Page 14 of The Song of the Void

I exhaled away the ball of stress that had built up inside me the whole time we conversed. A shockwave of invisible energy blew past me, rattling the jars of medicines on the shelves.

“—long?” Reiven burst back into action and finished his question like nothing had happened. Did he not realize he was frozen in time?

The shopkeeper seemed unfazed as well; I heard the page she had been stuck in the middle of turning flutter as she completed her action. I stared up at Reiven with wide eyes, struggling to shove a mask of indifference and normalcy back on my face. But he caught on.

“What?” He threw a glance around.

“You can’t leave me alone for five minutes? Honestly.” I breezed past him and hurried out the door to keep my shock hidden.

“Hey!” He chased after me, seizing my shoulder to spin me to face him after we made it to the wagon and horses. “You’re acting shady. Let’s see what you bought, Blue.”

He seized the bag containing my goods and rifled through it. When he held up the sleep-inducing drug, I held my breath, but as I suspected, he knew nothing about medicines.

“Not afraid of a needle, are you?” I asked as he eyed it suspiciously.

Satisfied enough with my purchases, he shoved the bag back into my hands. His gaze raked up and down my body. “I wouldn’t put it past a fucking Siren to scheme a way to kill the Timebreaker, and protecting that kid is my job.”

“Well, I assume that if I kill Ashkade it would end poorly for me. So, for now, I mean no harm to him.”

Reiven’s pure black eyes narrowed. “I don’t trust anything out of your mouth.”

“The feeling is mutual, you pirate bastard,” I snarled.

He hardly budged at my attempt to shove him away. I glared up at him, furious at how his—admittedly impressive—stature and build made me feel small, even if I was taller than the average Human woman.

“Former pirate bastard,” he corrected me. “Listen. If that boy gets a single scratch across his dopey-ass face because of you, I’ll cut your throat open and bury you so deep in the sands of Arvensis that not a single drop of rainwater will permeate the earth deep enough to reach you.”

I let his threat wash over me, keeping a mask of defiance pasted on my face. This threat—it wasn’t as empty as I hoped it could be. The grim determination in his eyes burned right through my soul. But at least he gave me some useful information. He actually cared for Ashkade, and that made him vulnerable. More vulnerable than me.

I grinned. “Perhaps I’ll use my treacherous Siren fingers to rip his pretty green eyes out and feed them to the sharks, eh?”

His lips tightened into a frown. He inhaled deeply through his nose, a clear, pitiful attempt to keep himself calm. Wouldn’t that be a treat? Annoying him until he cracked.

I leaned closer, grinning wider. “Careful, Reiven. Your weakness is showing.” Yes, pushing his buttons on this journey was going to prove very fun. “All you have to do is figure out the magic words, and you’ll never have to lay eyes on me again.”

“Unfortunately…”

Both of us sprang away from each other at the soft drawl of the Timebreaker himself. He tapped his crutch on the ground a few times as he glanced between us, brows furrowed.

“You’re stuck with us for now, Zephra,” Ash said. “Y’all are givin’ me awful mixed signals over here. The Siren threatening me said I have pretty eyes, while my own bodyguard insulted my face.”

I cringed. Ashkade was the one person who I might actually sway to my side. Why’d he have to walk up at exactly the wrong time? Surely he knew my threat was empty, and that was why he innocently cocked his head and gazed up at me.

Reiven left me to shake Ash by the shoulders. “Check those herbs and medicines she bought. You’re smarter than me with that kind of thing. They might be dangerous.”

Ash groaned and straightened his hideous vest. After a cursory glance through my bag, he handed it back to me with a sniff. “It’s just medicine, Rei. Quit bein’ so jumpy already.”

His bodyguard grumbled under his breath and started down the street, toward that salty tang to the wind. I went to follow him, but Ash grabbed my hand to stop me.

“I didn’t mean what I said about feeding your eyes to the sharks, alright?” I said.

“So, who’s the sedative for? Me or Rei?”

Ash must have been dropped on his head at some point. The idiot didn’t even take the sedative from me, just clucked his tongue and asked me not to use it on him.

I glared at his mess of sun-woven waves as I followed him down the main road, the sedative vial tucked safely in my corset rather than the bag. There had to be a reason he let me keep it, no one was that stupid. Or maybe the boyish naivety was a front to trick me. I made a mental note to ensure he didn’t switch out the vial with a dummy one while he inspected my bag of goods.

It doesn’t matter if he’s young or nice on the surface. He’s a Human, and none of them can be trusted.