The Fire Prince (The Cursed Kingdoms Trilogy Book 2) (62 page)

Harkeld groped for a name. Serril?

“It was the artery. The patch tore when he coughed,” Justen said. Something was wrong with his appearance. Harkeld blinked slowly. His hair. Justen’s hair was too dark.

His chest ached and his throat was tight, dry. His breath caught as he inhaled.

“Rut it!” Justen said. “Petrus, stop him coughing!”

The third anxious face disappeared from view. Harkeld’s brain tried slowly to identify the man while he coughed. Petrus? No. Petrus had white-blond hair, not dark brown.

Hands clasped his throat. Whoever the face belonged to had healing magic. A weak, soothing sensation spread from those hands. The spasming muscles in his throat relaxed. It became easier to breathe.

“Don’t let him cough,” Justen ordered. His hands were pressed to Harkeld’s chest. Healing magic flowed from his touch.

Justen was a healer?

Harkeld blinked at this knowledge, and turned it over in his mind, examining it. He didn’t feel angry or betrayed by this new secret of Justen’s.

The two healing magics felt different. Whoever held his throat had a blunter, simpler magic. Justen’s magic felt like Innis’s, complex and precise.

“Don’t forget to take my hands and my blood if I die,” Harkeld whispered. “It’d be... ironic, don’t you think? ...if you got to Sault and found... you’d forgotten them.”

Someone snorted a laugh by his ear and then said dryly, “If he’s making jokes, I don’t think he’s going to die.” He recognized the voice: Petrus.

Justen gave them both a that’s-not-funny look. “He’s not going to die. I just need to patch this artery properly.”

Harkeld wrestled with the question of why both Petrus and Justen had dark hair. Memory sluggishly returned, moving in hazy swirls like steam from the hot pools. They’d been riding to the anchor stone and...

Cora’s dead
. Memory hit him with a jolt that he felt physically. The breath choked in his throat again. He coughed—

T
HIS TIME, WHEN
consciousness returned, no one was looking at him. Justen had his eyes closed, a fierce frown on his face. Serril was beckoning something down from the sky. A swallow swooped low, landed, shifted into... Justen?

“How far away’s Rand?” Serril asked. “We need him
now
.”

“About five minutes,” the new Justen said.

He wasn’t quite Justen, Harkeld decided. His nose was too short. His ears too big. His eyes the wrong color.

His Justen shimmered all over, as if sunshine lay on him. The new Justen didn’t. How odd.

“Any sign of the archer?”

“No.”

“Keep an eye out for him—but stay out of range.”

The new Justen nodded and changed back into a swallow. Now he shimmered too.

Harkeld watched the swallow swoop upwards. “Are you twins?” he asked.

Justen’s eyes opened.

“That’s torn it,” Petrus said dryly.

Serril grimaced, but Justen didn’t answer. His face was strained, haggard.

More memory hazily returned. The anchor stone. It had been gray and white this time, and his hand had stuck to it. His palm began to burn, now that he’d remembered.

And something else had happened. Something that had given him this ache in his chest, as if a draft horse had kicked him.

Memory returned with shocking, vivid clarity. An arrow had struck him. Right through the heart.

Harkeld’s heart gave a terrified leap. He inhaled sharply, coughed once.

“Rut it!” Justen said.

“Innis,” Petrus said sharply. “That’s enough. Stop.”

Innis? Where was Innis?

“I only need one more minute,” Justen muttered. “It didn’t tear that time.”

“Rand’ll be here in five minutes—”

“And he could die before then!” Justen said fiercely.

“So could you!”

“I just need to patch this properly, so it doesn’t rip open every time he coughs—”

“You
promised
.”

Justen glanced at Serril. “May I shift, sir?”

“If it will save his life, yes.”

Shift? Harkeld stared muzzily at Justen. What was he talking about?

Justen’s body shrank within his clothes. His face became smaller, changed shape, no longer square, but oval, with gray eyes instead of brown. Pale skin. Long, curling black hair.

Innis?

Harkeld blinked, and blinked again. He opened his mouth, but no sound came out, not even a cough.

Innis closed her eyes and frowned deeply. The hands pressed to his chest hadn’t moved. The sensation of healing magic flowing from them became stronger.

Harkeld stared at Innis, still blinking, still trying to understand what had just happened.

Innis opened her eyes and lifted her hands from his chest. “There. That’ll hold, however much he coughs.”

“Good,” Petrus said. “Now get away from him and don’t touch him again. I mean it, Innis.”

Innis sat back. Justen’s clothes hung on her, far too large, the shirt gaping open at her throat. Harkeld caught a glimpse of the Grooten amulet dangling there like a small round moon.

Justen’s amulet. Justen’s clothes. Worn by Innis.

She no longer shimmered. Her face was bloodlessly pale, exhausted.

“Where did Justen go?” Harkeld said, bewildered.

“Hmm. Still feel like coughing? No?” Petrus released his throat. “How’s your hand?”

Harkeld recognized evasion when he heard it. “What happened to Justen?” he said more loudly.

Petrus moved into Harkeld’s field of vision. He reached for Harkeld’s left hand, turning it palm up. “Ouch. That’s got to hurt.”

Harkeld pulled his hand free. “Justen. Where is he?”

Petrus glanced at Serril.

“The truth, I think,” the black-bearded mage said.

Petrus looked at Harkeld. “We made him up. All right? We took turns being him. The real Justen came with Serril on the ship. You saw him just now.”

Harkeld shook his head. “No.” But he could tell from their faces it was true—Petrus slightly belligerent, Serril uncomfortable.

Serril turned his head. “Here’s Rand. Thank the All-Mother.”

Justen didn’t exist? Harkeld felt dizzy, even though he was lying on the ground. There was a hollow feeling inside him.

He glanced at Innis. She was watching him. Yes, the truth was on her face too.

She hadn’t been sleeping in anyone’s pocket this morning. She’d been at his side the whole time.

No wonder Justen had known the dead hawk was Linea, not Innis.

Rand scrambled into view, panting. “How is he? Hedيn said an arrow in the chest.”

“Through the heart,” Petrus said. “Innis has healed all but the last bit. Neither of us has the strength for it. Do you?”

Rand crouched. Harkeld felt fingertips touch his chest, felt healing magic slide beneath his skin. “For this, yes.”

Harkeld stared up at the gray sky. His armsman didn’t exist. Had never existed.

It was a death of sorts, even though there was no body, no blood.

A hawk circled above them, its feathers shimmering. Shapeshifter.
The truth was there all along for me to see
.

The hollow feeling inside him began to fill with emotions. First was a sense of betrayal, as painful as the arrow in his chest. It was swiftly followed by humiliation and anger.

“Pull it out, Serril,” Rand said.

Harkeld didn’t flinch. He was far too angry.

CHAPTER NINETY-FIVE

T
HE WITCHES HAD
carried the dead prince away. The curse was coming. It couldn’t be stopped. The only person who could have stopped it was dead. Bennick had killed him.

“The curse doesn’t matter,” Bennick said. “It’s not worth crying over. We all go to the All-Mother in the end. Doesn’t matter how or when.”

Didn’t matter? Mam didn’t matter? Or Rosa? Or Da?

Jaumé held them tightly in his mind—Mam and Da and Rosa—and wouldn’t let Bennick’s words touch them. They mattered.

As for everything else, he would help Bennick down from this cave and back through the jungle to Loomath’s house. Bennick had taken care of him; he would take care of Bennick. That mattered. Bennick mattered.

Half a mile away, people crossed from island to shore. Two of the huge gray monsters helped them.

“Taking the body back,” Bennick said. “I’d like to have his head and hands and blood. They should turn him towards his home and leave him. Ah, well. At least I got him.” He held out the spyglass. “Here, lad. Watch and tell me when they’re gone.” He leaned his head wearily against the black rock.

Jaumé wiped his face and put the spyglass to his eye. A small boat with a square sail; he could see that much. No body. No prince.

People moved. Some wearing clothes. Some naked. The monsters were gone.

He didn’t want to see the prince’s body. But he looked, looked more closely, held his breath. The man getting into the boat, the dark-haired man with the bare chest and the red scar over his heart...

Jaumé’s world turned quietly over. He felt sorry for Bennick.

“What?” Bennick said. “What is it?” He took the spyglass, looked, hissed between his teeth. “He’s still alive.”

HERE ENDS BOOK TWO OF

THE CURSED KINGDOMS TRILOGY

Sorne, the estranged son of a King on the verge of madness, is being raised as a weapon to wield against the mystical Wyrds. Half a continent away, his father is planning to lay siege to the Celestial City, the home of the T’En, whose wyrd blood the mundane population have come to despise. Within the City, Imoshen, the only mystic to be raised by men, is desperately trying to hold her people together. A generations-long feud between the men of the Brotherhoods and the women of the sacred Sisterhoods is about to come to a head.

With war without and war within, can an entire race survive the hatred of a nation?

Rowena Cory Daniells, the creator of the bestselling
Chronicles of King Rolen’s Kin
, brings you a stunning new fantasy epic, steeped in magic and forged in war.

‘Once again, readers will be delighted by Daniells’ skilful plotting.’

LEC Book Reviews
on
The Usurper

‘Royal intrigue, court politics and outlawed magic make for an exciting adventure.’

Gail Z. Martin, author of
The Chronicles of The Necromancer
, on
The Chronicles of King Rolen’s Kin