Page 200 of Mud

This isn’t Taland—what the hell have I done?

I don’t know who Taland really is.

He lied. I lied.

We both lied and lied and lied…

“I did.”

The tears were bigger, heavier than before, but when they fell on my lap, sometimes on the vulcera’s scales, they didn’t lessen the weight on my shoulders.

Why, why, why would you?!

Only that first, weak ‘why?’ left my lips.

He shrugged. “Because I could.”

Goddess, I wanted to scream until the world broke. The same answer as before—the exact same answer.

Except this time, Taland continued.

“He drew the tallarose on my chest.”

The tallarose.Us.The ink on his skin.

“It’s actually a worse disease than this, what I put on him,” he said. “A curse, one entirely made out of magic—not a virus or a bacteria or a fungi—just magic. It last over a year, and it gets under your skin. It flows with your blood. It steals your energy and causes incredible pain once in a while, and one wrong letter could kill the subject.”

“Stop,” I said, and though I meant to sound harsh, I couldn’t. I simply didn’t have the energy.

So, why did you do it?!

Again, the words popped in my head, demanding to be said, but I refused to let them. Now that I was barely moving, it was easy.

The silence stretched, unbroken by screams for a while. I’d gotten so used to the constant noise of chatter and music and footfalls against asphalt in Night City without even realizing it. It felt like part of me was there still because the Bluefire challenge had been so terrifying that I refused to acknowledge I’d even been there.

Even so, Madame Weaver was less terrifying than this.

Then Taland said, “It’s also contagious.”

The world, the game, the colors of the Iris Roe hidden inside a mountain could have lost their colors completely for the longest second. All I saw was white inside my head, just as white as everything surrounding me right now.

A terrible disease that caused crippling pain. That merged with your body. That was contagious.

I looked up at Taland, the tears pausing for a moment. My hand froze on the vulcera’s jaw.

A heartbeat, then two.

Contagious,he said, and he continued to touch the beak of his familiar, half dead on his lap.

No, a man like him would never do what that man in the footage did—look at him!

He was Taland, my Taland. Despite his mouth, he would never ever,ever-ever-ever.

He hadn’t.

“You saved him.”

The words were crystal clear coming out of my mouth. And finally—finally—some of that weight was lifted from my shoulders.

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