Bloodleaf (Bloodleaf #1)(34)

I felt a pair of arms lift me free of the fire, and I struggled against them.

“Emilie! It’s me!” Zan said. “I won’t hurt you. Stop! It’s all right. It’s all right.”

“All right?” I echoed.

I didn’t know what that meant anymore.

Nathaniel had the second man cornered. He landed hard strikes on the villain’s chin and then his chest, knocking the knife from his hand. He pushed him up against the wall, arm across his windpipe, before that man’s skin also started to smoke.

“Bleeding stars,” Nathaniel swore, jumping back.

“You’re safe now,” Zan said again, hand on my cheek. “You can stop. They can’t hurt you.”

His words were like cool water to a fire. When I looked again, it wasn’t Toris writhing on the ground with charred clothes and bubbled skin but the stranger who’d attacked me. Behind him the other man was sobbing like a child, staring at the blisters disfiguring his arms and hands.

“Take them to the gate and toss them out,” Zan ordered Nathaniel. Then he added coldly, “Your welcome in this city will be revoked. Set foot inside these walls again, you’ll burn. Inside first, then out, and in such pain you’ll wish she had finished you here.”

If more was said, I didn’t hear it. With the last of my energy spent, I felt myself falling, my vision blurring into blackness.





?14




Heavens above. Is this the girl? What happened?

We found her in the tavern district.

Put her here. Quickly. Help me get this dress off. What of her attackers?

They’ve been removed from Achlev.

How many?

Two. One of them had this on him.

Stars, Zan. This is coated in bloodleaf. If she got cut with this, I don’t know if there’s anything I can do . . .

You have to try. Do whatever it takes. We need her.



* * *





I woke to brimming sun and sweet smells in a room painted with yellow flowers.

A woman was at the hearth. “You’re awake. I honestly wasn’t sure it was possible.” She placed a mug of steaming broth in my hands. “Drink up. You’ll feel better once you’ve got something in your stomach.”

She had a cheery, doe-like beauty—?pink cheeks and soft brown eyes, framed by a wealth of chestnut hair. I guessed she was probably three or four years older than me, though she was several inches shorter. When she turned, her round profile revealed that she was with child, and pretty far along. Despite that, she moved around the room with dainty authority, unbothered by her pregnant condition. “I’m Kate,” she said. “Nathaniel’s wife.”

“Rosemary,” I said, my voice barely coming out as a whisper. I moved the mug in a small circle, watching the liquid swirl inside it.

“Zan told me your name was Emilie,” she said in surprise.

“No. I mean, yes. It is Emilie. But there’s rosemary in the broth.”

“Right.” She smiled. “I like it because it calms the nerves,” she said. “I add it to everything. Not much, but a little.” She gave the pot on the stove another stir, then tapped the spoon on the side.

“Zan brought me here?”

“Don’t you remember?”

“I . . .” I swallowed, a vague echo in my ears: We need her. We need her. “No,” I said. In my cup, the liquid’s surface was undulating in tiny peaks and valleys, disturbed by the shaking of my hands.

Kate took pity on me. “Yes. Zan brought you here.” She gently took the cup from my hands. “You’re very lucky, you know. You almost didn’t survive.”

“I heal fast.”

“Well, the cuts were one thing. I stitched you up as best I could, but I’m a seamstress, not a surgeon. I did a much better job on the tear in your cloak. And being poisoned by bloodleaf . . . it must be the Empyrea’s will that you’re still here. I swear, that’s the only sensible explanation.”

“The knife was poisoned?” My mind was whirring. Bloodleaf? Did the bloodcloth save me? Even now, was someone else dead in my stead? “My bag,” I barked suddenly, desperately. “Where is my bag? I need my bag.” I tried to stand.

“No, no, no, don’t get up. It’s right here. See?”

I snatched it from her, and when my trembling hands couldn’t get the flap open, I turned it upside down and emptied the entire thing onto her floor while Kate watched, slightly agape. Dropping to my knees, I sifted through my paltry belongings until I found the square of silk. I almost cried with relief when I saw that of the three drops, only Kellan’s was faded, and less so than I remembered. The other two were still a deep, dark red.

It was easier to clean up the mess than it was to make it; my hands were already steadier. The last thing I put away was the charm bracelet, from which hung a single remaining charm, the winged horse. I held it out to Kate.

“What’s this for?”

“It’s for your help. Please take it, and I’ll go.”

Her eyebrows lifted. “I can’t let you do that.”

“I have to pay you somehow. I know it isn’t much, but—?”

“No, I mean . . . I can’t let you go.” She gave a frustrated grumble. “Zan will be by shortly—?he’s been coming about every other hour to see how you’re doing. He wants to talk to you. I told him that, if by some miracle you did wake up, I’d keep you here until he came back so he could at least try. I didn’t tell him you wouldn’t punch him in the face. I think he’s earned it, taking your horse like he did.”