I reached up to cover his hand with my own. It took a few tries to get my voice to work enough to croak out his name, but he didn’t wake. A tug on his arm elicited no reaction either, and worry set in.
I hardly had the energy to roll over and push up on my hands and knees. Sinking back on my heels, I cuppedPenny’s face in my palms and patted his cheek. “Come on, Pen, open your eyes.”
His breathing was labored, and I hoped it was the glare off the snow outside making him look so pale. He didn’t respond to me at all.
Staggering to my feet, I dragged myself to the living room to strip the pillows from the couch and gather some blankets. I didn’t have the strength to move Penny, but I could at least make him more comfortable. As an afterthought, I scooped the couple of candle stubs off the bookshelves beside the fireplace and brought those with me back into the kitchen.
By the time I had Penny propped up on the pillows and cocooned in the covers, my knees were shaking. The candlelight revealed that his skin was indeed ashen and covered in a sheen of sweat. A glance at the table confirmed only one full glass of charcoal water, which meant I hadn’t dreamt Penny taking his. It was a small bit of hope, but I seized on it.
I dropped beside him and pulled him in to rest against me. Panic made it hard to keep my own breathing steady when his head lolled onto my shoulder. He still didn’t stir.
“Please wake up,” I said, leaning my cheek against the top of his head. “I need you to be okay.” I dabbed the sweat on his face and neck with my sleeve. “I know you’re tired. I’m tired too, but I need you to give me something.”
How long had Penny tried to wakemelike this, suffering alone and afraid, before he’d passed out himself? I hadn’t expected to respond so strongly to a larger dose of hemlock, given my lengthy and gradual exposure years before. I’d anticipated the nausea, but not the intensity of it. I certainly hadn’t given any serious thought to the specifics of my own reaction. My mind hadbeen too occupied with concern over Penny to worry for myself.
But the longer I sat, the more memories filtered in from after Klaus left. Hunched over the sink while my insides tore themselves apart, it had occurred to me that I could die here. Despite the fear flooding my mind, I’d still had the capacity to wonder how Penny would finish the Oaths and face Merrick without me. I’d worried what it would do to him to watch me die, and if he succumbed to the poison too, that he’d take his last breaths alone.
Tears pricked my eyes, and I held him as tightly as I dared. The worst was over for me, but Penny was still in the throes of it. There had to be something I could do.
Nora had prescribed rest and fluids. I had no way to flush his system myself, but if anyone could help, it would be Harlan. Not that he’d willingly assist. And the thought of leaving Penny alone in his condition while I trudged through knee-deep snow in the middle of the night to fetch the grudging herbalist was not an appealing one. So, rest would have to do.
I tucked him tighter into my side and pressed my face in his hair, seeking the comfort I always found in him and wishing his arms would loop around my waist in response. But he remained deathly still.
I drifted in and out of fitful sleep, only rousing fully when Penny went rigid in my arms. I barely had time to mumble his name before he jerked so violently that his head collided with my chin, clacking my teeth together and sparking pain up to my temples. His body bucked, and it was all I could do to lock my arms around him to keep him from crashing into the cabinets.
“Pen, it’s me,” I said, trying to hold him still. “You’re safe.”
But as he thrashed, arms and legs flailing, it became clear that this was no nightmare. His breathing was shallow and erratic until his head tipped back and he made a choking sound.
I couldn’t move fast enough to lay him on the floor. As soon as I had him rolled onto his side, his head cushioned by a pile of pillows, he gasped in a handful of labored breaths. The convulsions continued, and there was nothing I could do but sit by and ensure his head stayed off the hard wood floor.
I had never felt so helpless. So useless.
I promised him I wouldn’t let anything happen to him. If I’d been faster and prevented him from drinking the hemlock, if I’d put a stop to this before it got so out of hand, we could have been far away from here by now. He would have been safe.
It felt like an eternity before he stilled, and his breaths evened out to faint wheezes. My face was streaked with tears and sweat, and my eyes burned as I crept in close to brush the hair off his face.
“Please wake up, sweetheart,” I croaked, sinking down beside him to press my forehead against his. “Wake up.”
There was no sign that he heard me.
The thought of leaving him was even more unfathomable after what I’d just watched, but I had no choice. He needed help, and I couldn’t offer it myself.
“I will do whatever I have to do to make sure you’re okay,” I whispered, cupping his face in my hands and kissing his forehead. “I can’t do this alone. I can’t lose you.”
There were a hundred other things I wanted to tell him, but there wasn’t time. I pulled away, making sure he was as comfortable as possible before using the countertop to pull myself onto unsteady feet. The walk to the apothecarywould require a feat of will, but the blizzard raging outside the window was a small spot of luck. The blowing snow would cover my tracks and wipe away any evidence that I’d sought out my father’s old friend a second time. Not that it would make the trip there and back any easier.
“I’ll be back soon.”
I started toward the hall on legs that felt as wobbly as a newborn calf’s. When my eyes caught on the two glasses on the table, the full one black and murky like it was filled with mud, I doubled back to dump the charcoal down the drain and rinse away the evidence of what we’d done. Harlan didn’t need to know that I’d already taken steps to try to save Penny, or that they hadn’t worked.
I was already panting when I shrugged into my heavy wool cloak. Out of habit, I strapped my Penny-menacing knife onto my belt before stepping into my boots. After flipping up my hood and pulling the edges of the cloak around myself, I pushed out into the whipping snow.
The wind stung my cheeks, and a chill crept over my sweat-damp skin as I forged through the ever-deepening drifts. There were no lanterns lit along the road, so I dragged myself between their posts by the brightness of the snow to keep myself from straying off course. It would be too easy to get lost in the near whiteout conditions and freeze to death. And I’d be damned if I survived hemlock to die from the cold.
By the time I arrived at the apothecary, exhaustion made my eyelids heavy enough that I could have fallen asleep standing upright. I braced against the door and used what little strength I had left to pound on it. Unconsciousness threatened as each blink grew longer until finally the door swung open, and I staggered into a verystartled Harlan.
“What in Eeus’s name?—”
