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I return my focus to our camp. The others haven’t shifted since speaking to Natharius; Juron and Caya appear to be fast asleep, along with Zephyr, while Taria continues her meditation.
Arluin didn’t intrude on my dreams last night or the night before, but that’s because I spent the first shackled with light infused manacles, which may have stopped him from connecting to my mind, and I spent the second riding through the entire night. Sleeping remains a problem.
I rummage inside my satchel for my bundle of potions and hold out the orb and whisperacoligos. The bundle appears in my hands and from it, I retrieve a bottle of sleeping potion. I raise the vial to the moonlight, the deep indigohue glittering in its radiance.
Taking sleeping potions carefully to ensure I only sleep a certain number of hours was how I endured Arluin’s torment before Esterra City. Right now it seems sleeping potions remain my only solution, but I only have a few bottles with me and I don’t know where I can find the herbs I need to make a new batch.
Even if I had an unlimited amount of sleeping potions to take, it isn’t a long-term solution. If I can destroy Arluin in Gerazad then I’ll be freed from this spell, but there’s always the possibility he will escape justice. Then I don’t know how many months—years—it will take for me to defeat him.
My gaze trails across from the sleeping potion to Taria, her face serene and her white hair glowing in the moonlight. When I summoned Natharius, I asked him if he could remove Arluin’s spell and he said he couldn’t cleanse it with his dark magic. But maybe Taria’s light magic will be powerful enough to cleanse it. While I’m loathe to interrupt her peaceful meditation, I decide this matter is urgent enough to disturb her.
I return my potion to the bundle and slip off my blanket as best I can without waking Zephyr. One of his talons snags on my robes, but I manage to unhook the fabric and free myself. I tiptoe over to where Taria sits.
Though the priestess appears to be in deep meditation, her golden eyes snap open as soon as I crouch before her. She scans over my expression, her white brows drawing together. “Is everything all right?” she asks, her voice as gentle as a summer breeze.
I sit opposite her on the other end of the blanket and hold out my bandaged wrist. The fresh silk the priestesses at the temple used to secure it remains in place. “Do you already know what’s under this?”
Her frown deepens, and she reaches forth to take my wrist but doesn’t loosen the bandage. “No,” she replies softly, “though I can sense powerful dark magic here.” She taps my wrist precisely where the dark magic is embedded into my skin. The mark burns in response to her touch. “Is it not part of your connection to Natharius?”
I note she calls Natharius by his name rather than ‘Void Prince,’ but why Taria is sympathetic to such a fearsome demon isn’t my most pressing concern right now. “No,” I say, “it isn’t Natharius’s magic. It’s Arluin’s.”
Her expression darkens. “Arluin’s?”
“On the night Nolderan fell, he placed a tracking spell on me.”
Taria draws her lips into a thin line. “Then he can sense your current location? Does he know we’re pursuing him to Gerazad?”
“No, it doesn’t seem like he can. The mark on my wrist is an eye, and as long as it’s covered, he isn’t able to enter my mind. At least not while I’m awake.”
“And it isn’t the same case while you’re asleep?” she presses.
“No, it seems he can communicate with me through my dreams.”
“Does he appear every night?”
“Every night that I dream.”
She raises a brow.
I’m hesitant to admit the truth, that I’ve been taking sleeping potions religiously to cope with Arluin entering my dreams. It isn’t my fault he does, yet I can’t help from being ashamed by this truth. It makes me feel so helpless, the person I vowed I’d never be yet constantly seem to be.
I’m not sure how much Taria knows of Nolderan’s potions, or whether the Priestesses of Selynis have their own version of alchemy. In Nolderan potions were originally invented to enable the non-magical population to access certain perks of aether—though they certainly have their benefits for magi—and I doubt the priestesses would allow their divine light to be easily distributed among the general population.
Thankfully, Taria doesn’t press me for an explanation.
“The dark magic I sense from the mark is great indeed, but perhaps I can dispel it,” Taria says.
“Thank you,” I say. “The High Priestess noticed it when she healed me from poison and another priestess said she was looking for a way to cure it, but then I ended up in a cell.”
“The only way I can think to cure this mark is througharandir. I imagine the High Priestess will have tried this, though.”
My stomach sinks. “Is there no other spell you can think of?”
“Let’s see if it works first. It is possible the High Priestess’s magic wasn’t enough to remove the mark.”
“But yours might be?”
“The Grand Priestess’s certainly would be. However, there is a reason I will succeed the Grand Priestess and not any of the High Priestesses.”
