Page 83 of Skalterra By Nightmare
“Did you want something, lovely?” the old woman sang, and Fana turned to me with big, begging eyes.
“I don’t have money,” I hissed back at her.
She shoved her hands into the pockets of her cloak and pulled out a few silver coins.
“Tiernan does.” She smirked.
“That’s Tiernan’s money?”
“Yes.”
I held her gaze for a moment, knowing Ferrin wouldn’t want us to stop, but feeling bad for the kid in front of me. Her and I were the only two in the group who hadn’t volunteered for any of this.
“Fine. And since Tiernan’s paying, I want something too.”
Fana’s face split into a grin, and her robes billowed around her as she skipped towards the pastry woman. She pulled her hood back to better survey the selection of sweets at the woman’s counter, and I watched, satisfied at having secured my place as more fun than Tiernan.
“Do you know you’re being followed?”
That voice, smug and with the slightest, lilting rasp, made the Skal in my veins feel like ice. I spun around, looking for the man I knew it belonged to, but Ciarán stayed hidden.
“Fana!” I warned. Fana looked up from the counter, a pastry already in her mouth.
“None of that, Blue. You don’t need to worry about me.” Ciarán’s dark laugh sounded from every direction, and I put a hand against my head. Fana returned her attention to the sweets, and I stumbled back until I found the edge of the dock. “I’m far, far away, though I do have questions for you. Namely, what the hell is growing on my chest? It looks like mold.”
“You’re in my head,” I hissed, horrible realization dawning over me. Ciarán, the Grimguard hunting us, had somehow gained access to my consciousness. “How?”
“How?” Ciarán repeated. “Have your friends not warned you? Never tell your full name to a nocturmancer if you don’t want to give them access to your mind.”
Dread churned my stomach. Theyhadwarned me, but not until after I’d given the Grimguard my name as he lay injured on Orla’s bed.
“So, Wren Warrender, prospective Von Leer Viking, back to my question,” Ciarán continued. “Do you know you’re being followed?”
21. Sports Design and Innovation
The laughter of the village children sounded far away, the docks turned cold, and the light of the steam-lamps seemed to dull. Skalterra was collapsing in around me, and my breathing hitched.
I’d given Ciarán my name. Now he held power over me.
“Get out,” I hissed, my eyes trained on the back of Fana’s hood. “Or I’ll tell Galahad—”
“Now don’t dothat,” Ciarán chided. His voice was so clear, so loud in my head, that it took everything in me not to search the boardwalk for him. “You know what Galahad will do if you tell him, don’t you?”
“He’ll tell me how to get rid of you.”
“Oh, Blue, there’s no getting rid of me. Not now that I know your name. We’retethered,the same way you’re tethered to that old man. But don’t worry. I promise not to get too jealous.”
I ripped my eyes away from Fana to glance up and down the walk, searching for Galahad and Tiernan at the neighboring shops.
“Galahad will fix this,” I asserted, both to myself and Ciarán.
“He will,” Ciarán conceded. “By killing you.”
I froze with my hands balled into fists at my side.
“He wouldn’t,” I said, but the scars on my hand said otherwise.
“You’re a liability,” Ciarán sang. “You can’t get rid of me, buthecan get rid of you. You think he’ll let you tag along if I’m in your head? You think he’ll let you go back home knowing I might call you to my side and make youmyweapon?”
