Probably shouldn’t.
I empty the sack, then fill it with the stripped carcasses that’ll make good bait. Knotting the top, I look toward the exit, trying to summon the energy to move. End up shifting the stool out from under me and flopping across the ground—joints achy, lids heavy from staring down the line of arrows, hunting the rodents that’ve found their new lot in life feasting on the slain folk trussed up in the Ditch.
It’s hard to see the rodents and not the fae they’re chewing on. Harder to shake the sense that I should find something to do about it rather than sit back and pretend it’s not my problem.
Suddenly exhausted, I let my eyes shut.
Just a little rest. Then I’ll gather my shit and go catch something meaty.
Fucking hate going south of the wall. Everything wants to eat you. Even the ground has an appetite for swallowing things that move. And Pah’s out there somewhere in a snowy grave I was never able to find.
I blindly bat around and grab a pillow from the seater, stuff it under my head, then put a mental timer on myself.
One hundred counts, then I’ll get back up again.
I only make it to twenty-two before exhaustion yanks me under.
The handler shoves me.
Hard.
I hit the bars with such force the tender skin on my hands ruptures, bursting my freshly mended burns. Another handler pins me in place, firm knuckles and a blade pressed between my shoulders as I wait for the door to be unlocked, seething, looking at Fallon balled on her side in the far corner. Facing away, in the same spot she was when I was dragged from this cell kicking and screaming.
Impatience eats me while a third handler fumbles with the ring of keys, finding the right one to push into the lock. Finally, the door swings open.
I’m shoved in, the ground shackle retethered to my ankle, the ones around my wrists removed. The usual shit, but I bounce, wishing they’d hurry.
“Bloodstone,” I order as the lock clunks shut, knowinghe’sout there in the tunnel.
Watching, as he often is.
“I fought,” I press, looking through the strands of my wet and tangled hair, toward the darkness beyond the bars where the lantern light fails to reach. “The bloodstone I earned. Give it to me.”
“Apologies, Fire Lark.” Arkyn steps into the light and flicks back his hood, revealing his half-melted face, watching me down the line of his hooked nose. “But it seems the bloodstone is no longer necessary.”
Of course it’s necessary. It always is.
Fallon’s sick with sun starve. Without the sun she’s used to, she needs the bloodstone to stay alive.
Arkyn flicks his tattered cloak and turns, charging down the long tunnel.
“Wait,” I blast, gripping the bars, wedging my face into a gap. Heart thrashing as he disappears into the dark. “Wait! … ARKYN!”
I snatch my pan and bash it against the bars, over and over.
Scream for him to come back. To give me what I earned.
My throat is raw, his footsteps long faded by the time I turn, crawl onto the ground beside Fallon, and pull herclose—believing Arkyn will come back with the bloodstone.
He has to.
I won’t fight for him again until he does. Will threaten to stand in the pit and let the beasts eat me, earning him nothing but a souring crowd.
It takes me too long to calm the rapid beat of my heart and my swift, sawing breaths. Too long to realize Fallon’s chest isn’t moving.
“Fallon?”
Silence.
