Page 60 of Cloak of Night
“Rest,” Sora said. “You can fill me in later.”
He closed his eyes but insisted on talking, although his speech was slurred and slow, like he had to piece thesentence together word by word. “Aqueous bombs... explode... when they touch... water... but... theyreallyexplode... when they hit... ice.”
Oh. So that’s how he’d gotten blown into the lake. No wonder his head hurt. Sora was amazed Broomstick had gotten away with only that.
Well, other than almost drowning. She let out a long exhale, relieved she hadn’t lost him.
“Tell me... the vault?” Broomstick asked.
Sora reached into the hidden pocket just inside her collar, pulled out the gold soul pearl, and held it out to him. “I got Prince Gin’s soul.”
Broomstick’s face contorted, and he jerked away from the pearl as if it were a plague.
Sora frowned. “It won’t hurt you.”
“N-no,” Broomstick said, shaking his head vigorously. “Get it away from me. You can’t trust me with it. I’m a bad person.”
“What are you talking about?”
Suddenly, the words spilled out in a nearly delirious flood. “I’m going to kill a lot of people in the coming war, Spirit. The Dragon Prince is going to use me as a weapon on the mainland to slaughter city after city, country after country. I’ll pretend to be friendly and plan big parties for them, and entire towns will show up, excited to be invited. Because, you know, people trust me. I’m nice. I like talking to them and hearing about their families and their hobbies and their dreams. But once I’ve lured them in, I’ll blow them up. All their loved ones they just introduced me to. All their hopes and wishes blasted into ashes. I’m an evil person. Keep that soul pearl safe from me.”
Maybe he still has water in his lungs.Broomstick was out of the water, but the lake’s effects lingered, refusing to relinquish its hold on him.
Sora tucked the golden pearl away, not because she didn’t trust Broomstick but to calm him down. “You’re a good person,” she said. “One of the best I know. The visions you saw weren’t real—”
“But they could be!” He jumped up.
Her heart ached for him. Broomstick was the kind of person who threw surprise parties for his dormmates and sent birthday gifts to his coworkers’ children. All he wanted was to bring joy into others’ lives. The idea that his charisma could be used to cause harm was an assault on his very being.
If there’s water in his lungs, can you get it out?Sora thought to the emerald dust that now floated lazily in the air.
But the magic just eddied for a few seconds around Broomstick before returning to doing nothing.
Did that mean it couldn’t help? Or that Sora was wrong and there was no water in Broomstick’s lungs?
Gods, no. If it was the latter, that meant the lake’s enchantment had infiltrated something deeper inside him. Maybe Daemon had been able to protect Sora through their gemina bond because he was a demigod, like how he’d kept her tethered and therefore shielded from the Dragon Prince’s powers of hypnosis. But Fairy had only taiga magic for Broomstick to latch on to, plus he’d been unprepared for falling into the lake.
“We need to get out of here,” Sora said. “Maybe Liga will be able to help.”
Broomstick broke into a cold sweat. “You should leave me here. Then I can’t hurt anyone.”
“No! Don’t you see? The fact that you’re worried about hurting others proves that you’re good. The evil is only in your head. It’s not real. You have to fight it.”
“I can’t.” Broomstick let out a sob. “I saw what I’m going to do to those people. I can’t let it happen. I can’t make all those people love me, watch them get dressed up for the best night of their lives, and then murder them. I can’t. I won’t.” He sprinted for the water, determined to throw himself in.
Sora threw a net of ryuu particles at him. It tangled Broomstick’s feet, tripping him. She pounced and hit him in the back of the head with a chunk of ice.
Broomstick slumped to the ground.
“I’m sorry.” Sora looked at him. “I said you wouldn’t die today, and I meant it.”
She packed up their bags, then asked the ryuu magic to find her a path out of the caverns. It took a few moments, but soon enough, an emerald trail glittered against the ice.
Her gemina bond sparked as if Daemon were reaching out, asking if she needed help.
“Yes,” she said softly.
She wrote a message to Daemon and Fairy explaining what had happened. She could get Broomstick out of here, probably as far as Paro Village, the nearest town in this southern part of the kingdom. If Daemon could fly, they could come to meet them. Sora created another miniature eagle ray and sent the letter off to Jade Forest.
