I felt the voice around me. Each sentence from a different point in the room. She truly was everywhere, but I waited, still. I hoped my stillness meant she wouldn’t use the solid fog on me. I gambled my life on her wanting to finish me on her own, use that little dagger of hers.
I bristled, feeling the flow of fog as it swirled around me. Feeling her move within it, part of its swirling nature, and I waited. I wouldn’t hold out much longer. I was covered in my own blood, from the myriad of tiny punctures all over my body. I’d be too weak to stand in a moment, then dead not long after. She’d not even need to come for me. That meant I needed to get her attention.
“End this,” I whispered, hoping my voice was filled with despair.
“As you wish,” she hissed, and in that moment, I felt her materialize right in front of me, felt the thrust of her dagger through the fog toward me, felt her triumphant inhalation of breath…
And that’s where I stuffed my hand full of webbing, clamping it over her mouth. Auwei was doing her part, reacting with my limbs far faster than I would have. I connected with something solid. Then Auwei took control to leap back, the mistweaver’s dagger pierced my chest over my heart, and sank an inch into my left breast before I managed to get away.
I heard the mumbled struggling as she tried to breathe, the raking of her own nails over her face to remove the webbing. I surged back in, using my spider’s sense once more while she was distracted, knowing exactly where she was. I grabbed the arm with the dagger and forced it into her chest. Then I bashed the hilt with my palm to sink it in deep.
She must have freed just a bit of her mouth as I heard a faint gasping sort of scream. Then the fog whipped around me. I was tossed into a wall, hitting hard, sinking to the floor as the mists swirled in an agitated frenzy.
Her muffled cries lasted a moment longer as the mists whipped and thrashed and then… they were all sucked back to one spot, to her, as she fell to the floor, dead.
I laughed, a faint and exhausted thing, a little surprised I’d actually won. But the laughter quickly faded as I saw the carnage in the hall. The freely flowing blood from the dozens of bodies, the dead king and queen, the sliced-up courtiers. It was a testament to how weak I was, that I didn’t even have the strength to be sick at the horrid sight.
Then I looked down at myself and saw my torn dress, bits of it falling away exposing far too much skin. Not that I cared so much about that as I did for the wounds on my chest and side and the tiny bloody holes, all over my body. I spun some silk to patch the larger wounds on my chest and face, but by that point I was getting dizzy, weak.
The many points of light in the room were fading to darkness. I slumped to the ground, as some large form drew close to me. I couldn’t make out who it was as I fell into unconsciousness. My only thought was: if it’s a guard, I’m dead.
Chapter 27
“You just refuse to die,don’t you?”
I blinked awake, and when I did, I grunted with pain, my body on fire with a thousand cuts.
Ant was leaning over me. “I’ve healed you as much as I can, without blacking out myself. I think you’ll live, but Spirits Within, you’re a mess; a tough as nails mess.”
“Don’t mention nails,” I groaned.
He grinned, but looked incredibly drained and weary. Oddly though there wasn’t a scratch on him.
“How…? You’re…”
“I think she wanted me to take the blame for all this. I was trapped in solid fog, but left unharmed and alive.” His weary grin widened. “So, you saved me.” He held out a hand to help me stand. It took me a couple of tries and when I did stand, I had to lean heavily on the wall.
“I’m not going to get far.”
Amber rushed toward us, having barged through one of the doors. She took one look at me and her eyes went wide. “Girl, put on some clothes!” She scooped down and plucked up a cloak from one of the dead, it was slick with blood, but still she wrapped it around me.
“Thank you,” I said. “Where’s Silence?”
“I sent him back to Fin with your message. Hopefully he’s long gone out of here by now.”
I nodded.Good.
“Let’s get out of here before—” Ant finished with a curse as we all heard the thunder of running footfalls heading this way. We weren’t out of this yet. The big man sighed, gave a grim smile, and turned to Amber and me. “I’ll hold them off as long as I can. Go.”
A part of my spirit broke at that resigned look on his face. “No! You—”
“Hush, child,” Amber whispered. “No use arguing when he gets like that. He’s tough, he’ll catch up. Come.” She helped me up, slipping one of my arms around her shoulders.
Ant didn’t look back as he headed toward the noise of the approaching men. He stopped only to pick up a sword from one of the bodies on the floor. It seemed so small in his hands. How could he defend himself with something so small?
I turned to Amber, ready to tell her that I hadn’t just killed a mistweaver to let my friends die like this, but the words died on my lips. There were tears on her cheeks. I’d never seen her shed a single tear before.
She must have caught my shocked look from the corner of her eye. With a slight shift of her head toward me, she gave that same grim smile I’d just seen on Ant’s face. “Yes, I worry too. Now let’s get going so his sacrifice isn’t in vain.”
