Page 131 of Freeing Hook

“Iaso?” I ask, hating how pitifully desperate my voice sounds.

She backs away, placing her hand over her neck to hide her scar. “How much did he tell you about me?” she asks. When I stumble over the words, she snaps her fingers at me. “Quickly girl. Before he finds you.”

Fear lances through me, but something is wrong, and I have the feeling that I won’t know what until I give her the information she wants.

“I know you are—were—his wife. I know he tried to get rid of his Mating Mark to be with you. You were friends with him, and Peter, when you were a child. I know your blood contains healing properties, and that when the plague struck Estelle, you went to the Darling mansion to heal their daughter. I know…” I fight the urge to shut my eyes, to shield myself from her expression as I recount her death. “I know my mother slit your throat and made me drink your blood to save me. And I know it destroyed him.”

“Yes. Yes, it did, didn’t it?” Iaso’s expression is far off and I wonder if she’s remembering her own death or the boy Astor used to be. The boy she fell in love with.

Slowly, she leans herself against the walls, shutting her eyes. Tears squeeze from her lids to her pale-blue cheeks.

“Please,” I say. “He just wants to be rid of our Mating Mark. He never stopped loving you, and he never will. He doesn’t want to love anyone else. It’s his choice.”

“You sound thoroughly convinced,” says Iaso.

I swallow, shifting on my feet. But I can’t talk about Astor now, not when I’m face-to-face with the woman who unwillingly took my place in death. “I’m so sorry,” I say. “I’m so sorry about what they did to you. For me.”

Iaso flits her hand. “It was long ago.”

“But you’ve been trapped here ever since.”

She stares off into the distance, like she’s searching through the past. “He won’t quite let me go on.”

“I don’t understand,” I say.

She sighs, pinching the bridge of her nose. “That much is obvious.”

I would flinch at the insult, except there’s no unkindness in her voice.

“Do you love him?” she asks abruptly.

At that, I do flinch.

“That’s answer enough,” she says with a flit of her hand. She begins to pace across the cave floor with the sort of determination I’d expect from a healer. “And yet you’re willing to help him rid himself of the Mating Mark?”

Again, I nod.

A sad smile softens her full lips. “So it’s truly love, then. My husband is a fool for not seeing that.”

“I think he sees it. He just can’t care for me in the same way,” I say.

“Clearly not,” she says, anger spiking in her tone, though I can’t understand why. She runs her hands through her hair at her scalp, pacing again. “Nolan, what have you done?”

Again, the unease settles in my belly. I don’t understand why she’s so distraught over Astor trying to remove his Mating Mark, unless she fears it will fail just as it did when they were fifteen. Still, that doesn’t make sense. Doesn’t seem to be enough to inspire the distress, the disappointment I’m witnessing.

It hits me then that it can’t be a coincidence that Iaso is the Seer we’ve been searching for. There has to be a reason Astor didn’t tell me we were returning to his home village.

Something as dull and heavy as stone thuds in my stomach. “He’s not trying to break his Mating Mark, is he?” I ask.

Iaso’s fingers stop running through her hair, frozen in that crazed position as she spins on her heel to look at me. “Just give me a moment to think. I can get you out of here. Or…” She squeezes her eyes shut, thinking. “Keep him trapped long enough to let you escape. You do have a way off the peninsula, don’t you?”

I shake my head. “Only on his ship.”

“Of course,” she says, rubbing her palms together. “Then perhaps if you told him I was begging him not to go through with it. Perhaps he’d still listen to me…”

“Please,” I say, tired of being left in the dark. “Just tell me what he’s trying to do.”

But when Iaso stares at me, mouth half open, apology written on her expression, I think I already know.

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