He sat again. “A weed to some. A potent toxin to others. Few with good intentions grow it. If you brush against it with exposed skin, it’ll make you sleepy. If you drink enough of it,and it’s basically flavorless, it will kill you. It slowly builds in your body until it brings your heart to a stop.”
“Even one of the fae who heals quickly?” Reyla’s gaze sought mine, and I read stark terror there.
“Even the fae,” he said. “My assumption is that some is growing in the courtyard, and you accidentally brushed against it. Did you go outside yesterday?”
That’s right, it was the next day already. Despite all I had to do, I needed more than a short nap if I hoped to stay awake while I went after my court’s core.
“Iwasin the courtyard,” Reyla said slowly. “The gardens are gorgeous. I picked some flowers for my room. Kinart . . .” She struggled to swallow; her eyes shimmering. “He used to give me flowers, and they made me smile.”
Something she hadn’t done often since he died, but who could blame her?
“I’m sure that’s what happened then,” Zayde said. “I’ll look for it tomorrow and burn it. In between then, get rid of the flowers because I bet there’s willwort among them. Their blossom is bright pink.”
“I did pick pink flowers.” Reyla covered her mouth, stifling another yawn, and leaned back in her chair, her eyelids sliding closed.
“Is there an antidote or a spell that’ll diffuse the toxin?” I asked.
“Yes, but we’ll wait to see if it dissipates on its own, which it will quickly do if she’s no longer exposed to the toxin. The spell is quite complex.”
“Anything else?” I asked, and he shook his head. “Alright,then.” I rose from the sofa. “I need to go lay down.” I nodded Reyla’s way. “You too. I’ll flit you to your room.”
She sighed and got to her feet. “If you say so.”
I walked over to her and held her face again, studying her eyes and her color.
Was this due to willwort?
Or was something else going on with my friend?
43
VEXXION
Iflitted to the other side of the room only to have the beast roar from directly behind me. Again, I flitted, jerking myself around the cavern in a macabre dance. The creature must sense where I’d go next because it always waited.
My lungs burned, and my heartbeat stormed in my ears. The beast's eyes locked onto mine, its pupils narrow slits of hot malice. Its low growl reverberated through me, freezing my instinct to run. My legs felt anchored by an unseen force, and the smell of damp fur mixed with rotting soil churned through my sinuses. Each ragged breath I took in tasted like sweat-soaked fear. It clawed up my throat. There was nowhere to go and no way out. I had to reach my court’s core, but I knew the instant I turned my back on the beast, it would attack.
Its muscles coiled, and its spiked tail whipped behind it, smacking against the wall. Time splintered into fragmentsaround me—each beat of my heart stretching thin enough to hold a lifetime of terror.
The beast lunged, and time froze. My breath snagged in my chest, and my muscles locked in dread unlike anything I’d felt since I hung against the dungeon wall, watching Ivenrail gleefully carve my mother to death. My thoughts raced as I thrashed through every possible escape.
Paralysis turned my bones to stone. I couldn't break through the waves of fear bombarding my body. Whatever future I might’ve wished for, one filled with laughter and a love I could almost taste but not quite grasp, vanished. Only the present existed, crashing over me like a wave I couldn’t fight or flee from—pinning me to this moment with vicious glee.
I tightened my body and lifted my head as the beast slithered closer, its putrid breath coating my face and the wickedness in its eyes reaching inside me to latch onto my soul and wring it of all that was good and true. As it sunk deeper, it battered me in relentless waves fueled by the fear surging within me.
This would not,couldnot be my end.
I would not permit it.
Yet there was no escape. If I was going to claim my court’s core, I had to do it this moment.
No running. No hiding.
Like everything life had slammed my way, I would face this with my spine stiff and my resolve unwavering.
Power roared up my throat, slamming through my veins at a pace faster than the blink of an eye. It surged to my fingers and toes, cauterizing as it flowed.
I latched onto it like the reins connecting me to a herd of wild creatures who surged and bucked in front of me. Sweat drenched my grip, the reins almost slipping. My heart pounded, a furious drum, and instinct screamed at me to let go, to let this herd,this beast, this cavern of my court’s core win.
