Through the ringing in her ears, Briar felt the knife at her belt again. Her fingers fumbled for it, clumsy and desperate, vision swimming.
She got it free and drove it backward into Ferria's arm with all the strength she could manage.
Ferria's scream was sharp and genuine. Her grip released, and Briar stumbled forward, trying to run, trying to shout for help. But her legs wouldn't cooperate, wouldn't hold her weight properly. The blow to her head had left everything spinning and disjointed.
She made it three steps before Ferria caught her again, yanking her back by her hair. Briar tried to swing the knife again but Ferria caught her wrist, twisted until her fingers opened and the blade fell into the corrupted undergrowth.
"Stupid girl," Ferria hissed, blood running down her arm where the knife had caught her.
Briar opened her mouth to scream, managed to draw breath—
The second blow caught her temple, harder than the first. The world went dark at the edges, closing in like a tunnel. She felt herself falling, felt Ferria catch her, felt the ground moving beneath her as she was dragged away from the light, away from the camp, away from safety.
The sounds of fighting grew distant. She tried to hold onto consciousness, tried to move her limbs, but everything was slipping away like water through her fingers.
Then the world went black, and she knew nothing at all.
Chapter thirty
Briar woke to pain.
Her head throbbed with each heartbeat, a steady pulse of agony that made her stomach turn. She tried to move and found her body unresponsive, limbs heavy and disconnected. The world spun even with her eyes closed.
She forced her eyes open anyway, squinting against light that felt too bright despite being dim. Stone walls curved around her, smooth and seamless. The air held that particular quality of stillness she recognized, the weight of magic pressing in from all sides.
A safe haven.
Memory returned in fragments. The camp. The creatures attacking. Ferria's hand over her mouth. The blow to her head. Fighting back, the knife driving into flesh. Then darkness.
"Finally awake." Ferria's voice came from somewhere to her left. "I was beginning to think I'd hit you too hard."
Briar turned her head, the movement sending fresh waves of pain through her skull. Ferria sat on what looked like a root formed into a bench, wrapping a bandage around her forearm. Blood had soaked through the fabric in several places, dark and wet.
The knife wound. Briar had done that.
"Where—" Her voice came out rough, throat dry. She swallowed and tried again. "Where are we?"
"Somewhere safe." Ferria tied off the bandage with sharp, efficient movements. "Somewhere your protectors can't reach you. Not immediately, anyway." She looked up, and her smile was cold. "Do you remember this?" Ferria said, watching her face.
"We hid in one like this once." Her smile turned cold. "Though I may have been... less careful with the wards that time. This one is better protected. Much better. Malus will be here soon, and we can't have interruptions before then."
The words penetrated slowly through the pain fogging Briar's thoughts. Malus. Coming here. For her.
She tried to sit up and found she could move now, though her head spun with the effort. Her hands were unbound, but her body felt wrong, sluggish, like she was moving through water.
"I wouldn't try anything sudden," Ferria advised. "You took two solid hits to the head. You're concussed at minimum. Sudden movements will only make you vomit and I’d rather not be trapped in here with that smell."
Briar pressed her hand against the ground, using it to steady herself as she pushed into a sitting position. Her stomach rolled in protest, but she swallowed hard against the nausea.
"Why?" The word came out hoarse. Briar's throat was dry, her mouth tasting of copper. "Why are you doing this? I’ve never done anything to you. I—"
Ferria turned back, and her smile was cold, vicious. "Haven’t you?"
“I don’t understand.”
“Of course you don't." Ferria was quiet for a moment, studying her with amusement. "Do you know what I find fascinating about humans? How much value you place on life. Your mortality makes you weak. Not just because you die so easily, but because you're so desperate to protect what little time you have. It makes you easy to manipulate."
She stood, moving closer, and Briar instinctively tried to scoot backward. The movement made her head spin, and she had to stop, pressing her palm flat against the floor again to keep from falling over.
