by morning, I at least want a night,” Last said. Then she added, her voice splintering, “He’ll survive. I’ll make sure of it. Now. The binding. Do it. You gave your oath. Do it.”
And so the Bard pressed his hand to his son’s brow, and while Primus and the Clark fought both the fire creatures, and Celia and Ragnor and Jacob darted between them all, Last conjured her binding illusion.
“Luvic,” the Bard said, his voice full of command. “Luvic, look at me.”
Luvic’s fire-drenched eyes jerked to his father’s. They flared brighter, coherence returning.
“That’s right,” he said, pushing the dark hair from Luvic’s forehead, stroking his cheek. “You must bind your troth.”
Luvic jerked, his back arching in pain, and his father sent a gentle, soothing hand over his forehead. “Now, son. Do what I say.”
Last held out her hand. She smiled at the twisted, thorny black rope that stretched from her heart and hovered over her hand. The poison barbs reached toward Luvic’s wrist. He held his arm up, his hand shaking.
His fingers twisted, and the golden rope of his illusion floated over his palm.
I startled, surprised, when I saw the cricket hop into his open hand.
Last laughed. Then her rope snapped forward like a cobra and twisted around Luvic’s.
The illusion wove together, two threads spinning, until the black and gold combined into a single infinity knot that reached from Luvic’s heart into Last’s.
Then the illusion flared brightly and sank into both of them.
The cricket chirped. Luvic closed his hand gently around it, his fist falling to the floor. Then his eyes rolled back in his head.
Unconscious.
“There,” the Bard said, disgusted. “It’s done. Stick to the bargain. Give me an heir within a year, then I’ll take him off your hands. Permanently.”
The Bard stood, brushing the dust off his suit. He lifted his arms and conjured, shooting a ribbon of glimmering water at the fire creatures. The second it struck them, they disappeared.
The old men—Celia and Ragnor—dove through the hole they’d blown in the wall.
Jacob frowned after them, scratching his chin. His clothing was soaking-wet and dripping on the floor. He casually turned back to the Clarks and the Bard. “So . . . does this mean no cake?” His wet hair fluffed in a puff of wind. He smiled and smoothed it down.
“Get out,” the Clark hissed.
Jacob’s friendly expression vanished as he stared at the Clark, as if he were rooting through the cellar of his mind. The Clark took a hasty step back, his smooth skin turning parchment-pale.
I felt a final goodbye tap inside my chest, then Jacob turned to Last and said solemnly, “Congratulations.”
Then he stepped through the hole in the wall and disappeared.
Last sniffed. She looked around at the destruction. She looked down at her ruined, smoldering dress. She looked at Luvic, unconscious and bloody on the floor.
Then she smiled beatifically and said, “That was exactly how I always dreamed my wedding would be. It was perfect.”