“Those,” Madde gestured out the window, not taking his eyes off me, devouring the sight of me walking across the room. When my knees buckled, my legs weak, he flew in to catch me. “Look. They’re called the Bridestones, and they’re as old as balls.”
Pain snickered. “Interesting word choice.”
I glanced back at him and startled. “Why are you covered in mud?” It was smeared on his black trousers and darkened the slate grey of his Henley. His hands, too, were speckled with it, and there was a smudge on his jaw that made my fingers twitch to brush it off.
“Oh, you know.” He ran a hand through his curls, holding his other out to me, a bunch of wildflowers clutched in it. “Just getting flowers for my girl.”
“From a bog?” I guessed, accepting the flowers and bringing them to my chest, my heart aching. Tor should have been here. We should haveallbeen safe.
“I may have slipped and fell while collecting them.”
“He slid all the way down the hill,” Death supplied with a ghost of amusement. His hand came to rest on the small of my back, his presence stalwart and comforting. “The Bridestones’ magic might help us track Tor. Miz already found an item to use from the chest.”
I hadn’t even noticed the ornate wooden chest propped open in the middle of the room. It was a wonder I hadn’t walked into it. “How do we do it? Shadows?”
“There’s something we need to do first,” Pain said before Death could respond, his hazel eyes drifting in my direction. “We couldn’t get the collar off while you were…”
“On holiday in your mind,” Madde supplied, peering out the window. I followed his example and looked through the warped glass. Grass stretched out in all directions from the front door in a messy sprawl, a desaturated grey-green instead of the vibrancy of Ford’s End.
I saw the stones instantly; they were pretty hard to miss. Giant, hulking rock carved by what had to be weather and time, clustered around the cottage like it had been built within the shield of them. The ripple of power I’d felt intensified, but like I’d sensed through the void, it felt nurturing and kind instead of sinister. An old, natural magic, nothing at all like death magic, or whatever twisted thing Nightmare and Cruelty wielded.
My fingers drifted to the collar, wincing when I found it half embedded in my skin, fused with my collarbones. “Can we cut it out?”
“We might have to,” Miz replied, a twist of anger deepening his words until he sounded like the man I first met, not the Misery I’d come to know. “But there’s something we can try first. Pain’s going to guide us through it; he has the most experience with the bond.”
I glanced at Pain in surprise. “You do?”
He ducked his head, rubbing the back of his neck. “I, uh, sensed you the first time on Halloween night. I knew your soul was meant for mine instantly. It’s like… a bridge made of crystal and starlight, stretching from me to you.”
Madde waved his hand between me and Pain, searching the air.
“Mystically, obviously,” Pain huffed, darting a shadow at Madde’s hand. “I can feel you, darling woe. Right here.” He touched his breastbone, and I closed my eyes to concentrate, feeling for the connection.
“I can’t feel anything,” I admitted, my shoulders dropping.
“What about now?”
I frowned and wondered if Cruelty was just messing me when she called them my— “Holy shit!”
A rush of white, electric fire hit the centre of my chest and I stumbled back so suddenly Miz had to catch me. “That’s you…?”
It felt like starlight, exactly as he said, like a sun burned to life inside my rib cage. Powerful, but pure in a way no magic I’d sensed before had been. Precious, fragile, and yet as strong as platinum.
Tentatively, I reached for that place inside me where the starlight burned, and Pain honest to god giggled. That was his soul…?
I looked from Pain, smeared with mud, to my other men, my eyes wide. “Can I feel you, too?”
Pain smiled, boyish despite being… actually, I had no idea how old he was. I was only now realising how little I knew about him. “There are more threads connected to your soul. Maybe they’re bridges like ours, or… well, I can’t think of anything else. But other stuff instead of bridges.”
“Chairs?” Madde suggested honestly, his eyes wide and guileless.
I laughed. “Tell me how to find them.”
“Each thread will connect into the same place,” Pain explained, stepping closer to lay a hand over my heart. “You should be able to feel all of us. Reach for the place where our bridge meets your soul.”
I had no idea how to do that, but I closed my eyes and reached inward. It was impossible to concentrate with memoriesattacking me while I was conscious and no longer hiding from them. Not to mention my ribs and chest pulsed with deep, searing damage I didn’t remember feeling before.
Pain breathed a soft curse, and the hurt was swept away, snuffed out as easily as that. I frowned. Did he feel that which he took into himself? And how much pain had he taken from me, after Violence beat me?
