Page 6 of Anchor

I stayed in the dark for a long time, but eventually, I began to make out the light somewhere far away. I began to move toward it instinctively, and to feel more of my body—my heart beating and my blood rushing and my thoughts clearing and…my magic.

My magic was there. I felt it, felt the weight of it in my veins, felt the flavor of it on my tongue, felt the heat of it against the inside of my skin.

It was there and it was alive and it wasmoving,eager to answer my call.

Every other thing that had been on my mind until that second, all that chaos my skull had barely contained, came to a sudden halt.

My magic wasvibratinginside me, and I knew that if my ring was on my finger and I called for it, it would answer.

Goddess, I’d won the Iris Roe. I’d actually drained the colors of a man-made Rainbow with the help of Taland’s magic, and it had worked. It had fucking worked, whichterrifiedme, because I also remembered what had happened after. How they hadn’t ended the game, but the players had tried to kill me, demandingtheirmagic back because I had no right to it. Because I wasMud.

And then the vulcera and Taland’s eagle had fought—stop it, I’m not worth it, stop it!—and Taland had taken me through the Drainage.Please, please, please stop…

My eyes opened.

No-no-no-no—it couldn’t be. Taland was too smart to simply walk through that Drainage. He was too smart to have cost himself everything because of me—toosmart. He wouldn’t.

He would never. Not ever.

But then how am I in my room?

I blinked and blinked for possibly a hundred times before I was able to tear my eyes off that ceiling, to look around in hopes that maybe I wasn’t where I thought I was. Where IknewI was.

The memories rushed through my mind even though I didn’t want to believe them. I didn’t want to believe that any of it had happened, that the Iris Roe was over and Taland wasn’t there and my magic was inside me, magic I didn’t even recognize anymore. I hadn’t had it in a while, and now I couldn’t tell you if it was the same or different, or if it was magic at all!

I couldn’t tell you because I didn’t care to think about anything else other than Taland.

Taland, who was most definitely not near me.

My body moved somehow, and I sat up. There was no pain anywhere on me—none.I was clean, my hair dry, my nails trimmed, my red silk pajamas on me.

My red silk pajamas are on me, and I had a small bruise on the inside of my elbow, right over a thick blue vein, like I’d been pierced by a needle in the past couple of hours. I was lying on my bed, in my empty room, and it was dark outside but all three lamps were on so I could see.

I could see that I was all alone.

No Taland anywhere.

Tears filled my eyes as the chaos continued inside my head, taking my breath away. I refused to believe that that had happened, that those players had really tried to kill me after I’d already won, that the Council hadn’t ended the stupid game—after I’d already won!

I needed to get out of there before Madeline found me. I needed to go back to the City of Games, to find Taland—and no, I didn’t wonder about how I was in the mansion, in my room; why I was clean and dressed in my own clothes. I didn’t wonder about anything, just tried to make it out of bed so I could start running.

I never got the chance.

The door to my room suddenly opened and Poppy came through with a big glass full of reddish juice in her hand, and Fiona followed.

On the inside, I screamed.

I screamed in panic and fear and relief and every feeling under the sky that was suddenly falling over me, and Poppy screamed on the outside, too. Only a short scream when she saw that I was awake, then turned and put the glass in Fiona’s hands, and ran over to the bed. To me. Grabbed me by the shoulders, looked at my face, said something I couldn’t quite understandbecause my ears behaved like I was underwater, and then she pulled me to her chest and hugged me. Tightly. For a long time.

Meanwhile Fiona stayed by the door with the glass in her hands, a smile on her lips, and tears streaming down her cheeks as she watched us.

“…survived! Iknew-knew-knewit! And don’t you worry about a thing—I took care of everything,” Poppy said without stopping to take a breath. “All that filth is off you and we gave you vitamins and everything you need to get your strength back through an IV for like four hours straight. You’re okay. You’re perfectly okay—Grandma’s healers put about twelve different spells on you—you arefine!”

Grandma’s healers.

Funny—she’d never once called them for me, not when I was young and sick with a flu, and not when I’d gotten wounded on a mission when I worked as an agent—best to stay at Headquarters; they’ll take care of you just fine,she’d said that first time.

I’d been relieved. Any reason to stay out of this mansion was a goodreason in my book, even when I was sick or in pain.

---