Page 38 of Bound to the Shadow Queen
The bond rebelled at the loss of contact as I lowered Everly onto the cushions. Fury burned bright in Noerwyn’s pale eyes, but her hands remained steady as she tore into her supplies.
“I hope you made them suffer,” she said, her features pinched and her voice carved from ice.
“Not enough,” I answered, remembering deaths that had come far, far too quickly.
Nevara stood silent at the far end of the room, her slim fists clenched around her staff. Mana flared from the top, pulsing like a furious heartbeat.
Did she smell the blood? Did she See the wounds in whatever vision her precious Shard Mother saw fit to provide her with?
I ground my teeth, forcing myself to look away from her. My gaze landed instead on Everly’s ashen features, her lips trembling with each ragged breath.
A thin, broken scream tore from her throat. I looked sharply at the bottle in Noerwyn’s hands. It should have been soothing the wounds, not making them worse.
“Why is that hurting her?”
Noerwyn shook her head in bafflement, all the while keeping up a steady stream of murmuring.
“I know, Evy. I’m here. I’m here, and you’re going to be all right,” though the words fell flat as she yanked the cork from another bottle.
No. The Unseelie mongrels hadn’t suffered nearly enough. My eyes flicked back toward the portal, and the temptation to go back and finish what I had started clawed along my skin. I should have finished them. Should have buried their bones in frost.
Ice laced the floor, crawling up the walls and ceiling.
Everly choked on another breath, her body seizing, and Noerwyn froze, lips parting.
“Son of a mother-loving whore.” She hurled her bottle against the bloodstained wall, letting out another string of curses before she turned to me.
“You have a Spring healer at the palace, right?” she asked without waiting for an answer. “You need to take her. Now.”
I shook my head once. “Travelling through the ice isn’t safe in her state. It was a risk the first time, but she could bleed out?—”
“She will bleed out if you don’t,” Noerwyn shot back, her composure cracking at last. She peeled back one of the blood-soaked bandages, revealing the blackening edges of the wound.
The sight made my veins turn to ice. The Unseelie and their shards-damned poisons.
“Take her,” Nevara said quietly.
Noerwyn squeezed her eyes shut, her voice trembling when she spoke. “Will the healer be able to save her?”
Nevara pursed her lips. Her gaze was distant and swirling with starlight. “She will die if she stays.”
She might die either way.
The unspoken truth seemed to echo off the frozen walls along with another scream. My ring iced over, the bond tugging so hard it hurt.
I scooped her into my arms once more.
Nevara’s earlier question whispered back, curling like smoke in my mind.
What will you do when you find her?
I still didn’t know. But I sure as hells wasn’t going to let her die before I figured it out.
“You are too stubborn to die like this, Morta Mea.”
Then I lunged through the ice, fury and desperation snapping at my heels, willing her to still be breathing when we landed on the other side.
Everly
