Page 63 of Heat of the Everflame

Alixe and I sat in the sand in dead silence, our attention fixed on the wall of trees we’d just escaped. Every time a bird rustled a branch or a creature skittered through the brush, my heart would stop, my lungs would still, and a flush of adrenaline would pulse through my veins.

In the inevitable stillness that followed, my body would shake until I forced myself to calm, and the vicious cycle would begin all over again.

When neither of us could take it any longer, Alixe broke the silence. “Did you ever learn anything about godstone as a healer?”

I smirked grimly at the irony. Godstone had been one of the many topics my mother forbid me to learn in her effort to shield me from the Descended world. Had her disappearance not prompted me to take over her work at the palace and pore over her notes on Descended ailments, I might not know about it even now.

“The small wounds aren’t always fatal,” I answered. “As long as the toxin doesn’t spread, they heal. Slowly, but they heal.”

“And if it does spread—is there any treatment?”

I clenched my jaw. “None that I know of.”

She pulled her knees to her chest and wrapped her arms around them, dipping her head low. Almost too quietly to hear, she began whispering, offering up a prayer to the Blessed Mother Lumnos—to watch over Taran and Luther and return them to us, to guide Taran’s healing from his wounds, and to carry us safely back to ourterremère.

I felt suddenly out of place, a heathen intruder into a sacred rite.

When she finished, she gazed up to the sky. “I have no offering, Blessed Mother, but I hope you hear me all the same.”

“Offering?” I asked.

Alixe looked at me. “When we pray to the Kindred, we give an offering of magic. Just a small drop, something to honor the gifts they bestowed. They say the magic given up in prayer is lost forever. In theory, that is—no one really knows for sure.”

“If that’s true, I’m surprised anyone prays at all. Aren’t the Descended a bit, um,obsessiveabout keeping their magic strong?”

She cracked a small smile. “That’s why the Kindred give the strongest magic to their most faithful servants. ‘An ember given is a flame received.’” She smiled. “At least that’s what my mother yelled while chasing me around the palace as a child,trying to get me to say my prayers instead of sparring with my cousins.”

I laughed at the thought of a tiny hellraising Alixe fleeing her exasperated parents. I imagined it looked quite a bit like my own childhood, a few miles away but an entire world apart.

“That explains Luther’s power,” I said. “I’ve never seen a man more devout.”

Alixe nodded in agreement.

“But what about me? I’ve never prayed to her.” I looked up at the stars and squinted as if I might come eye-to-eye with the divine old bird herself. “I’ve made fun of her a fair bit. Cussed her out a few times. I asked her for a favor once, and I’m pretty sure she laughed in my face.”

“Faith isn’t always about prayer. Sometimes it’s about sacrifice.”

Her somber look sent a chill climbing up my spine. I didn’t ask what she meant, and I wasn’t sure I really wanted to know.

Her head turned toward Arboros, and she sucked in a breath.

My eyes shot to the trees. From the shadows, two figures appeared. One was staring at a small object in his hand, and the second was limping, his arm draped around the other’s shoulders.

I started toward them, but Alixe grabbed me and pushed me back. “I’ll go. You stay here.”

“This is absurd,” I hissed. “Stop treating me like a liability.”

“Youarea liability,” she clipped, uncharacteristically losing her usual calm. “The three of us will always put your life first. If you wish to protect us, let us do our jobs to protect you.”

Heated arguments swirled in my throat. “Fine,” I gritted out. “Go.”

I fumed at my involuntary helplessness as I watched her run to their side and take Taran’s other arm over her shoulders.

Moments later, faces began to appear among the trees. I started to shout a warning, then paused as I realized the mortals had stopped their pursuit at the edge of the forest.

“I’m fine,” Taran muttered when they approached. “Let me go already. I’ve had worse wounds from a bar fight.”

They ignored his complaints, which only made him grumble louder, and laid him out on the sand. I kneeled at his side and gently peeled away his vest and the thick tunic underneath. The two gashes were already red and swelling, with fresh blood still seeping from the wounds.

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