Page 118 of Of Serpents and Ruins
"You're more or less free to do with other medicines whatever you like," he said with a grin, "but it's most important when it involves something like this. The basilisk venom is powerful and rich with healing properties and antivenom. It can be used in many potions and anti-venom concoctions, though it must be treated with great care. It’s worth its weight in liquid gold. My mam would be thrilled with such a bounty. She’d spend hours and hours on those anti-venom concoctions. Three drops of this steeped with blood root and vulture bones and a few other reagents and a month of rotation and proper care and—boom."
"That sounds complicated." I raised an eyebrow.
"And his mam would never charge much even when it was complicated," Lorna said.
He tilted his chin in agreement. A flicker of sadness passed through his black eyes.
He missed his family. Both of them did. They'd been here in our world for so long.
I opened my mouth to speak, but Arjax shook his head. "In time, little cousin. We'll find our way home one day. Until then, Mischief and all the rest have need of us, as do you. So we just make the best of what we’ve got. Fix what we can. You’d be amazed at what’s really possible out there."
Lorna strode up to me, fixing me with a stern gaze. "Show me that water serpent form of yours again."
I straightened my shoulders and obliged, feeling the surge of energy and sting of transformation.
"Stop." She pushed her hand into the center of my chest.
The sharpness of the blow startled me more than it hurt. My form fell away before my dress had even merged with my scales.
"You can interrupt shifting?" I staggered back, staring at her in shock.
She smirked, hands on her waist. "I can." She held up her finger then tilted her head. "Now." Drawing in a deep breath as if to demonstrate, she lifted my shoulders and then pushed them back to open my chest. "This has to stop. You’re hunching in when you go to shift, girl. Push your shoulders out and back. Deep breaths. You need the air. Fill your lungs."
Kine had told me to take three deep breaths before shifting, so I did that as well.
Lorna nodded, her gaze moving up and down my body as she considered me. "After this, when you have time, you need to build the muscles through here." She put her hands on my back and then pushed against my core. "You’re strong, but you could be stronger."
While Arjax made the preparations, Lorna worked me over, examining and criticizing my form. She praised my stance and examined my pressure points. The hardest one was her focus on my spine.
"You little cousins always want to pull in. It lessens the pain. I know that, but you’ve either got to have your lungs and blood full, or you’ve got to keep open. It shortens the shift. Now draw more from your core like this. It’ll help you when you try to coil and be more fine-tuned with your movements."
She had me continue to shift and change while Arjax worked on the venom. Kine watched while Elias sketched. He’d nearly filled up yet another book, his pencil now little more than a stub and his red sleeves smudged with graphite.
Kine kept his arms folded as he watched Lorna work with me.
She analyzed every aspect of my shifting, critiquing my posture and my stance most of all. "You’ll be strong enough eventually to shift even when you aren’t in perfect formation, but for now, if you take the proper stance, you’ll have better energy throughout and better control."
The shifting had eased my tension as well, wearing me out.
She turned toward Kine. "What about you, baby blue?"
Kine offered the ring to Lorna. "Can you see any reason why this would stop working? The Sepeazian magic is separate from yours, but the rings—well, something has disrupted it. Our scholars believe it is because of the overall curse and how it affects all the elements. They think maybe it’s because something in there is blocking the Vawtrian energy, but perhaps you could tell us better?"
"How long has this been an issue?" Lorna accepted the ring.
"It started a few weeks ago as best I know," Kine said. "Before that, there had been odd fluctuations but nothing alarmingly out of the ordinary, especially considering what had been happening."
Lorna gripped the ring in her hand and clamped it tight. Golden energy surged and crackled from her hand into the ring. It smelled like lightning on metal.
Oh, wow. "What was that?" I asked, my hand still gripping my arm but no longer working out the tension.
Lorna chuckled. "The well that you put these in to recharge is filled with Vawtrian energy, but here you are at the source. Well. Not exactly. But Arjax and I count as sources even if we aren’t the only ones." She scowled as she gripped the ring tighter, thin lines forming over her brow. She tilted her head as she looked at Arjax. "Hold this." She tossed him the ring.
He snatched it out of the air and turned it over in his palm. He’d barely curled his fingers over it when he snapped his hand up. "Someone poisoned the energy." A deep frown seared his brow. "This isn’t coincidence. Someone has been trying to steal your shifting as well."
BRANDT
That dream had been so real, and it wasn't the first time I had had it either. Cold sweat soaked my skin.
