Page 22 of Heart of Night
I was wrong. There won’t be another opening to run. If I wasn’t certain when Ephegos forced the poisoned water down my throat, I’m sure now. It’s become impossible to tell the number of hours or days passing between my poison-induced periods of sleep and the time I spend vomiting and fighting a pounding headache when I wake up again.
This is the third time they’ve poisoned me on the journey to Meer, and every time I open my eyes, it’s night, so I can’t make out more than the immediate surroundings when Herinor marches me to a thicket where I can take care of my needs.
With nothing staying in my stomach for long, I’ve become weak and incapable of even thinking about running.
“Over there.” Herinor points at a low hedge that seems all too domesticated for us to still be in the Plithian Plains.
I follow where he’s pointing and double over, retching until the nausea ebbs and I’m able to breathe again.
The male hasn’t spoken about his oath to Ephegos again, or about how he intends on breaking it to help me the way an actual ally wouldn’t. Then, I’ve given up hope that anyone is my ally in this world. The only person willing to save me died to actually do so, and his death still haunts me in the nightmares of my poison-sleep.
I’m about to gather myself up and stagger back to the carriage when movement in the nearby bushes catches my attention. Before I can make out what sort of animal snuck up on us, Herinor darts over and reaches into the twigs, extracting a human shape clad in leathers. A bow and arrow are slipping from the person’s hands as Herinor slams her down on the ground where he pins her with his steel grasp.
Not any person, I realize.
“Kaira—” My voice is weak and my legs shaky as I stumble toward her, pulling on Herinor’s shoulder to get him off her. “Get off her. She’s not an enemy.”
Herinor doesn’t seem convinced, for he grabs the woman by the throat as he pulls her back to her feet, skillfully evading my attempts to shove him off her.
“Is something wrong with your eyes?” He jerks his chin at the bow and arrow. “She was pointing that at you.”
Kaira’s brown gaze meets mine through the pale, moonlit night, and she tries to shake her head. She’s wearing the exact same clothes she was when I saw her sneak along the hedges at the Flame estate.
“Did you follow us all the way here?”
“Apparently, or she wouldn’t be hiding in second-rate bushes to fire arrows at you.” Herinor drags a struggling Kaira toward the carriage, his free hand herding me along. “Only thieves and assassins sneak through the night like this.”
Under different circumstances, I might have raised a brow at him, asked him if he was serious, but with my head spinning from lack of nourishment and the aftereffects of the poison, I am in no condition to challenge him about anything.
“Don’t hurt her,” I ask instead, hating how helpless I’ve become. If only I had my magic?—
It’s a topic I try not to think on too much anymore when all it does is give me flashes of the day when even magic wasn’t enough to save Myron.
Herinor’s chuckle rolls through the field, bouncing off the polished walls of the carriage as he marches us up toward Ephegos’s elegant form. “I’m not the one who decides what’s to happen with her.” I can’t help noticing the disdain in his voice. “He is.”
“And he will make sure the lower Flame is properly punished for an attempt on my prisoner’s life.” Ephegos pushes away from the carriage, prowling toward me as if cataloguing any injuries. Of course, all he is doing is making sure I’m not visibly damaged when he delivers me to Erina.
My stomach sinks despite the excitement and adrenaline coursing through my blood. If Kaira truly meant to kill me… Perhaps Herinor was right that I have no allies.
He releases her, shoving her to the ground in front of the Crow traitor, her whimpering as her knees hit the hard earth making me shrink an inch. “Followed us all the way from the estate,” he notes, stepping back so he’s standing beside me—probably to make sure I won’t bolt.
The thought brings a dark laugh to my lips. As if I could run in this state. As if I could do anything other than exist.
Holding my breath, I scan the Crow from the side, searching for any indication he’s going to push me to my knees next, but Herinor stands like a statue as he waits for his master to exact justice on the would-be assassin.
Something in the way Kaira quivers under his stare tells me she’s been in this position before and knows exactly what’s going to happen next.
Since I woke in the Flame estate, I haven’t seen Ephegos lay a hand on anyone other than me, friend or foe, but when he strikes Kaira’s face with the back of his hand in a wide swing, it’s obvious he has more practice beating up his prisoner than he’d let on.
At the gasp of agony from Kaira’s lips, something tries to rise inside me like a memory of the power I once held, but there’s no water around us. No stream. Not even a puddle … if I don’t count the spiked liquid in the canteen that’s sitting under the bench inside the carriage.
“I tolerate a lot of things.” Ephegos stalks away from the cowering part-Flame, folding his arms as if he hadn’t just struck her in the face and musing at the stars above is the only concern he has. “But I don’t tolerate insubordination, Kaira. You were worth nothing in Jeseida’s service, and if you’re stupid enough to sneak up on two full-blooded Crows in the middle of the night and try to kill their charge, you’re even more useless than I initially thought.”
He stops to eye Kaira, who is shaking with suppressed sobs. Sobs of fury, I realize as she turns to watch Ephegos, and I can make out the ire written on her features. Her bow and arrow have dropped to the ground in the process of Herinor dragging her to the carriage, lying in the dirt and leaves right at Ephegos’s feet. He swipes them up with a swift hand and snaps them in half.
I could swear a part of Kaira’s defiance withers at the sight of her weapon being destroyed.
“I should end you for your disobedience.” His hiss is the closest I’ve experienced him to his Crow self since the breaking of the curse, and it’s enough to remind me what sort of creature I deal with.