Sylvester held the jar containing my heart in one hand. I could see the little silver chain dangling from it like a strand of cobweb. His face was turned from us, so we could not see if he spoke, or even changed expression, but the mist flashed white for a moment and seemed to shiver.
“He’s doing something,” said Cornelius. “Do you feel it?”
“No. I don’t feel anything.”
I spoke too soon, however. A great pain gripped my chest, and I gasped and fell back. Cornelius jumped out of the way. It was just like the old pain of being apart from the sorcerer, and it only grew in intensity. I wondered if I had made a terrible mistake—if, by urging Sylvester to use my heart, I had signed my own death warrant.
“The mist is fading,” said Cornelius from the window. He had both paws pressed against the crystal. “Are you all right?”
I couldn’t even answer him. Sweat pearled on my forehead. I managed to heave myself to the window and press my face against it, gasping circles of warm breath onto the crystal. I saw Sylvester lowering his arms, and I saw that the jar that had once contained my half heart now contained golden oil and nothing more.
“It’s done,” I managed to say. My breath was slowly coming back.
“Look,” said Cornelius. The mist was dissipating—not all of it, but enough of it to leave a tunnel wide enough for our carriage to pass through. Sylvester was hurrying back to us, the jar swinging from his hand. He wrenched open the door.
“Foss? Are you all right?” he demanded.
“Yes,” I said. The pain was fading. “It ... stung for a moment. That’s all.”
“You were right,” he said. “It worked. But we have to hurry. I don’t know how long it will hold.”
The magical horses snorted to life again and went from a standstill to a gallop with a flick of Sylvester’s wrist. I felt warmth returning to my hands and face, and only then realized how freezing cold I had been while he was performing the spell.
Sylvester watched me from the opposite seat, his eyes intent. He still held the jar between his hands. My heart was gone, and in its place were swirling dark specks that looked like drifting ash.
The horses sped through the pathway we had created, and the mist arched over us and at either side, swirling malevolently at its edges, as if it would surge in and dissolve us if it could. Cornelius had hunkered down again, his front paws tucked underneath him, and had started an anxious purr.
“How thick do you think it is?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” said Sylvester helpfully.
The mist boiled and hissed at its edges. I shut my eyes, but I still felt it, an awful presence hemming us in from every side.
“What does it feel like?” Sylvester asked. “The heartsickness.”
“What?”
“You experienced some of it just now, didn’t you? When I used your heart?”
I opened my eyes. His skin looked even paler than usual against the dark fur trim of his coat. He had drawn it up tight against his long throat, against the cold. If I had let myself, I would have reached forward to stroke the spoonful of white skin that showed. It took all my strength to restrain myself, and even then, my hands wavered in my lap as if ready to obey. I felt the hot dousing of shame once more.
“It is hell,” I said, more forcefully than I had intended to. One of his perfectly shaped eyebrows rose a little. “It is like being thirsty, all the time, and never allowed to drink. It is like bleeding inside and dying a little at a time. It is like a fever that never breaks.”
His eyes were very steady, but their blue had darkened. I glared at his stupid, unfeeling, perfect, beloved face and wanted to slap it.
“Worst of all, it isembarrassing,” I said.
“The worst part is the embarrassment. Not the unbearable pain?”
“Yes,” I said. “Because yes, I’m a good cook, a competent butcher, and a more than competent accountant, and I did manage to leave my village and follow you to the city, which is more than almost anyone I know has ever done ...”
“... And you murdered a sorceress,” Cornelius added.
“Yes, thank you—but despite all of that, to look the way I do and to love someone who looks the way you do, that is a humiliation that is worse than any pain. I would gladly take the suffering and leave the love, if I could. I would be in pain every day rather than love you.”
“To look the way you do?” He stared at me in puzzlement.
I flushed. I had given too much away.
