He took it, but didn’t drink. He just recorked it and set it on the ground next to her belt, fixing her with a stern look. “What did you hope to—”
His last few words she couldn't quite make out. She blinked at him for a moment. He sighed and switched to Chymesian. “What did you hope to accomplish with your reckless actions?”
“I'm just a simple human princess utterly enamored with pretty flowers.” She looked up at him through her eyelashes, trying to look as empty-headed and harmless as the most famous damsels in legend. “Please don't hold my nature against me.”
He scowled. “Your false innocence is as sheer as gauze.”
“I have no idea what you're referring to.”
He sighed. “If you will cooperate and accept this, everything will be much easier for you. I wish you no ill. That's not why you're here.”
Had they come looking for her specifically to take her as a hostage and not simply gotten lucky because of her foolishness? Had they been coming to kidnap her from the academy, and Callahan and Emerson had been hurrying to come protect her? But…
“Why? As in, why me? What are you hoping to get out of this?”
His eyes widened and then he shifted back. “What more would I need than to secure peace between our people?”
He was hiding something. But then he picked up the waterskin and she no longer cared about his secrets. He took a sip before setting it to the side and picking up her belt. It took all of Hellebore’s willpower to maintain her façade and bury the grin trying to crawl onto her face. She couldn’t give it away. She just had to be patient. He started fiddling with the pouches despite her glaring at him. “You carry quite a... an arsenal, you might call it?”
“I am an alchemist. Does that surprise you?”
“But no supplies? How far did you expect to get?”
His Chymesian was about as good as her Iubian was, given she had no clue what he was trying to get at.
“Look, all I wanted was the iris. If I'd known it would be this big of a deal, I wouldn't have gone after it. I thought it was just a flower that you all have plenty of. I wasn't trying to run off with an elf.”
“Yet, I am running off with you.” His lips twitched up, but his eyes were starting to flutter as her sedative kicked in. He blinked, trying to focus his gaze on her. “What concerns me is how you used my injured guard to steal our magic even though such practices are long forgotten by your people in the name of peace. If any alchemist can cut an elf and use us—”
“I'm not just any alchemist, and I was simply trying to get away. I made an educated guess about the required modifications to a formula already on my glove that would assist me in escaping, and I was correct. I wasn't trying to turn her into an experiment.”
“You are Palladia's...” His voice dropped to a murmur, trailing off into a cough.
Did he know her aunt personally? Or just by reputation?
He tried to clear his throat and then opened one of the pouches to reveal nothing inside. His brow furrowed, and he started to look at her. She couldn’t hold back her grin anymore as he slumped over while the sedative took control.
She whispered, “Sweet dreams.”
A shout went up from one of the elves on guard duty, but Hellebore had already ripped her belt out of his hands. “I'll be taking this with me, thank you!”
She slung it on as she reached into another pouch when a hand encircled her ankle. She looked down to see the captain's face screwed up. He was choking on his breath while trying to keep her in place.
She froze.
What she'd transmuted into the water from her belt was meant to put him to a peaceful sleep. It wasn't supposed to cause any damage. He was choking and gasping, and it was clear as his face turned red this was not something he would likely survive.
She could easily rip her ankle out of his weakening grip, but…
She might not want to be a hostage, but killing a Sun Elf in her escape wasn't going to do her people any favors. The elves were shouting, but she dropped to the ground and quickly wrote a new formula in the dirt and pushed her power into it. She put her other hand over the captain and began separating the sedative in him from the water in his stomach. Once she had the sedative completely separated, she pushed it up and drew it out.
He jolted, turning on his side and with a wretched noise, he emptied himself of the apparently fatal sedative.
His breathing cleared right as two elves grabbed her by her arms and hauled her up, ripping her through the air and away from the captain.
The captain lay on the ground as another elf rushed up to his side, possibly a healer, but the captain’s gaze was on Helleboreas she was dragged away until his eyes fluttered shut. Her arms were bound behind her again, her chance of escape gone, and she was thrown back into the carriage.
As she lay on her back, bruises forming on her shoulders and legs from the way she'd been thrown in, and from one of the guards being extremely rough with her, she stared at the ceiling.
