Page 70 of The Girl Who Should Be Dead

There’s another flex, something barely against her neck, and Ambra flinches.

“Here,” Gurlien says, before scooting closer to her on the giant bed, until he’s right next to her, the fabric of his shirt grazing her shoulder. Quick, he wraps the leash around his hand, and she shivers once more. “How much of that do you feel?”

Ambra swallows, and the leash isn’t cutting off her air or anything, but the tension might as well. “A fair amount,” she manages out. “It doesn’t hurt, but it’s like…” her mind flashes blank, trying to find an equivalent sensation. “How sensitive were you? Before your injury?” She blurts out.

His lips part, and he’s very close. “Fairly.”

Another tightening, a jerk, and she grabs his shoulder, flailing, in some strange fear. “Did you ever dive into a ley stream?” The words are torn from her, even then they make little sense. “Did you ever tap into too much magic that you weren’t supposed to grasp?”

A minute widening of his eyes.

“Did you ever plug into something and know, just know, that it’s too strong for you?” It tightens, vicious, cutting off her words with a squeak.

She fights against it, clawing up at her neck, before Gurlien catches her hand, holding it tight.

“Yes,” he replies strongly. “Yes, I know what that’s like.”

It’s still too taut for her to speak, so she struggles, before it loosens just a bit.

“It’s like that but around your neck.” It closes again, a vicious jerk, and her mind blacks out, her back arching off the bed.

Before Gurlien’s hand around the leash tightens, and he slams his hand against the bed, crashing her back down into the room with him.

She gasps, the air torn out of her lungs, and pain snaps down her back.

Gurlien grabs her shoulder, pinning her down, and that touch will do nothing if they try again, will do nothing against their pull. “I got you, you’re here,” he says, serious, and her whole body shakes against the bed.

Another attempt, slicing through the skin on her neck, and Gurlien grips the leash just as tight back. She sputters, choking on the leash, on blood welling up in her throat.

But his hand on her shoulder digs in, as she jerks with another attempt, fear coating her blood and pumping through her veins like acid, washing through her stomach and her lungs.

“You’re okay,” he murmurs, after a keening noise tears from her throat, and she’s manifestly not, but she turns her head towards him on the bed, the shaved side of her head gross with sweat against the pillow.

She blinks at him, and her eyelashes stick together.

He’s pale, a grim determination in his jaw, and she’s close enough to see the small variations of colors in his eyes, the flickers of lighter brown and even green.

They stare at each other, in the silence after the attempt, the only sound Ambra’s harsh breathing.

His lips part again. “Did I hurt you?”

It’s so laughably wrong that she huffs out, her throat raw.

“You’re bleeding,” he says, serious, because of course she is. “Your neck, your eyes, and your mouth. And nose.”

She lifts a shaking hand to her mouth, dabbing and coming away with a black smudge.

He’s still gripping her shoulder, still pressing her into the bed, and a rush of gratefulness floods through her.

“You…” she rasps, before she coughs, the taste bitter.

“I’m okay,” he informs her, holding up the hand with the leash. “This wasn’t…this was okay. I didn’t hurt you?”

He’s shaken, too.

Not trusting her voice, she shakes her head.

“Are they about to try again?”

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