“I don’t know why I’m not healing myself.” Reaching back, I feel across my shoulder to where the spike is still protruding. “My body should have rejected this thorn by now.”
Reaper sniffs around the wound, and I stifle my cry of pain at the intense stabbing that follows her slight brush. Heat strikes along the path of pain, a deep burning that tells me this thorn has to come out.Now.
“There is poison in this thorn,”she says, not moving closer to it again. “It’s a claw thorn. If you try to remove it, it will rip out your flesh and inject a final dose of toxin that will kill you. You were lucky not to be struck by more of these.”
Turning my head over my shoulder to see her better—a move I instantly regret as it pulls at my injury—I ask, “Poison? Are you sure?”
She nods.“It’s numbing you to the true pain right now, but soon, there will be no numbing. I do not have the means to remove it, but we must find a way to detach it soon. Or you will succumb to the toxin.”
The fact that the jolts I feel arenumbedpain is quite terrifying, but it explains the burning sensation that seems to be sinking deeper.
“I don’t know how to remove it,” I say, the admission bitter on my tongue. Vulnerability sucks and right now, I’m at my weakest. “My best bet is to keep moving and hopefully make it to Demon City before Isuccumb.”
And hope that I can somehow reach Malia in time. Her witch magic is my only lifeline right now.
A rumble rocks Reaper’s chest, and I decide to pretend it’s to warn off some nearby creature, not that she’s expressing displeasure with my current plan because she thinks there’s no possible way I’ll live that long.
It’s not like I have any other options.
Pushing to my feet, I stretch my arms, carefully testing my mobility, relieved that all other pain is basically gone.
Sure, my back is on fire, and my feet feel like lead as I pick them up and start to walk, but I tell myself, I can push through anything. This poisoned thorn is merely a blip.
We continue through the wilderness for what feels like hours.
The darkness deepens to a depth I never imagined and it’s only with my wolf’s sight that I can discern the environment around me as the shapes of the trees, vines, and bushes blend together in the dark. Despite the small buds of green I saw earlier, the earth beneath our feet seems to become more ashen, covered in twigs and dead roots that trip me up multiple times.
Beads of sweat build on my forehead and chest, pooling at the base of my neck and my breathing becomes harsh in the quiet. At one point, Reaper presses up against me, supporting me without going so far as to carry me.
“You’re burning up.”
I have no denial. My vision is blurry and my stomach feels like an empty pit. I can’t stop the soft moan escaping my lips. I remind myself:This is just a blip. Merely a blip. I can push through this. I have to get back to my sisters and my wolves. I have to set them free.
I’m swaying what feels like minutes later, and my senses are so dulled that I don’t register Reaper’s sudden stillness until I take a step and she’s not there to support me.
She darts forward again just in time to stop me from tipping to the side.
“What’s wrong?” I ask, my voice slurring as I lean on her again.
Her response sounds far away, the glow from her violet eyes trailing across my vision like dancing lights.
“A colony of bats is following us,”she says.“They don’t usually attack unless you threaten their nest somehow or hurt their young. They’re very territorial.”
If she’s right, then I guess I must have unwittingly stumbled into the territory of the first bat I faced.
Reaper’s growls increase as she lifts her nose.“There is a foul curse in the air. Magic that hasn’t dared touch the Forbidden Lands for years—the same magic I sensed when you arrived here.”
“Let me guess,” I say. “Crone’s magic.”
Reaper’s lips draw back over her teeth and I’m glad she’s on my side.“Crone has been waiting for her chance to seize power, but she must be truly reckless if she’s forgetting who owns these lands.”
I assume Reaper is talking about herself owning the land. I consider carefully—well, as carefully as I can with my feverish thoughts—if Reaper is some sort of ruler here in the Forbidden Lands and that’s why the other creatures stay away from us. That is, theywerestaying away from us.
The screeching of a swarm of bats reaches my ears. I should have heard it sooner, but my senses seem to be as numb as my back.
I haven’t forgotten the way the bat I encountered earlier burned my skin with its acid and I’m not about to wait for that to happen again.
Striking the rune on my wrist, I unclothe myself to shift into my wolf form so I can use her teeth and her speed to defend myself. For a moment, the power of the shift fills me with renewed determination and clarity.
