Page 79 of Across an Endless Sea

Another slap to the face breaks me out of my paralysis. My eyes snap open, and I come face to face with Prae.

“What the fuck happened to you?” she demands, slapping me again—even though I’m clearly awake. “Your Nicnevin has gone on a rampage on a giant snake and you decided to get a sleeve done to commemorate it before hanging out in the dungeon for a night?”

“Sleeve?” I grimace. “My fucking powers are gone, Prae.”

Which means it wasn’t just a dream.

My cousin’s good eye sharpens, and she reaches forwards, tapping my pectoral. “I guess that explains this part…”

I look down, practically tucking my chin into my collarbone to see what she’s pointing at.

There, over my heart, is a single rose in black ink, almost identical to the one on my hand. Only this time it’s surrounded by a ring of six swords, each one wrapped in chains that shackle it to the rose at the centre.

The flower doesn’t exactly look… healthy either. Unlike the one on my hand, its petals are withered and tattered, and I grimace as I wonder what the fuck that means. Danu didn’t mention anything about this… did she?

The tattoo doesn’t end there, either. The bruises on my arm have faded to a sickly teal, but they can’t disguise the twisting, geometric knotwork that spears outward from the chained rose, along my arm and down to my wrist. The intricate piece tumbles over every inch of skin between my shoulder to my hand.

The knots form four empty frames, spaced evenly across my outer arm, before ending in a thick inked shackle that echoes the iron one still secured around my wrist.

It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that the four gaps are for the fae I’m supposed to win over. Is Danu going to reward me with more ink I never asked for?

“I’m getting you out of here,” Prae murmurs.

There’s no way Elatha has ordered my release so soon, and I blink at her. “What?”

“Oh, use yourbrainfor once, Caed!” she snaps, and I blink as I finally comprehend the panic in her eyes. “If Elatha finds out you’ve been covered in fairy magic by the Goddess he despises, do you think he’s going to let that slide? You were on thin fucking ice to begin with. This will tip him over the edge. You want to find out if your connection to Rose will keep you alive through all the horrors he can come up with this time?”

“But he’s—”

“A paranoid asshole who’s already accused you of treason, if the gossip I heard on the way here is true,” she hisses. “Wakeup, cousin. He doesn’t let traitors—or even suspected traitors—live. Do you want to survive, or you want to be loyal and tortured?”

The vehemence in her words shocks me into silence.

Of all the people who would ever say that to me, I never once considered it might be Prae. After seeing the horror that befell her own mother for treason, she’s the last person I’d expect to go against orders and break me out of my cell.

“Survival and glory,” she whispers, reminding me of the family motto.

Balor’s words echo heavily in the darkness as my cousin moves over to the corpse of my jailer and plucks the key from his belt. She fiddles with my cuffs while I ponder the words.

Glory? Any hope of that fled to the Deep Caves with Rose. As for survival…

Prae’s right. If I stay here, I’m dead. My father will happily let me rot, just like he did my mother. Or he’ll banish me back to the Deep Caves. He won’t have to wait long to be rid of me, because the Goddess will collect my head before Beltaine.

The only way to stay alive is to run.

Once we’re out of Fellgotha, I’ll figure out what to do about this latest shitshow.

“Survival and glory,” I whisper back as the manacles clink open and I hiss, rubbing the soreness away. “Prae, you can be heir—queen, even—if—”

“I don’t want that,” she says, cutting me off. “Ineverdid. That’s not my definition of glory.”

Not her definition of glory? What other definition is there?

Fear that my otherwise intelligent cousin might be losing it grips me for a brief second before I disregard it. Whatever Prae means by that, I’m glad she’s on my side.

Once again, I try to reach my swords, but nothing happens. Has she at least let me keep my glamour? I turn one hand invisible just to check I still can and my shoulders droop in relief when it disappears.

“So, here’s the plan,” she continues. “I’m supposed to be readying a ship so that I can go and die in the search for your reincarnated mate. You can sneak aboard with your glamour, and we both get out of here before Elatha realises what’s happened. Once we’re across the sea, and far away from him, we can work out what to do next.”

---