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“You’ll need to step aside,” Avaline whispered to me.
“I can’t be near him?” No. I couldn’t watch Erik slip into some endless dream, locked in Larsson’s mind. I needed to know he lived, breathed, and was still warm. Heat prickled along my scalp. I was mortified when my chin trembled, and sharp, thorny emotion tightened in the back of my throat.
Until Avaline patted my shoulder, awkward and more like a slap, as though the woman hardly knew how to comfort another soul. Being locked away most of her life, I doubted she did.
“Only for the bleeding.” She pointed to a place a mere three paces away. “Stand there. When the connection is made, I think out ofanyone here, you will prove the most powerful anchor.” With a nervous look about the room, she added. “Not that the king does not care for all of you. I’m certain he does.”
“I think I would make a much greater anchor than Livie,” Aleksi insisted. “Bloodsinger and I are inseparable.”
Erik glared at my cousin, but this close, I could see the flicker of a smile on his lips. “Put your hands on me, and I will separate us swiftly.”
“Oh, it should be Valen,” Mira said, beaming a little wickedly. “It’ll frighten you right back, Ever King.”
I knew what they were doing. Happened when one had grown with others since infancy. They would know the tension mounting in my blood, the burn in my lungs. They’d know the endless flow of horrid outcomes rampaging through my mind.
They were unthreading some of the woven pressure in the room with smiles and jests, and I loved them for it. In truth, I thought Erik was more relaxed.
Avaline called for Murdock to handle the blood once Erik’s skin opened. I hugged my middle, silent and unmoving, as Joron’s daughter sliced Erik’s arm open on one side, then the other. Murdock pressed on the king’s flesh, draining the blood in big bursts until the bottom of each mortar was coated.
Tavish joined Avaline in front of one mortar. Together, the witches added herbs, and with a wave of their palms, both bowls of blood flashed in a black spark, filling the room in the harsh scent of iron and salt.
With a nod of thanks to Tavish, Avaline dipped her fingers into the mortars, coating both hands. “Rest, King Erik. Think of the one you wish to see.”
One lingering glance at me, then Erik closed his eyes, and Avaline began to sing.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
THE SERPENT
Endless water dragged me deeper,deeper, until I was lost to a bottomless sea. Then, my feet struck solid ground, buckling my weak leg.
Floorboards met my cheek, bruising my shoulder and hip. I groaned and rolled onto my back. Overhead, dim light split through droplets of muggy sea air, catching bits of dust over the dark wood laths.
Minimalism blanketed the room. Small, dim, and when the floor swayed it was clear—I was on a ship.
A chest of cherry-stained wood was topped with tin mugs and goblets of old wine and a rich, amber mead. Dried herbs added rustic potency to the room, and scattered in disarray amidst the ale were bones. Slivers and full pieces, teeth, and fingers.
Another moan, not from my chest, tilted my attention to the narrow bed pushed against one wall.
When his eyes blinked open, when he caught my gaze, Larsson scrambled for a discarded blade on the floor.
I rolled out of reach when the edge slammed into the wood, splintering a few boards from the gash. He swiped again. Handslifted, I dodged and struggled to my knees. Too slow, too disoriented, the point of his cutlass sliced through my chest.
A sharp breath, then . . . nothing.
Not pain, not blood, nothing but an eerie mist of cold.
“What is this?”
A cruel grin split over my mouth. With his blade still impaled deep through my heart, I stood. Larsson stumbled backward, dropping the sword. It spilled through my body like I was nothing but a projection of his nightmares.
“Hello,brother.” The word was poison on the tongue, sharp and painful.
The sight of his gnarled ear brought a flush of pride and numbing rage in the same breath. Larsson, dark hair scattered over his brow, twisted his features into one of disdain. A face I’d trusted, on my ship, in my palace, with Livia.
I no longer recognized this face.
With buried resentment, I strode past him and sat on the bed. It neither gave under my weight nor felt like much of anything. Still, I frowned. “Rather uncomfortable for a royal, don’t you think? What ship are we on?”
