“I don’t know. I think she’s going into shock. Hurry up.”
Nick reaches for his sister and yelps as the flames sear his skin a hot shade of pink. “Shit?—”
“Well? What does the book say?” I bark.
He whips the pages with frantic fingers, then his voice comes out rough, fraying at the edges.
“It’s more than poisonous. Lethal, really. There’s a recipe for an antidote, here, but it would take hours to make, if I even had all of the ingredients.”
Another spasm rocks her body, and I pin down her arms.
“Work with me,” I bite out. “What can I do?”
Nick slams the book shut. “It says the venom kills in less than half an hour. There’s nothing you can do.”
No. No, that can’t?—
Max burns up in my embrace, heat pouring off her in waves as her body convulses. I lock my arms around her, holding her through it, keeping her from hurting herself or slipping out of my grasp and disappearing down the hillside.
Nick grabs his forehead, the fire coming from Max giving off intense heat, forcing him to retreat a few inches. “Fucking hells.”
I feel my clothes burning, too. My skin. My fucking heart.
Death is meant to be familiar ground, yet she’s hurtling toward it, and I can’t follow. If she goes, I’ll be left here, anchored to a world she’s no longer in. It will destroy me if I can’t go with her.
Without another word, Nick draws one of his daggers and slices it across his wrist in one clean motion. Dark blood wells, then spills freely. He turns his palm downward, letting his blood shower the soil. “Dark one, heed my prayers.”
Don’t take her from me.
Save her from this venom.
I beg you.”
Nick goes very still, one hand clasping Max’s wound despite the flames, the other flat over her heart as if listening for something deeper than her pulse.
“Lord of the Hollow,
Ancient one of bark, shadow, and buried hunger,
Hear me.
I know this forest remembers blood.
So remember ours.”
Then he presses his bloody palms to the earth. “Dark One.” His tone dips into an unnatural rasp, a voice that doesn’t belong to him alone. “Help me. I beg you.”
The forest answers. Shadows rush from trunk to trunk, swallowing what little gray light remains until the darkness becomes thick—almost alive.
A voice that seems to belong to fifty instead of one resonates through the air. “Mac an Té Faoi na Fréamhacha.We serve the one beneath the roots.”
Nick searches the dark for a face, something he can see, but there’s nothing. “Save my sister. Please.”
“Who do you serve?” the voices hiss.
Nick doesn’t hesitate. “I serve the one beneath the roots, too,” he declares solemnly.
“And what are you willing to sacrifice?”
