“Melder.” Skul Drek shifted, almost like he was torn on how to act—keep the Berserkir in his grasp? Or step beside me?
I held up a hand, bile on my tongue. “I’m fine. A little more.”
The warrior thrashed. I didn’t hear him scream, not in the mirror.
Chips and pieces of rune-marked bone flickered and fell away until the gold bone faded to the glowing ashes and drifted away on the icy wind.
Teeth clenched, I found a final piece that would open enough of a gap to sink a blade inside to his heart. Pain in my own body felt like falling into a bed of hot coals.
I cried out and stumbled.
A cold hand reached out, catching me under the arm. Skul Drek did not release me until the final thread snapped.
I bent over and heaved, retching from the pain.
“Go.” Skul Drek spoke in more of a growl than a voice. “Do not be seen here.”
“Pull back the ravagers,” I said weakly. “They follow you. Pull them back.”
He hesitated. “As you say.”
His blazing eyes looked between us. The rope was as thick as the one that once held him bound to the distant shadows. There was nothing at his back, no chain fading into the mists. Now itseemed to have altered course and bound the assassin to me. I didn’t understand it, but there was little time to fret over it.
Skul Drek took a step closer. “You brighten the night, and I will fight to keep it.”
A gust of cold chased away the inky shadows of the mirror. I fell onto my side on the damp cobblestones.
The clatter of steel over the stones drew my attention. With the same stance as in the mirror, Skul Drek held the Berserkir in his inky tethers, only now the warrior was bloodied and misshapen. His skin was shredded like claws scraped over his skin.
All gods. I’d torn him apart. What appeared as unraveling gilded threads in the mirror was slaughter in reality.
Blood bubbled over the Stav’s lips. “P-please.” His foggy eyes looked at the blade in my hand.
I clutched the dagger against my heart, holding the Berserkir’s gaze. “Dine in Salur tonight.”
On the next heartbeat, I thrust the point through his heart.
The feeling of carving through flesh, bone, the shudder of his body, the wet gasps as he fell, all of it was sickening. It was merciful. It was a death I caused.
The dagger caught in his chest and took me forward when the Berserkir toppled to the side. Cold, harsh hands caught me again.
I looked to Skul Drek, pulse frenzied. He said nothing for a drawn-out moment, then all at once shoved me in the same direction Krisjan had fled. One foot caught on a raised cobblestone, flinging me forward onto my knees.
I whirled around, but by the time I looked back, Skul Drek was already gone.
42
Lyra
When the horns sounded withthe retreat of the ravagers, Mikkal—steadier from Hilda’s bone tonic—insisted he escort me to the palace before anyone noticed my absence.
Once I was properly placed outside the doors of the healer’s wing, I nudged him forward. “You should let them see to your wound.”
“I am quite well,” he said.
“Then return to your mother and father, before they fear the worst.”
Mikkal hesitated. “Thank you.” He clenched his teeth and stared at the woven rug under his boots. “Thank you, Lyra. I-I am filled with shame, for I do not even know if I was cruel or kind to you while you served in our household.”
