Page 91 of Draekora
“Niyx!” Alex cried, rushing over to himand sinking to her knees at his side. “Niyx!Niyx!Look at me!”
When she rolled him over to face her, she let out a loud gasp as he moaned in agony.
Four long slashes, like claw marks, ripped through his clothes and tore into his flesh. The lines travelled across from his right hip all the way up to his left shoulder, diagonally dissecting his chest. But as gruesome as the injury was, that wasn’t what had caused Alex to gasp, nor was it the amount of silver blood spilling out.
No, what caused her to gasp was the murky brown liquid the rain was quickly washing off his body. Because she knew exactly what it was. Heedless of the risk to her own health, she reached out in order to put pressure on the wound and draw him close enough for theValispath, but with a shout of pain, Niyx jerked violently away before she could touch him.
“Don’t,” he panted out. “Can’t… touch… me.”
“Niyx, I need to get you out of here,” Alex said, talking to him as she would a wounded animal, low and calm. “You need to let me help you.”
“Don’t… touch,” he struggled to tell her. “Sarnaph… blood.”
Alex felt a shudder go through her at his confirmation of what the murky goo washing from his wound was. Thanks to Aven’s blood in her veins, if her skin made contact with it, she would be almost as debilitated as Niyx.
“It—It’s not as bad as it seems,” she lied, reaching for his face instead and running a soothing hand across his cheek and through his dark hair. Even in the rain she could tell he was sweating feverishly, something she had never seen a Meyarin do before. He needed help, and he needed it immediately.
“I’ll be right back,” she said as an idea came to her, and she tore off into the forest. She was back by his side in a blur of movement thanks to her Meyarin speed, carrying a whole armful oflaendrawith her. Knowing he was beyond able to chew the flower, she summoned A’enara and sliced open a bulb, the sticky liquid within dribbling down her fingers and merging with the ever-increasing rain.
Moving it to trickle onto his wounds, she continued cutting bulbs until thelaendracoated his chest like honey. She then sliced her final flower and carefully took Niyx’s head in her hands, gently lifting his face and urging him to swallow the healing liquid. Hacking and spluttering, he could barely manage a whole mouthful.
“You’re going to be fine,” Alex told him, steeling her voice to mask how much she was shaking inside.
“Won’t… work…” Niyx panted. “Just… helps… pain.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” she told him, stemming her rising panic at his words. “Laendracan heal anything.”
“Not… Sarnaph… blood,” Niyx said. “Nothing… can… fix.”
“Not true,” Alex said, trying to come off as confident when she felt nothing of the sort. “I have a friend who was poisoned and he’s perfectly fine now.”
But Zainhadnearly died, or so he’d told Alex. It was only because of Fletcher that the Meyarin had managed to survive the arrow to his shoulder. The problem was, Alex had no idea how Fletcher had saved him.
“Look,” Alex said, hands shaking, “the Sarnaph blood’s all washed away now. I’m going to get you back to the palace—someone there will know how to help you.”
She reached under him to pull him up enough to wrap an arm around his shoulders, drawing him close and forcing herself to ignore his agonising moans.
“Can’t… save… me,” he puffed. “Going… to… die.”
Despite her concern, Alex was certain that wasn’t true. Niyx remained alive in the future, so she knew—sheknew—he would survive this.
“You arenotgoing to die!” she told him adamantly, giving him a small shake to bring her point home. And yet, it was then with shocking clarity that a memory came to her; the sound of Aven’s voice after he first saw her Claiming scar and heard her lie about its cause.
‘I’ve never heard of anyone surviving Sarnaph blood poisoning…’
That wasn’t all he’d said. It was his next words that had Alex trembling hard enough that Niyx groaned and tried to pull away from her jostling his injured body.
‘I’ve never heard of anyone surviving Sarnaph blood poisoning,’ Aven had said, only to finish,‘withoutMenada dae Loransabeing performed on them.’
Looking down at her rapidly fading friend, Alex was panting almost as hard as he was as she waged a mental war with herself. Was it possible that Niyx truly wouldn’t survive the poison… unless she helped him? Unless she shared her life force with him? Unless sheClaimedhim?
It was an abhorrent thought and she couldn’t believe she was even considering the idea, especially given that she had firsthand experience with the effects of the bonding. And yet, she also knew he was right. If shedidn’ttry to Claim him and share her energy with him… he was going to die.
Maybe if she got him back to the palace, someone else would be willing to do the ritual. Maybe she could convince them to break the law, and maybe they’d be willing to risk execution in order to save his life. But Alex knew it was a long shot. And looking at how quickly Niyx was fading in her arms, she doubted he would last until she found someone to help. His life was literally in her hands.
It was then that another memory hit her, one of him speaking to her from the darkness of his future prison cell.
‘A life for a life…I’m now absolved of my debt.’
