Darkling (19 page)

I step between the two.

“Tristan,” he says at last, his voice strained.

Draven’s eyes settle on mine, asking for an explanation. I hold his gaze for a few moments longer.
Later
. He blinks and I know he understands.

“What’re you doing here?” I ask.

“You ought to have knocked,” Tristan snips.

I arch a brow at him and he relaxes his stance, folding his hands in front of him. Not as friendly as a man as he was as a spirit. Then again, he has reason to be wary of the boy with the bow.

Draven sucks in a breath and hooks his crossbow onto his belt, shifting his weight as he relaxes. “Following a deer.”

“A deer?”
They’re scarcer than rabbits.

“Sounded like a deer. It led me here.” He glances around the illuminated hallway. I remember my first impressions of this house.
Such grandeur. “Do you live here?”

“Yes,” Tristan says, stepping up to my side.

Draven’s brows lower over his dark eyes. “How’ve you survived? Game this deep in died first.”

“I didn’t,” Tristan replies.

Draven’s eyes flick over Tristan’s refined clothing. Tristan doesn’t offer any more information. Draven looks to me, his jaw set. “If there’s food to be had, then I must know. Elias is starting a lottery.”

“What kind of lottery?” I ask.

“One where the winner is butchered.”

It takes a few moments for his meaning to make sense.
Cannibalism. Morrot is going to devour itself. Has it really come to this?

“The name will be drawn tomorrow,” Draven says.

That’s why he was so deep in the woods. So recklessly searching for any game.

“So I ask again. Is there any food to be had?”

Tristan’s eyes have softened. He shakes his head. “No.”

Draven’s shoulders tense. He takes in the slightest breath and holds it. It’s enough to tell me how disappointed he is. How hopeful he’d been when he found the house. We need to catch whatever it was he was hunting.
Something to stave the hunger. I don’t want to think of my parents’ names being drawn. Or anyone’s, for that matter. Least of all consuming the flesh of your neighbor. He had said a deer led him here. Led him. A chill jets down my spine. That was no deer.

“You have to go,” I say breathlessly.

“What?”

Tristan steps closer to me. “It was her,” I whisper to him.
“In the woods.”

“Get out,” Tristan hisses, brushing past me.

Draven takes a step back. His eyes flit between Tristan and me. Tristan points to the door downstairs. Draven blinks, as if clearing his vision, then steps forward, holding his hand out for mine.

I stare at it. His fingernails are stained and chipped and a scar is peeking out from under his sleeve.
A thin white line as a reminder of Lady’s claws. He presses his lips together. I feel my hand twitch but I keep it at my side. Tristan’s back is stiffening.

“Willow?” Draven whispers.

I part my lips but no words come. I want to see my family again. I want to smell Jasper’s hair. But I can’t go. I can’t abandon Tristan. Even if he is growing taut, like he wants to strike. More man right now than I’d prefer. He still needs me to guide him. To protect him. I shake my head.

Draven lets his hand fall to his side. He looks at Tristan with a gaze both sad and cunning. He has seen the change in me. He knows how I feel. For a moment, I’m worried he’ll lash out. Then the same look crosses his face that did when he first saw me after his father died.

When his gaze briefly meets mine, I feel an ache in my chest. Like the twisting of the roots his constant presence has grown in my life. No matter what happens now, I know those roots will wither and die.

The leather of Draven’s trousers creaks as he steps back.

“Go,” Tristan says lowly.

Draven shuffles to the top of the stair. He rests his hand on the railing then pauses. I’m having trouble breathing steadily. He casts me one last look over his shoulder. Our roots are already growing cold. I’m growing cold. He hurries down the stairs. Then I realize I’m not cold, after all. My hair is standing on end. But I’ve noticed too late.

I suck in a lungful of air. Draven’s boots echo in the entryway. I scream his name just as a black, shrouded form flies into him from the dining room.

Tristan grabs my arm and yanks. I hear Draven go down. The lamp above my head shatters. The oil burns radiantly for a moment, and I glimpse Victoria’s corpse on top of Draven and Tristan’s shoulder as he pushes me. Then the oil burns out completely. Darkness surrounds me until Tristan shoves me into the bedroom.

He slams the door before locking it.

“Draven!”
I try to shove Tristan out of the way but he grabs my shoulders. “You can’t leave him out there!”

“Stay here,” Tristan hisses. “I’ll –”

He gags. That horrible gag when Victoria summons him. No, she can’t have him, too.

“She can’t hurt you,” I say in a rush, resting my hand on the side of his face. “You’re your own, remember?”

“You don’t understand,” Tristan gasps. “It’s my fault.”

He isn’t making sense but he’s in pain. I kiss him. He lets out another choking sound. My kiss hasn’t calmed him. Why hasn’t it calmed him?
Because of his loyalty to that decrepit woman. What is she doing to Draven? I can hear him screaming.

“She’s
dead
, Tristan. You owe her nothing!”

“I owe her everything,” he snaps then gags.

His expression is strained. Each breath is a struggle. I’m about to shove him aside and go after Draven myself when his fingers dig into my shoulder.

“There is something about me you don’t know,” he gasps. “Something you need to know before
I...”

Tristan coughs and doubles over. I try to catch him. He touches my face. Whispers build around me in my mind. I don’t want this. Not now.

Draven
. I have to help Draven. But Tristan’s forehead is touching mine. Daylight invades my senses as I’m yanked into his memory once more.

I’m downstairs in the kitchen while Victoria is shrieking in the bedroom. I’m attempting to mix something green with a mortar and pestle but it’s hard with the pain. My hands are shaking like a rheumatic’s. The skin of my arms is black and blistering red and I know my back is just as damaged. I can’t even wear a shirt. Victoria lets out another shriek and sounds like an animal. She has screamed so much that she spit out blood. That’s why I’m here.

I scrape the green mash into a glass and stir it. This will help her throat. I move away from the counter but twist too quickly. I cry out in pain and drop the glass and it shatters on the floor. That was the last of the nettles that numb. That was the last remedy that could dull her pain. Tears are blurring my vision as despair takes hold of me.

Can’t I do anything to help my wife? Victoria screams out my name. Had she not been screaming it earlier, I would never have recognized it amidst her tormented sounds.

While I’m bent over, I vomit. It’s white foam. I can’t recall the last time I ate. I can’t even contemplate food. I gasp as I straighten. My back feels like it’s getting burned all over again. I have existed in such agony since that horrible day that I don’t see how I could ever recover. I’m wheezing again so I take a moment to catch my breath.

“Tristan,” she shrieks then gurgles and I worry she is choking on her own blood.

I force myself to move and climb the stairs. I have to hold onto the railing because I’m still shaking so much. Hoisting my weight up each step feels like the skin on my back is cracking. Perhaps it is. I’m so winded and dizzy at the top of the stairs that I gag. I dry heave but nothing comes out other than acid eating away at my lips. Victoria’s shrieking has subsided to moaning.

The door at the end of the hall is open. I can glimpse her dark form on the bed, bathed in daylight from the burnt out wall.

Placing one foot in front of the other, I limp down the hall. Victoria is whimpering and moaning. The shock of seeing her like this hits me anew even though she has been this way for days. We both have. Her body is covered in burns. More than half of her face is black and peeling and oozing blood as it dies. I can see one of her teeth through a charred hole. Her eye is dark red mush, like a bruised plumb. The dress she was wearing when the fire caught her is attached to her, melted in place by her skin. It hides the scaly, puss-filled burns on the rest of her body.

I want to be sick again but I can’t. I am empty and the room is spinning for a moment. I don’t want to lose consc
iousness again. Last time that happened, I couldn’t get up without passing back out from the pain. It took me far too many attempts.

“Victoria,” I whisper.

She groans in response. Blood is trickling out of her mouth, staining the pillow with the rest of her soot and rot. I don’t know how to tell her that I dropped her medicine which was the one thing that could ease her suffering. I gently sit on the bed beside her.

“Tristan,” she mumbles.

It sounds like her tongue has become so swollen that she can no longer move it. Her lips are falling off. She groans and tenses. She starts thrashing. Watery blood leaks from her dead eye. She can’t take much more writhing but she can’t control it, either. I know it hurts her, but I rest my palms on either of her shoulders to still her. Victoria shrieks at the contact but it limits her seizing.

Blood rushes out of her mouth, bubbling with spittle. Her blackened arms jerk up as she convulses. That hasn’t happened before. I wonder if that means this will be the last and she will finally be out of her suffering.

Then I’m being burned again. My scream is twining with hers. I feel the flames on my arms digging into my flesh anew. However looking down, I see that there’s no fire. It is her hands digging into my charred skin. Her yellowed fingernails carving twisted trails down my forearms as she convulses. My head doesn’t feel attached anymore. The pain is so much that my hearing dims. I’m only aware that I’m screaming because I can feel it in my throat.

When I am able to see again, Victoria is still. I release her. Blood is pouring down my arms. Her good eye swivels in its socket as she studies me. She is holding something.
A knife.

Where did she get it? Yes, I brought it up here to cut away parts of her dress weeks ago. Only it wasn’t weeks. It can’t have been weeks for there have only been three nights.

“Take it,” she wheezes.

My hands have gone numb. The pinkness of their unburned skin, though slick with rivulets of blood, makes it look like I’m wearing gory sleeves. I manage to grasp the hilt of the blade.

“Kill me,” she wheezes then lets out a whimper.

I shake my head.

“Kill me, or I’ll kill you.”

It’s an idle threat and we both know it. She can’t even sit up. Her eye swivels to my arm as I raise it, testing my motion.

“Oh, Tristan,” she hisses. She coughs out more blood and spittle, as if she couldn’t be any more wretched. “Your body. Your beautiful body…”

“Just rest,” I say. I’m getting dizzy again and I won’t be able to stay conscious much longer. I’ll be of no use to her once I black out. “Rest…” I slur.

I close my eyes. It feels like the house is spinning. Then I smell burnt flesh and feel her cold, crisp hand on my cheek. I open my eyes.

“Can’t feel your skin,” she wheezes. Of course she can’t. The poor thing barely has the fingertips to even touch me. “Tristan…
kill me.”

I shake my head. Her body tenses again with another seizure.

“Kill me,” she gurgles loudly.

“I can’t.” Tears blur my vision as she starts to convulse. Boiling sounds come from her throat. She’s hemorrhaging. “Victoria, I’m so sorry.”

“Kill,” she wheezes.

Blood and spittle fly out of her mouth as she clears her throat, making way for screams. She shrieks. My ears are ringing. She chokes as a piece of her throat temporarily clogs her windpipe. Half my vision is red. Blood is pouring down my face. She’s clawing it off.

My arm moves. Her screaming stops. She goes still. Blood trickles from the gash in her neck and the side of my face. I drop the knife.

I’ve just killed my wife.

Then I tear inside. A pain worse than burning. Something heavy moves through me and when it’s gone, I am left with a lighter body than before. As if gravity has become less severe. The pain is now tolerable. This is more than relief that my wife is no longer suffering. My physical senses have dulled. Am I dying?

Now I’m slumped on her grave with the scent of fresh dirt staining my hands. My healing arms are searing as my skin cracks. I’ll have to wait before I even try to make a headstone. Wait until I can move again for my back is stinging awfully. My wounds should be infected by now, but somehow I manage to get through each day, healing a little more than the last.

A cloud drifts past the sun and I wonder if it will rain. I glance upwards to see if there are more but there are no clouds at all. Instead there is a dark haze like thin smoke. I wonder what that could be.