Something heavy pulled at the hilt of my sword. The light seared, but I didn’t stop to consider what it was. I just dug my heels in and pulled back up the shore with my palms in agony and the weight dragging at the end of my weapon.
And the girl emerged from the pool, black sludge clinging to her skin and silk nightgown. Hair plastered to her body and choking coughs wracking her thin frame.
Barrett gave her his cloak, but I didn’t even hear the girl’s name. A dying buzz was humming through my sword, a pulse ofpower and might that ebbed within the steel and into the palm of my hand.
I looked between the blade and the tar, shaking off the shadows that eclipsed my mind.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Santorina
Lancasterand I cut across the mountains—a leg of the trip that should have taken a week—in a matter of days.
“We’ll continue through Mystique Territory tomorrow,” I said, unfurling my cloak on the ground to set up our makeshift camp for the evening. The sun hadn’t set yet, but it was beginning to sink behind the mountains. We were among the rolling hills, the range at our backs with a clean view of the plains littered by clumps of forest near enough to hunt.
“I’ll find us food for the evening,” Lancaster said, pulling a long, brutal sword from midair using his creation power.
“Couldn’t you use that magic to create a tent?” I grumbled, sitting back on my heels and pulling out my canteen. With the long grasses coating the hills, the ground was softer than some, but not entirely comfortable.
“Would you like to share a tent with me, Bounty?” Lancaster asked. There was no hint of suggestion in his voice, and somehow that made the question more of a taunt. Like I was weaker for not being okay with that option.
“Go get me dinner,” I demanded, taking a long drink of water to calm the riled sensation flipping through my chest.
Lancaster and I had made peace with the Bounty and Hunter senses over the trip. Or rather, I simply got used to it. It was peaceful to allow my muscles to relax for a moment, the voice inside of me screaming to attack him finally quieting.
I washed up in the stream, splashing water on my face. Then, I ventured into the trees to assess what grew nearby. We hadn’t encountered any trouble yet, so the vials of ointments and tonics I brought with me were still fully stocked, but as I wound through the trunks and crouched beside bushes to study the flora, my chest unknotted.
It had been so long since I explored nature simply for the pleasure of curiosity. Lifting the triangular red-tipped leaves of a vine stretching across the ground, I noted the vibrant colors and?—
A hand curled around my mouth, yanking me upright.
My heart thundered. I struggled, kicking back and striking the stranger’s shin. I ripped a knife from my waist, angling it toward their ribs, but a hand locked around my wrist, pinning it and pressing me closer to a broad, firm chest.
The voice I’d banished raged.Kill, kill, kill. The scent of bloodstained roses washed over me.
And I froze.
A husky tone whispered in my ear, “Relax, Bounty, it’s me.”
In a disjoined rhythm, my heart rate soothed at the rough sound of his voice, but my predator senses tensed. Needles prickled my fingers.
I spun, trying to ask what in the Gods’ names Lancaster was doing, but he clamped his hand over my mouth again, placing a finger against his lips to instruct me to be quiet. His hand was solid against me, but his fingers twitched, and I considered briefly how easy it would be for him to kill me right now.
The Hunter was sleeping. He’d promised after Ritalia died that unless someone called upon it using a bargain as the queen had with him, it wouldn’t wake. But the threat remained.
With raised brows, Lancaster nodded around the trees to my left. He dropped his hand, fingers curling into fists. Taking careful, impossibly silent steps in that direction, he pressed his back against a thick ash-white cypher trunk, carefully avoiding any splinters.
I did my best to trace his steps. He’d placed his feet where nothing would crunch beneath our boots. With how weightlessly the fae traveled, I was sure he did that as a guide for me. Annoyance rumbled through me. Arrogant immortal.
But I followed his lead, finding a tree to hide behind while I calmed both my rioting heart and the voice still warring for blood. But over both of those, I heard it.
A trilling, high voice.
I whipped my head to Lancaster.Singing?I mouthed.
He nodded.
Who is it?
