Chapter 33 #3
When I’ve drained the last gulp, I set the waterskin down and then roll up my sleeve, grimacing at the blood. I start to fumble with the bandage, but I accidentally drop it. A hand slashes out, catching the cloth before it can land on the dirt.
I suck in a breath and lurch up to see Piper standing before me. There’s an aggressive scowl on his face as he looks at the state of my arm. “You should’ve wrapped this already. You’re still bleeding.”
“That tends to happen when you’re sliced open,” I retort. “And I was about to wrap it. Obviously.”
His eyes narrow at my tone. “Still mad,” he seems to say to himself. “I’ll bind it,” he adds, before he clamps down on my wrist.
I try to pull away. “No. I’ll—”
My words evaporate instantly when I feel him go absolutely rigid. My gaze flies up, and the expression on his face fills me with alarm. He looks as if he’s in some kind of trance as he stares at my arm. When I try to pull away, his hold tightens.
“Let go,” I growl, but it’s like he doesn’t even hear me.
His nostrils flare, and then I watch in horror as he lifts my arm and abruptly clamps his mouth over my dripping blood.
I jolt in shock and disbelief, trying to comprehend the fact that his mouth is on my skin. I can feel his teeth, his lips, his tongue . . .
The vapor from his pipe suddenly swarms around him, rigid and pluming, like a fire chugging out smoke. It’s so thick I can’t see through it, and there’s a mix of inky black that twists with the silvery gray and glints with warning.
Fear grabs hold, and my ears strain, because I can almost hear something in the roiling smoke. The fumes seem to lock within my lungs, and not in the way normal smoke does, but as sticky as syrup.
A sweet taste hits the back of my tongue, while that sound, that almost-noise, raps against the drums of my ears. I shiver all over, and the sticky sweetness in my lungs spreads.
His grip turns bruising enough for me to notice it again, and my heartbeat slams when I feel his tongue beginning to slather over my skin and lick up the blood that stains me.
Shock delayed my reaction, but now I try to wrench away from him in earnest. “Stop!” I cry, and I jerk up my foot, landing a kick right between his legs, which finally snaps him out of it.
His mouth tears away as he grunts, jerking forward with a grimace of pain that cracks his expression. As soon as I feel his hands loosen, I yank my arm out of his grip, and all the suffocating smoke from his pipe instantly dissipates into thin air.
“What was that?” I demand, my pulse pounding.
“Varrik?”
I whirl around to see Garren and Frid rounding the corner of the building, both of them wide-eyed.
“Varrik . . .” Garren says, his voice sounding oddly stiff. “Did that just happen?”
Frid lets out a whistle. “Your magic just latched?”
My brows crash down in a frown. “What? What do you mean?”
Piper’s face has gone pale, either from what just happened or the kick I landed at his groin. He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. “I . . . fuck.”
His gaze drops to my arm again, but I tuck it protectively against my chest before flinging out my other hand. “Give me the bandage,” I demand. “I do not want you licking up my blood again like a dog lapping at a carcass.”
He hesitates, and my anxiety rises. There’s an unmistakable tingling where his mouth and tongue were, but I won’t even let myself think about that right now. The three men stand with a stilted silence.
Much to my relief, he finally holds out the bandage, and I snatch it up and start to wrap my arm. I can’t bear to look around, but I hope that nobody else just saw. My cheeks burn at the thought.
When I struggle to knot it, he swats my fingers aside and ties off the bandage himself. It’s tight enough to make me hiss.
“You said you wanted us to bring the fiends to Wystinn Burg, right?” Garren asks carefully. “Should I bring her too?”
Piper’s answer comes clipped. “No.”
“Don’t be an idiot, Garren,” Frid mutters. “He can’t do that.”
Garren shoots him a sharp look.
“What are you talking about?” I demand, but all three of them avoid my question and my eye.
“Take the fiends,” Piper orders. “Get them settled.”
Frid and Garren both nod and then walk off. As soon as they do, he grabs my good arm and starts hauling me away.
“Wait!” I try to pull out of his hold, but his grip is too tight. “Where are they taking the others?”
He ignores me.
I’m getting really tired of him doing that.
I look back long enough to see Kaetir and Rimona watching me go, before my sight of them is cut off as we pass by the carriages.
He stops us at a familiar horse, the beast of an animal pawing at the ground, its hooves dirty, greenish-black coat gone grainy from the dusty terrain.
Its eyes roll toward me, and the look in them still makes me think it would very much like to kick me.
Piper’s strong hands grip my waist, and he lifts me onto the saddle. He mounts behind me, arm banding around my middle, and then he urges the animal to a gallop. But he can’t run away from whatever just happened. Especially when I can still feel his mouth on my skin.
I won’t let him.