Important! Zorwal and Otavio are connected and affect each other. Their minds are connected to the Witch King too, and connecting more and more. Otavio is likely another anchor. He needs to be killed, just like Zorwal. He visited Zorwal recently.
Her brows furrow. “Otavio. We’ll need to tell Marlak and Astra.”
“Indeed.” I don’t want to voice my fears about them.
“You think they aren’t coming back, don’t you?”
I swallow. “I fear something’s wrong. Now, should I try to help? If I do, will it make everything worse? I don’t know.”
She stares at the table. “If they don’t come back…” Her voice is strangled. “We’ll need to find a way to defeat the Witch King.”
“If they don’t come back, I don’t know if I’ll be around for long. What you’ll have to do is survive, and help as many fae as you can to survive with you—and escape his thrall. Survive first. You say that dead people don’t have the right to give opinions, and it might be true. What I can say is that dead people defeat no one.”
She sighs and takes a sip of her tea. What I see turns my insides into soot, and I tremble from head to toe.
“Can I see your hand?” My voice comes out harsh and angry.
“What?” She rests the cup on the table and pulls her hand.
I take a deep breath, and even then, it takes all my effort to speak slowly. “Show me your hand.” My heart’s throwing a racket in my chest.
“It’s nothing.”
“Lidiane.”
Her hand is trembling as she places it on the table.
The tip of her finger is visibly white. I want to curse each second that brought her to this curse; the moment she decided to go to the castle, the moment that caused me to go there and rescue her. My magic must have taken her—and now I don’t know what to do.
She pulls her hand so that it’s right in front of her eyes and squints. “Maybe it’s an impression.”
All I can do is glare at her. She knows what’s happening as well as me.
Still, she says, “If Marlak kills the Witch King…” Of course she can’t continue conjuring a theory she doesn’t believe in.
Fury, fear, anger, even more fear. They cloud my mind so much that they cleanse it. All doubt, care, wisdom, and sense disappear.
I need to save her. No matter how.
In that state of desperation, an idea comes to me, and I get up.
“If I don’t come back…” All my words are stuck.
My thoughts are gone. All I can think about is saving her. And yet I know I might be condemning myself. I don’t care. I exit the house and float across the river. There’s a storm in my mind, a storm muffling faraway cries, muffling her voice calling my name.
In a second, I’m gone.
MARLAK
The sun descends, its shadows getting longer and longer as my heart gets heavy. I don’t know what I’m going to do if we’re caught here at night, when my magic is gone and my wife’s on the brink of unconsciousness.
I’ve been walking, sometimes running, for a long time, Astra in my arms. She insisted she could walk, that she was fine, with fluttering eyes and slurred speech. Still, I kept carrying her. Something’s wrong with her, and I don’t know if she was poisoned, lost too much blood, or if it’s just magic fatigue. But magic fatigue shouldn’t affect her for that long.
There’s still some time before nightfall when we finally reach the place where Krat left me—but he’s not here. I sit on a rock, glad to rest Astra on my knees and ease some of the weight, as my arms are trembling with the effort.
“Is this the meeting point?” She asks, her voice quiet but otherwise normal.
“Yes.” I look around, then shout, “Hello! Krat!” I look back at her. “He should be here at any moment.”
