Siren's Fury (11 page)
“Ah.” He taps the side of his head. “That, my dear, is, for the time being, my business to know, not yoursss. However . . . it wouldn’t make much difference, would it, now that your abilities are gone. Unless . . .”
I clear my throat. “Unless?”
“Unless you got new onesss.”
I exhale. “That’s not possible. Everyone knows you can’t give a Uathúil abilities. You have to be born with them.” I turn from him and his vapid game and glare out at the water. If the idea of training me was his offer, it’s nothing new. And Rasha had nothing to worry about. She and I can laugh about it later.
“My dear girl, is that what Eogan told you?”
I go still.
He smiles. “How do you think I have powersss?” Abruptly the ship bumps and tilts beneath us and Myles’s expression goes the slightest bit nauseous.
I swerve to stare at him. My breath is suddenly clobbering my throat. Maybe I should go inside now. Except I want to hear what he has to say. Besides, Rasha said that
if
he offers anything, he’ll do so in Bron. I count to thirty before I give in. “How?”
“
How
what?”
“How’s it possible? How do you have them, and how would I?”
“If I told you, that’d take the fun out of it.”
“So in other words you don’t know, and even if you did, you’d never willingly help Eogan.”
He smirks.
Exactly.
“Why don’t you go back to your water closet?”
“I’d never willingly help unless I’ve set my sssights on bigger
things than Sedric’s throne.” His gaze slides down my arm, as if bigger things could have anything to do with me. My responding glare could rip his eyes out.
He licks his lips. “I assure you that while you are in fact one of the more fascinating women I’ve ever met, I wasn’t only referencing you. Believe it or not, I may have a mind to save the world when all isss said and done.”
“By taking it over? How heroic.”
“Oh sssweetheart, we both know I’m not heroic. I’m nearly heartless and completely brilliant and a wonderfully attentive suitor when feeling up to it. But no, no, this has little to do with heroicsss.” He leans close and swipes a long, cold finger down the sleeve covering my left arm. “Let’s just call it . . . a sssoft spot I have for power, which will benefit all five kingdomsss, and you, if you’ll allow me to help.”
A sick feeling emerges, like ill-placed hope blossoming at the base of my mind. I shake it off. “It can’t be done.”
“The new abilities or the separating? Because I promise the first can.”
I stare at him.
Coils of twisted hunger slip down my spine and touch my heart.
This is his offer.
New abilities that could save Eogan.
His finger swirls over the bandage beneath my sleeve. “Such a shame to see your powers so quickly discarded. Especially when they sssimply needed a more effective trainer . . .”
I shake him off. “Even Rasha doesn’t believe separating them can be done.” But my voice is weaker this time. How could she not have told me? How could she have acted so casual if she really knew what he would offer? If she really knew what this could mean. To me.
Especially when she admitted there are no other options for saving the one person I care for.
“She may be right, on that I won’t lie to you. But when you go to sssleep tonight, ask yourself which one of us would be willing to risk and find out—a passive Luminescent or the second most powerful Uathúil you know trained by Eogan himself?”
His words snag at that slithering hope and without my permission billow it out with what we both know to be true—if anyone could know how to do this, it would be him. Suddenly I’m jittering all over. “I can’t,” I whisper, as behind us a door opens and then closes. “Don’t bring it up again.”
He looks up and lowers his voice to a mumble. “Your choice. But if you truly want to help him? Ask yourself if Eogan is worth
your
risk.” With that, he pushes off the railing and strides past me.
A few seconds later I hear the door to the dining room shut, and I am left with an armful of questions and horror and a desperately inflating hope that’s burning more questions into my mind than answers.
Could Myles help me get my power back? Would I actually be able to free Eogan in a way he could survive?
Could I free him in time?
I stare at the span of clouds and the sunset peeking between sky and water on the horizon and try to make some sort of sense out of the possibilities. Because while something tells me Rasha’s right—that Myles’s idea feels more slimy and more sinister than he let on—the very thought that I could free Eogan, that I could set this right, is enough to make my angry, hateful soul feel like breathing again.
I
’VE STOOD THERE A GOOD FIVE MINUTES BEFORE THE new presence emerges in my consciousness. I feel him before I see him. Standing there watching me.
For the split second after I turn to face him, Eogan looks normal, with the clouded sun rays and rain misting on his broad cloaked shoulders and face. My heart surges. The next moment his expression has morphed into a mixture of annoyance and suspicion and he’s demanding information with his eyes. As if Draewulf’s come to ensure his job of removing my ability has remained intact.
I shove aside my newfound hope and nausea and firm my fists.
Get the answers from him, Nym.
He’s walking toward me. I peer past him toward the dining area, but the door’s windows are too small to see through.
Where’s Rasha?
And where are my Faelen guards?
“You may think you’re smart sneaking on board this ship, but tell me you didn’t truly believe it was luck that no one caught you,” Draewulf says when he reaches me. “Or did you think me such a fool? You’re playing a bloody game here.”
“Where are my guards?”
He snorts. “I asked them to give us a moment of privacy.”
“And they obeyed?”
“I didn’t really give them a choice.” He holds out his hand.
When I don’t move, he glares down that attractive nose and grabs my arm. And presses into it hard enough that I can feel the pulsing of my own blood in my veins. I jerk away, but he’s already releasing it, seemingly satisfied that I have no power, although how he could tell is beyond me. Perhaps because I didn’t erupt and send a lightning bolt through his face.
He tucks a strand of bangs behind his ear and bends low enough that the wind whips my hair against his. “Make no mistake that I will kill every delegate here the next time you pull a stunt like that.”
He glares at me for one, two, three seconds longer. Then, without another word, he turns to stalk away.
“You’ll kill
them
but not
me
?”
He stops.
My arm begins throbbing where the cut is, and the grief and hatred abruptly blend in with the idea that he honestly believes he can take everything that’s mine. I narrow my gaze. “Why not? You could just finish me now. Or is it that you need me for something?”
He snarls. Flips around.
“Or perhaps it’s Eogan inside preventing you.” I step forward until I’m near enough to see the disgusting wolfish black of his eyes rimmed by Eogan’s green. “Tell me how it feels to know he’s still in there fighting you. To know he could still destroy you.”
Before I can dodge, his hand reaches behind me and yanks my head back, exposing my neck. He shoves me against the railing and about breaks my bones with the impact. He raises a fist, his body rippling in rage as he brings it toward my face.
I don’t even flinch. I smile.
I have found his weak spot.
His arm is an inch from my cheek when it stops.
Suddenly the rage shaking his body is growing stronger, more violent, and an odd look erupts in his eyes.
I frown and watch the black recede from the pupil and the green become brighter as his face flickers with confusion. As if waking from a dream and unsure of what’s real.
He looks around us, at the ship, at the sky, at his own body and me. He drops his hand. “Nymia?”
My heart stops.
My blood stops.
Everything stops.
Because it’s him. It’s those green eyes that are pure and brave and slightly arrogant in their own right. The kind of arrogance earned from a once-unfeeling heart that’s tasted brokenness.
“Nym.” His voice is husky. “Oh kracken—are you all right?” He tips my chin and searches my eyes before sweeping his gaze down as if inspecting every spare inch of me. His tone lowers to anger. “Did he hurt you?”
I have no words. It’s all I can do to breathe while my insides become an instant roar of joy and hope crashing against the broken spaces as his hands slip into my hair. I shake my head because, no, he didn’t, then nod because yes, he has, and I don’t know. I don’t care. The question is—“Did he hurt
you
?” I push back to look in his handsome face as his expression clouds and run my fingers up his onyx cheeks. I press his jagged bangs from his eyes. “Are you okay? Is he actually gone? What did you—?”
He shakes his head and leans into my fingertips as his body keeps doing that shivering thing. I watch his eyes close. Suddenly
he’s pulling me into him, holding me against the warm beating of his chest even as he’s trembling in a way I’ve never seen.
“Nym, you have to kill me before—”
I choke loudly and pull back.
What?
“He’ll destroy you and then everyone else. My people. Your people.”
“How do you know? Can you see him? Can you see how to stop him?”
He shudders. “He’s still here. I’m blocking him, but it won’t last long. And I can sense enough to know whatever he’s plotting will end in bloodshed for all of us. I keep trying to do it myself but he’s too strong. If you destroy my body before it’s too late . . .”
I’d rather cut out my own veins. “You don’t know for sure it’ll end badly.”
His green eyes find mine.
Yes, he does.
No.
I want to cover my mind.
I can’t believe this.
“It’s not open for argument. It
will
happen unless you—”
“Not a chance in hulls,” I whisper. “You can’t ask me to do this—and even if I could, Draewulf took my powers.”
“I know. You’ll have to use a knife. If you plunge it in at the back of my neck, it’ll kill us both.”
I don’t answer. I can’t. My lungs are blocked, my breath is blocked, and
how can he think I could do this? How can he ask me to kill him?
I look around for something—anything—to fix it. To stop this.
Myles.
“Myles thinks there may be a way to save you, and if I can just—”
“
Myles?
He’s dangerous—”
“I know what he is, but are you serious, Eogan? What you’re asking of me . . . I won’t. Not before I have the chance to try. And Myles says—”
“You can’t trust anything he says.” He takes on his trainer tone—the serious one he’d use when Colin or I would take risks too heavy for us. “I’m telling you . . . I’m asking you—”
“I hear what you’re asking! But are you jesting me right now? Your people need you.
I
need you.” My voice cracks.
His face softens. He flutters a finger down my face, my hair. “I’ve already damaged you enough for one lifetime—there’s no bleeding way I’m doing it again. Or have you forgotten what I did to your parents?”
What a bolcrane.
“Don’t you dare use that on me, because honestly? What would you do if I was in your predicament right now?”
He snorts. Then he inhales and pushes a black hand through his black hair, which only succeeds in making it endearingly messy in his all-too-familiar way. “It doesn’t matter because it’s
not
you. And—”
“Right, it’s not. So are we honestly going to stand here arguing about it when we should be figuring out how to free you?”
He runs a hand through his hair again and eyes me. “I’ve been working on that.”
“And?”
A flash of apology crosses his face.
“I don’t believe that. I
refuse
to believe that.”
“You have to. Otherwise . . .” His voice hardens even as his gaze drops to my lips. “Please believe me that he’s going to hurt you, Nym. And while that may not matter to you, it certain as hulls matters to . . . others.” I watch him swallow as the expression in those beautiful green eyes turns begging. He traces a finger down my cheek. His thumb stops beneath my chin and nearly crumbles me. Abruptly I am dissolving against his chest like paper flowers
in a puddle and he is enclosing himself around me. “Listen. When you get to Bron, I need you to find Sir Gowon and explain what’s happened to me. Tell him about Draewulf.” He leans into me so close, as if to ensure only my ear will hear. “Tell him Elegy 96. He’ll know what it means.”
“Will he be able to help you?”
He doesn’t answer.
“Eogan, will he be able to help you?”
“Hopefully he won’t need to by th—”
I move my mouth to his so fast to shut him up. He startles, but the next moment his lips are pressing down against mine, drinking in as if he’s been thirsty for emotion and warmth for far too long. Melting me into a tangle of heartstrings as everything I am, everything I thought I’d lost, rises to the surface. I push my fingers into his hair to pull him closer, tighter, because I cannot leave, I cannot breathe, I cannot let go of this moment.
His teeth catch my lip just as the shaking in his body grows stronger. He pulls away. “Promise me you’ll end this.”
I shake my head because nothing in me is ready for this. I still need to know—to find out—what will become of us, of him, of our future. I refuse to answer.
His response is one single nod. I can see it in his eyes—he knows I will not do it. Not when hope is standing here in front of me.
The next thing I know he’s gently edging me aside and placing his hands on the airship railing. His fingers grip down, and when I look up he gives me one last look of apology.
What is he—?
He lunges. I grab for his arm but it doesn’t matter—whatever control he has isn’t enough to throw himself over. His knuckles
turn white and his muscles are rippling with the effort. He’s straining forward, but his body won’t move, as if pinned by another force.