Chapter 9
Nyx
We come around a turn in the path and the trees break open, and there it is…
water. A wide, glittering stretch of it, reaching out far enough that the trees on the other side look like broccoli, and a bird skimming the surface near them is nothing more than a streak of white.
Whether it's a large pond or a small lake doesn't matter to me in the slightest.
I’ll finally be able to bathe.
The thought of being clean for the first time in days rises up so fast it crowds out everything else. The swamp water, the storm, the dirt and grime of days of travel ground into my skin and hair. I want all of it gone.
“A lake!”
I don't mean to shout it out, but I do, my eyes flying to Thorian as I come to a stop.
Thorian hesitates, shooting me a look, and Talon and Fenric come to a stop as well, glancing between the two of us.
We’ve been walking all morning. Gathering up our things and leaving the cave in the early light of dawn was an efficient, quiet affair, with Thorian and Fenric too suspicious of Talon to engage in our normal conversation.
That, coupled with the itching of my scalp and the greasy film over my skin, has made it difficult to keep my spirits up this morning.
I miss Fenric kicking his rock along the path, pointing out everything he sees and giving us information about them, and I miss Thorian muttering about how annoying Fenric is.
I’d also hoped, foolishly maybe, that Talon might use the walk as an opportunity to share about himself, but he’s been quiet aside from the occasional whistling. If he’s bothered by the fact that his entire team is dead, he doesn’t show it.
“I suppose…” Thorian relents, shaking his head as he looks down at me, “that we could stop for a brief wash—”
“Yes!” I pump my fist in the air, then turn and hurry down the side of the hill toward the water. I can hear the men scrambling behind me to catch up, cursing under their breath, and I know it’s dangerous to go ahead like this, but I’m excited.
Maybe it’s the lady in me, but I’ve been chafing against the dirt under my nails, the grime over my skin. Before, I argued to Thorian that freshening up would make me a better fighter, and he’d laughed while Fenric joked that our stenches might keep the beasts away.
Now, the water reappears when I break through the trees, my boots sinking into the soft silt of the lake’s sand bar.
I turn, meaning to say something, and the words dissolve entirely.
They're already undressing. Thorian has shed his tunic and is working at his boots, and the sight of his bare back stops me mid-step.
He's broader than I'd registered, solid and defined, the muscles of his shoulders and back shifting as he moves.
When he straightens and turns slightly, I catch the line of his chest, the flat planes of his stomach, and I forget what I was going to say entirely.
Fenric is already down to nothing but his trousers, and there's no polite way to describe what that does to me.
He's built differently than Thorian, leaner through the torso but no less defined, all of it cut clean by days of hard travel and a life that clearly hasn't allowed for softness anywhere. He tips his head back to catch the sun, completely at ease in his own skin, and I can’t help but stare.
Talon, paler than the other two, drops his trousers to reveal thin boxers underneath and doesn't spare a thought for any of us watching.
He's tall, all lean lines and hard muscle, his build understated until you're looking directly at it. His shaggy blond hair falls across his forehead, and even in the full light of day his blue eyes carry a cool, unreadable quality. He’s beautiful, in some way that doesn't quite obey the same rules as everyone else's beauty.
Like he was made by different hands entirely.
I know I should look away. I mean to look away.
I don't.
Heat pools low in my stomach, spreading outward, and I press my lips together and try to look like I’m simply standing here, perfectly composed, taking in the scenery.
Then Thorian glances over at me.
His thumbs are hooked in his waistband and he says nothing, just lets his gaze travel up and then down, slow and unhurried, like he knows exactly what's happening and finds it interesting. The corner of his mouth shifts, barely.
My face goes hot.
"I'm just going to find somewhere a little more—" I gesture vaguely at the trees near me, already backing away. "Private."
I turn and walk away with as much dignity as I can reasonably claim, which is not very much.
“I’ll be over here,” I say, noting that even as they’re dropping their clothes, they keep their weapons at the ready.
“Be at the ready,” Thorian says, his eyes lingering on me. Whether it’s from concern or interest, I’m not sure. But I do know that I need to get away from the sight of them before I do something hasty.
Like running my hand down the length of Thorian’s torso, or picturing Fenric pressed against me, or finding out if Talon is cold to the touch, as they often say vampires are.
From our moment in the garden when he tasted the blood on my fingertip, I remember him being warm, but maybe he’s only warm in my memories.
Once in my little area, I force myself to disrobe, repeating to myself that it's worth the brief indecency to be clean. Up until the night I left to come after Lyra, I'd never dressed or undressed anywhere but my own room, and never in the presence of anyone but another woman.
So it feels completely deviant to strip down naked in the sand.
I gather my clothes and wade in, scrubbing them against themselves as best I can, working at the worst of the swamp and storm until the water running off them runs clearer.
Then I wade back out and lay them over the nearest rocks and branches where the sun can reach them, smoothing them flat before turning back to the water.
Reluctantly, I leave my dagger near the rest of our belongings and slip back in.
It's absolute bliss. I unbraid my hair and tip my head back so it drifts in the water around me. I don't have soap, but I run my hands over every inch of my skin to dislodge the sweat and grime, work my fingers into my scalp until my hair feels as close to clean as I can manage without it.
I long for the days of tipping my head back over the tub while my mother or Hilda worked lavender soap into the strands. When bathing was an every-other-day occurrence, and I'd emerge from the bathroom smelling of flowers and tinctures, feeling both clean and hydrated.
But even with that gilded past in mind, this still feels impossibly good.
I still feel good when I finally force myself out of the water and back onto the small strip of sand, checking my clothes to see how they're drying.
I'm halfway through pulling them back on when I hear something move, almost imperceptibly, in the trees on the far side of my little beach.
I hold my shirt to my chest, looking up just in time to see Magnus step out of the trees and onto the sand.
My heart seizes. A scream catches in my throat.
Every instinct I have fires at once, and my eyes cut immediately to my dagger, sitting near where my clothes had been just three feet away.
Too far. Possibly too far. I run the calculation in a single panicked breath and force myself not to bolt, because bolting is worse.
Bolting means my back is to him, and if he's going to kill me I am not going to make it easy.
I don't breathe. I can’t breathe.
He doesn't raise his hands.
The silence stretches for a moment that feels considerably longer than it is, and gradually, incrementally, I take him in.
He doesn't look as put together as he did the last time we met.
His beard, perfectly groomed to a point before in the style of the warlocks, is now scruffy and slightly unkempt.
The purple robes are stained and dirty. Whatever the Trials have done to the rest of us, they appear to have changed him as well.
He looks almost tired.
I don't let go of my shirt. I don't reach for the dagger. I just watch him, every muscle in my body coiled and waiting.
“Don’t scream,” he says, raising his hand, eyes locking on mine. “I just want to talk.”
I can feel his magic like smoke in the air, can sense it working around me.
It’s dark and full of malice. His palms begin to glow with the stuff, and maybe if I didn’t have my own magic, I wouldn’t notice.
I get the sense that he’s trying to conceal it from me, that maybe he even cast some sort of stealth spell to hide the casting.
For another, it might have worked.
The way he looks at me is not just malevolent. It’s coveting. In an instant, I’m reminded of Shaw and his men, the threat of taking something from me that I would never, ever offer.
Rather than believing him, or asking what he wants to talk about, or wasting a single second actually thinking that this man might want to talk to me, I open my mouth and let out the most blood-curdling scream I can manage.
Thorian and Talon are there in an instant, bursting through the foliage half-dressed, their weapons at the ready. Fenric follows a moment later, and Magnus turns, trying to run in the sand and stumbling once before he hits the tree line and disappears.
The demi-god and vampire follow, while Fenric comes to my side, placing a warm hand on my shoulder.
“What happened?” he asks, glancing at the trees where the three men disappeared. “Did he try to hurt you?”
I look up and meet his eyes, and say nothing about having felt his magic before he'd taken a single step toward me. Saying so would mean explaining how I knew, and explaining how I knew would mean telling Fenric something I'm not ready to tell him yet.
“He didn't touch me, but he definitely planned to hurt me,” I manage, because it’s true, just not everything.
Fenric’s eyes flick down for a moment, and he seems to register that I’m not actually dressed, only holding my shirt up to my chest to cover myself. Clearing his throat, he turns away, scrubbing his hand over the back of his neck.
“Go on,” he says. “You should dress. We have no idea if his teammates are nearby, too.”
I shudder at the thought, and as I finish pulling on my leathers and strapping the dagger around my waist, I close my eyes and reach for any trace of magic beyond what Magnus was casting before.
But I don’t feel anything.
A minute later, there’s another sound in the trees, and Fenric pulls me behind him before we realize it’s Talon and Thorian returning.
“—well, I wouldn’t have hacked it if you didn’t pin him like that,” Talon says as they step back through the underbrush.
“And you’re sure he won’t turn?” Thorian asks, his gaze darting to me, then Fenric, then around the rest of our surroundings. He doesn’t seem to notice anything, which must mean none of the other Vultures are nearby.
“No,” Talon laughs, snorting and shaking his head. “We choose who to turn. That bite was just to scare the fucker. And, gods, if he didn’t taste like scum off the bath house pool.”
Thorian laughs. “Looks like it, too.”
“He won’t turn,” Talon elaborates, “but I bet he’ll use every ounce of magic he has in his body casting healing spells and anti-venom hexes. It should work to our advantage, the misinformation about vamps.”
Thorian chuckles again, shaking his head, and despite everything that just happened and the fact that my hands are still shaking, I raise my eyebrows at them.
“Well,” I say, hoping my voice sounds more steady than I feel, “I guess one good thing came out of this… The two of you are friends now?”
Thorian’s face shudders, and he says, “No,” at the same time Talon says, “Best friends, I’m afraid.”
“You’re okay?” Thorian asks, stepping in closer to me, and the other two men wait for my answer. Even though I already told Fenric nothing happened, I can feel his gaze on me. I can feel them waiting for the answer.
And, for some reason, I decide to offer them the truth. “I’m a bit...shaken. But he didn’t hurt me. Didn’t touch me. I was just frightened.”
“Bastard,” Talon says under his breath.
Thorian wraps his arms around me and holds on for a moment longer than strictly necessary, his hand warm at the back of my head. Fenric pulls me in next, pressing a brief kiss to my temple before stepping back.
Talon, standing a little apart from the rest of us, meets my eyes. "For the record," he says, "screaming was the right move. I’ve never seen a fucking warlock move that fast."
I realize that, although what happened was frightening, it’s not the same as what happened with Shaw. Because this time, the second I needed them, these men came to my rescue. They didn’t ask questions, just charged in and went after the thing hurting me.
And although I love Ivor to the bottom of my heart, he wasn't strong enough to keep me safe when those men came. I'd forgotten what it felt like to have someone capable at my back, someone standing beside me that I could lean on without hesitation.
It’s something I haven’t felt for a long time, not since my parents died.
Even with Hilda and Ivor’s support, I was still caring for them, in a way.
And it was the same for my sister. The death of my parents thrust me into a caretaking role that I never asked for, warping our sibling relationship until it barely resembled one at all.
“Thank you,” I whisper, looking up at each of them, including Talon. “For taking care of me. It feels good to be on a team with you all.”
Thorian stares at me, his jaw ticking, and although he doesn’t show it, I know what it means to him. I’ve gotten better at reading his expression. And the slight nod, the hand over his hair… It’s the same as Fenric’s smile.
"As heartwarming as this scene is," Talon says, swinging his sword around lazily and pacing up and down the beach, a sharp edge creeping into his tone, "we should probably get a move on."
“Something we agree on,” Thorian says, clearing his throat, clearly ready to move on from the talk of feelings. I smile to myself as they gather the rest of their things, dressing and returning to the path.
Maybe they're not ready to say it yet, but I can feel the bond between us growing into far more than a simple alliance.
The Obsidian Spire cuts against the horizon across the water, dark and distant, closer than it was yesterday. I fix my eyes on it for a moment, just breathing.
We're still alive. After everything—the swamp, the cemetery, the storm, Magnus—we're still here. Still standing.
And at the end of it, if we're lucky, if we're careful, if we can hold on just a little longer, there's Lyra.
I hold that thought close and don't let go.