He approached the table. She drew close as well. Using a bay leaf, she swiped it over what looked like green toothpaste. “Hold out your arm.”
He trusted her, so he did as she commanded. “Are you sure?”
“Yes. Please turn your arm over, palm up. Good. That will do.”
She drew close and flipped the bay leaf over, paste down. She pressed the substance onto his arm.
He didn’t feel anything at first, then the paste began to heat up. She peeled the bay leaf off and suddenly the mixture began to burn. “What have you done? Maeve? Get this off me.”
The burn became a flame eating into his skin. The pain had him shouting. She moved out of the way as he ran to the sink. He turned on the water and slid his arm underneath, but the flow seemed to intensify the spell. He grabbed a paper towel to try to get rid of the paste, but by then his skin was bubbling and bleeding. The pain was so severe, he shouted.
He turned to her. “Maeve! Help me! Get this off me!”
She stood very still. Tears poured down her cheeks.
“Maeve!”
He held his arm. He shouted. He screamed.
Finally, she moved to the white dish. Using another bay leaf, she scooped up a creamy substance the color of eggshells. She approached him. “Hold out your arm. This will stop the spell.”
He had no choice.
The moment the cream touched the burn, it eased quickly into all parts of the wound and the pain ceased. He watched the tissue heal swiftly and his skin come back together as though nothing had happened.
When the pain was gone, he had sweat pouring off every inch of his skin. He wiped his forehead with the sleeve of his t-shirt. He was breathing hard and his heart pounded. The residual effect of the pain had him shaking with adrenaline. He could smell the poisonous paste, as well as his burned flesh, hanging in the air. He hadn’t imagined it.
He stood very still, staring at her. “What’s going on? Why did you just do this to me?” He wasn’t sure he’d ever be able to trust her again.
Maeve grabbed tissues from the box on the counter, wiped her face and blew her nose. “That’s what Veyda did to your wife. To Laura. I was there. I’m remembering now. I remember it all.”
He still struggled to breathe. Why was she talking about Laura? He already knew she’d been tortured.
He leaned against the sink. “I know Veyda hurt her like this, but why did you do this to me?”
“Because I need you to know just a small part of what she suffered that night otherwise you’ll never understand.”
“Why?” The question seemed critical. Yet, he wasn’t sure he wanted to hear the answer.
She started talking again about that night, about standing near Veyda, of hearing her voice in her head, of watching the dark fog roll away from the victim’s body. “Braden. It was Laura.”
A terrible sensation descended on him, like he was caught in a nightmare he couldn’t escape.
“Laura begged me to end her suffering. She was in more pain than you can imagine. Even though I’ve given you a taste of what she endured, try to picture the same poison all over your torso and your thighs. Can you do that?”
He nodded very slowly.
Maeve continued. “I crossed to the platform and climbed the steps. One of the witches gave me the ceremonial knife.” She gestured in front of her as though she could see the past as clearly as she could the present. She shifted her gaze to meet his. “But the poison was designed not to penetrate to the organs. Do you understand what that means? The death is slow, beyond any kind of agony you and I can imagine. The same poison eats through the muscle all the way to the bone, but it’s not life-threatening until hours have passed and it bleeds into the bone, then the blood supply.”
He looked at his now healed arm. He’d felt the burning chewing up his muscles as well. He rubbed his arm, trying to make the memory go away. “But why did you do this to me?”
“I needed you to have a frame of reference for what happened that night.”
He knew the rest of what she’d done. She’d told him. He’d helped her recover her memory.
But there was something else he wasn’t seeing.
His gaze dropped to her hands. “You said the witch gave you a blade?”
