“If she dies, we are fucked.” Amy unnecessarily reminds me.
“Then stop standing in my entryway and bring her up.” Laz’s voice floats down from above. Amy and I exchange a look. I take the stairs two or three at a time.
The wooden walls feel close as we climb, then open into the tower room. Shelves cover every wall, filled with vials, jars of strange liquids, and a few small preserved creatures. A cluttered desk sits off to the side, books stacked in shaky piles. Two wide windows look out over Main Street, the lake, and the dark forest. In the center, a deep cauldron bubbles over purple flames with no clear source. The air carries notes of patchouli, roses, and smoke. It's cold even with the fire, and Ivy curls tighter into me without waking. I pull her closer before I notice what I'm doing.
“Put her down.” Laz’s voice behind us makes Amy spin and curse. He's standing at the back of the room with a book in one hand, half moon spectacles perched on the edge of his nose.
“Where?” I ask. Every shallow breath she takes registers, try as I might not to care.
“The desk.” He waves a hand, crouches, sets down the book he'd been holding and digs through another pile of them. He yanks one free from the middle, sending the rest tumbling, and starts reading before he’s even upright.
I clear the desk and lay Ivy down. My bag slips off my shoulder and I toss it to Laz.
He catches it without looking. “Pieces of the creature. Definitely a baby basilisk.”
He glances inside and returns to the book. “The adolescent age is why she’s still breathing. A full-grown would have killed her on sight.”
“Can you heal her or not?” My voice is rougher than I mean, my teeth almost bared. I tell myself it’s just instinct. Everything I care about depends on her surviving. The words repeat in my head while the hound inside me strains toward her, pulling at bonds I refuse to name.
Laz and Amy both shoot me the same look.
“Yes,” Laz says, “Hold her arms, Conall. Amy, take her legs. This might hurt, and I don’t want her thrashing.”
I pin her wrists gently above her head. Amy takes her ankles. Laz, hair messy from being dragged out of bed, drops two clear drops of potion from a small iridescent bottle onto her parted lips.
As soon as the drops touch her tongue, Ivy jerks hard. Her pulse jumps under my fingers. Every instinct I have surges forward, raw and uninvited. Heat flares where my skin touches hers, dangerous and electric.
A crease forms between her brows and she moans, low and broken.
“Laz.” I grind out his name.
“Give it a moment. The poison’s working out.” He says it calmly, already turning back to his books.
Ivy thrashes again, sweat gathering on her brow, her hands shaking under mine. I lean closer without thinking, as if I could take her pain away. “You’re okay,” I whisper, my voice low and rough, just for her. She calms. I don’t know if she can hear me, but part of me hopes she does.
Laz straightens and levels me with a scowl. “What happened?”
I explain the mimic calling her from the trees, the creature charging, my shift, her panic. When I mention the basilisk, his eyebrows meet mine.
“You’re sure that’s all?” he asks carefully.
“What does that mean?” Laz and I know each other like everyone else on this island. This feels like something he’s accusing me of.
“It means your ancestors had a contract with Shipton. When she died, you were supposed to be free. Instead, she transferred the whole thing onto this woman before she died. That would make anyone angry.”
Ivy shifts under me, eyes still closed, lips parted, breathing steadier now. I realize I'm still lightly holding her wrists, thumbs having drifted to her palms.
“You think I’d kill her to get out of this?” It’s not a question. “I’m angry, Laz. I was supposed to be done with protection duty. Done guarding self-centered witches. But I’m not putting that on a woman who doesn’t even know what’s after her. I didn’t cause what happened tonight. The basilisk came from her own roof.”
Laz raises both hands. I don’t soften.
Even now I feel the spell pulling at me, steady and warm, like invisible threads wrapping tighter around my ribs. All it wants is for me to keep her safe. I tell myself that’sallI’m doing, even as the pull runs through me like a current I can’t turn off, humming under my skin wherever we touch.
Ivy’s eyes flutter open.
Here we go.
Ivy
