“Oh, darling, you are freezing.” She gestured to Solas to grab a blanket from one of the tents. I could only focus on my breath misting in front of my face like it did in the depths of winter at Stonebriar. My muscles were rigid as I tried to take a step. A light-headedness swept over my body, threatening to pull me back to the ground.
“I think…” I stopped and cleared my tender throat that felt like I had been screaming for hours. “I need to lay down,” I finished weakly.
“Of course. I will make you some tea for the pain before I heal your arm,” Cerilla said.
Solas wrapped a warm blanket around my shivering form. I took a step and faltered, my legs quivering relentlessly. Solas caught me before I could fall and I glared at his hand steading my arm.
“Easy now,” he said with a weary smile.
It must have been the near-death exhaustion, but I decided to lean on his arm. Trusting him, just this once, to help me. He took my shift in weight as permission and gently swooped one arm under my knees and gathered me against his chest. “Breathe,” he said soothingly as he carried me to my tent.
Cerilla paced behind him, eyeing me as if I were going to disappear. I groaned as Solas laid me down on the bedroll.
“You are strong, Lyra. No one survives the Commander’s shadows and lives.”
I couldn’t answer, too busy dragging air in and out of my frigid lungs through clenched teeth. Cerilla knelt beside me, pressing a small steaming cup into my uninjured hand.
“Drink,” she instructed gently. “Slowly.”
Solas helped me sit up, and I brought the cup to my mouth. The herbal liquid burned going down, not unpleasantly, but with purpose. Heat bloomed through my chest, dulling the jagged edge of the pain. My shaking eased by degrees, breath coming a little steadier.
“Good,” Cerilla murmured. “Now, this will hurt.”
She settled beside me, her hands hovering just above the bone protruding through my forearm. Small wisps of darkness slithered from her fingers, humming softly as it spread throughmy arm.
Pain flared, sharp and blinding. I cried out, fingers curling uselessly as white-hot agony lanced through me.
Solas held my other hand, squeezing reassuringly.
“Almost,” Cerilla soothed, voice firm but kind. “Stay with me.”
Her magic pressed deeper, deliberate and precise. I sobbed, gripping onto Solas’s hand as if he could pull me away from the pain. My bones cracked, sliding back into place with a sickening sensation that made my stomach churn. The pain ebbed slowly, replaced by a deep, aching throb.
Cerilla exhaled and leaned back, the glow fading from her hands.
“There,” she said softly. “It will be tender for a few days, but it is set.”
She wrapped my arm carefully, movements practiced and reverent, before brushing damp hair from my face.
“You should rest,” she added, eyes searching mine. “You’ve been through more than most survive.”
But I was drifting. The tea weighed warm and heavy in my stomach, warping my sense of reality as they both left.
The silence was so thick I could almost hear the soft crackle of the fire.
I had nearly died. But, for a moment I had controlled the Commander of Death. Pride filled my chest like a brief flicker of a candle before being snuffed out by pure exhaustion.
I drifted off, falling into the depths of sleep.
Twenty-One
Monsters
Asharpclickshattered the silence outside my tent. Every hair on my arms rose. Anotherclick…closer this time. My eyes shot open. A shadow swept across the canvas. I sat up, clutching the blanket to my chest and staring at the canvas wall.
I let out an unsteady breath, squinting in the dark. An outline loomed over my tent. Tall, thin spider-like legs jerked at unnatural angles as it moved.
The sound came again, faster. A high-pitched sound that sent my nerves on edge. It was so close, nothing more than a thin piece of material separated me from Gods knew what.
