Page 128 of Moonmarked

I drew in a deep breath and prepared to scream my guts out for help—when her hand closed round my ankle, and she squeezed so hard it hurt.

The scream caught in my throat. The seer waswhispering with her eyes closed now, though they continued to bleed. Her lips were barely moving, and I couldn’t understand a word she said, but…

English.

She was whispering in English.

All the thoughts in my head, all that panic and terror took a pause. I leaned over, both to get her hand off my ankle—how in the fuck could she even grip me so hard?!—and to listen to what she was saying.

I actually understood.

She was repeating the same words over and over again: “Pour this where the world forgets itself, where memories drown and names are swallowed. Pour this where the world forgets itself, where memories drown and names are swallowed…”

She let go of my ankle all by herself as I watched in disbelief, and her other hand was moving, reaching for the bowl. She had something between her fingers—a tiny glass vial with an attached wooden lid, and she was trying to fill it with the water of the bowl, I thought.

“Let me help you,” I said, so completely disoriented, and I took the vial and filled it for her, closed the lid and put it in her hand.

She didn’t take it.

“Pour this where the world forgets itself,”she repeated—and I finally realized she meantthat.The white liquid in the vial.

She was giving itto me.

“Please,” I whispered. “Please, can you sit up? I’m going to get help. Just hold on.” With the vial in my fist, I tried to push her up by the shoulders, but she could have weighed a fucking ton.

It wasn’t possible. Isawher size. She wastinyfor fuck’s, sake—how in the hell was she so heavy?!

“There, where summer meets winter. There, Noxavira, there…”

“HELP!” I screamed at the top of my voice.

The seer was losing it, and she was still crying blood, and I needed someone to get her off meright nowbefore I lost my fucking mind, too.

I thought I’d have to scream another few times for someone to come in here and find me, but suddenly the door opened all the way and in came a man I’d never seen before. Behind him was Lyall.

The man was big,huge,easily over six and a half feet, and he didn’t even look at me, only kneeled on the floor and grabbed the seer in his arms.

He moved her, pulled her up, though I could see by the way he gritted his teeth and the way his veins bulged on his neck and temple that he was having averyhard time doing it.

Which made absolutely no sense to me, yet it was happening right in front of my eyes.

The man pulled up the seer, and then he was moving, rushing out the door, and Lyall kneeled in front of me.

His hands were on my face.Don’t touch me!

“You’re okay,” he whispered. “You’re okay, Nilah. You will be just fine.”

I didn’t believe him.

His office felt even colderthan before. I sat on one of the bigger couches on the far right, looking at the wall behind the desk. Lyall sat with me, encouraged me to drink the glass of water he’d put in my hand.

Meanwhile, the vial with that white liquid burned me through the pocket of my pants.

“What was it?” he asked when I finally took a sip. “What did she say? What did you see?”

I looked at Lyall. He seemed stressed. Nervous. Restless as he talked to me.

“She showed you something.”

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