“Do it.”
Their eyes met over Sophia’s face. Cathal read caution in Douglas’s, all of the warnings and objections that his brother wanted to state, but none of them passed his lips, and in time he dropped his gaze and shook his head. “Aye. Go find a page. Send for dry clothes for the both of you, and food. It’ll take me time to prepare. And send for Madoc.”
Cathal paused on his way to the door. “The Welsh boy? Why?”
“He’s half decent with magic. We’ll need two, and you’ll be in no condition to assist.”
Had Cathal had the energy to take that as a slight, he would have soon found himself proved wrong. Before the spell began, Douglas and Madoc propped Sophia upright and bade Cathal sit before her, then bound each of his hands to hers, winding the ropes from fingertips to elbows and back again. He knelt with his legs beneath him and struggled to keep his balance, in no condition for the pacing they did as they chanted, nor for bending and drawing shapes on the floor in chalk.
He might have spoken or joined the chanting, but the incense was strong and touched with poppies. Cathal wavered, balanced, breathed deeply, and tried to fall into the rhythm of the chanting. He felt her heartbeat through their joined wrists, steady but quick.
Then the force of the spell tipped over and the effect began. Cathal felt energy draining away from him, slowly at first, seeping from his palms into Sophia’s. At the same time, her aura brightened. He could see no other difference, nor feel any in her body, but he began to hope.
He kept hoping still as the chanting continued and the flow of energy quickened. Now it was like water running downhill, like snow melt in the spring, and his legs wavered beneath him. The room grew blurry.
The chanting slowed and stopped. Cathal heard footsteps, then Douglas. “Shall we unbind you? It won’t stop otherwise.”
“No,” he managed, though his voice was hazy. “No.” He repeated it stronger, with a glare, though he didn’t take his eyes from Sophia.
Until she freed herself and woke, he would be with her, the cost be damned.
Thirty-nine
Sophia ran.
She raced downstairs in the darkness, and this time she didn’t bother to look at the doors or the light that came from beneath them. She cared only that she kept her footing and that she outran the shape that ran behind her, his feet heavy and his breathing as twisted as the rest of him. Betimes he stopped to scream threats at her. They were ugly things, but she let them pass over her mind.
The more breath he used to shout, the less he’d have to run. Sophia wasn’t sure if that was entirely true in this world, but she let it comfort her.
She flung herself out the castle doors just out of Albert’s reach. The courtyard felt larger than it had before—mayhap it was, the way things were in the aether—but she ran across that too, ignoring the pain in her side and the burning in her lungs, and then stopped short.
The bridge had vanished.
She had no time for surprise, despair, or even thought. Bending down, she wrenched off one of her shoes and tossed it across the gap. Sophia sent her will along with it, and so she wasn’t wholly startled when the shoe landed upside down and grew in a flash, such that the sole stretched from the edge of the forest and upward into a tree. She was profoundly grateful, or as grateful as she could manage the attention to be. As soon as the bridge looked stable, she was lunging at the edge.
At that, she was just in time. The claws of Albert’s long arm scraped down her back, tearing her gown open in four wide strips and scratching the skin beneath. Sophia yelped, more in fright than pain, and jerked away onto the bridge.
There was no railing this time, nor even ropes. For all that, she couldn’t afford caution. She kept to the middle, fixed her eyes on the tree ahead, and went as fast as she could drive her body. The chill of her exposed back—real air or not, it was cold enough—and the stinging pain were spurs. When she wanted to hold back out of fright, she told herself that a fall from the bridge was probably better than what the monster behind her would do if he caught her.
Even so, when she reached the tree and pulled herself onto the branch, it was with the last of her strength. Sophia’s legs and arms were shaking and boneless. Every breath was an ordeal, and the view before her eyes was misty. She could see Albert clearly enough, climbing across the bridge toward her with dreadful persistence. The effort, or the screaming, had taken its toll on him. The skin on his face had cracked, and a ghastly red line ripped its way from the bottom of his chin to just beneath his left eye.
She shuddered, swayed, and clung to the tree for support.
Damaged he might be, but he was still master of this place, and she doubted that she could sway it very much against his will. The shoe had most likely worked because it had mirrored a real object and its use in the context was plain, but she had few of those left, and she could think of few ways to turn them against Albert.
Calcination. Dissolution. Go back to the source.
Sophia looked upward. The tree kept going, and at the very top, tiny in the red-gray sky, she saw a shifting spot of pure black.
That was where she needed to go, if for no other reason than that it was the only place open to her. She doubted she’d find a pleasant reception on the ground. Sophia gritted her teeth, grabbed a branch, and pulled.
Her body barely moved. She tried again, and felt tears start running down her face with the effort—exhaustion, frustration, fear, or the shrieking pain of her muscles—but nothing happened, and Albert was almost to the tree. His lips drew back from his teeth, the smile splitting his skin further, and Sophia screamed with all the breath she had left.
Out of nowhere, fresh energy poured into her body. It started at her palms and spread down, burning along her arms but in a pleasant fashion, or at least a useful one. Sophia thought of Cathal’s kisses, of the way he’d touched her and of feeling him deep inside her when she climaxed. The power she felt now wasn’t quite the same, but it was close.
She pulled herself upward a third time, and this time hauled herself onto the next branch. Albert turned his face up to her and hissed. “Bitch,” he said, “you’ll know your place before I finish with you.”
Sophia didn’t respond. Talking was a waste of climbing time and of energy, even though she was feeling stronger with every moment. She hugged the tree trunk now and pulled herself upward, a feat she could never have accomplished in the real world. She was making changes again, even if they were small ones. If Albert realized that, or if he didn’t have to make his own changes to follow her…
