His hands caught me again, strong and immediate, pulling me upright before I could slip under the water.
“I said rinse,” he snapped, already annoyed. “Not fucking—get fancy.”
“Cleaning my hair is hardly fancy,” I shot back, breath uneven.
He ignored that.
I leaned back slightly, just enough to keep my balance, the water moving softly around me as the cold continued to press into my skin. My body still felt wrong, heavy and light at the same time, like I was only partially inside it.
“Eravic said there was a healer on the boat,” I said, watching him.
He exhaled through his nose, the sound controlled but edged. “A lot has changed.”
“What—”
“The wards at Gyarin failed,” he said, cutting in before I could finish. “The undead broke through.”
I went still, the cold water pressing against my skin as the meaning worked its way through the fog in my head.
“Eravic’s sister lives along that coast,” he continued. “A ship reached us at first light. They took him, his men, and Junis.”
“What?” The word came out sharper than I intended. “They just left?”
“They didn’t have time to say goodbye.”
There was something final in the way he said it that made arguing pointless.
“They took the healer with them,” he added. “They’ll need him.”
I stared at him. “So there is no healer.”
“No.”
He hesitated. “This ship was cloaked and warded, invisible to the undead and most others. It still is, but with Vaelor gone both protections will begin to fade. And with Gyarin nearby, more undead have likely been created.”
So we were in danger.
The cold had dulled the fever enough that I could think, but not enough to feel steady. “Where is Nyara?”
“Below deck.”
“Where?" I pressed.
“Below you. Safer than you." His voice was laced with irritation.
“What does that mean?”
He exhaled, already losing patience. “There’s an escape boat beneath the lower deck. It’s stocked and ready.”
“I still don’t understand.”
“The undead are drawn to power,” he said. “They feel it. Track it.”
I frowned. “Power?”
“The same thing that lets us do anything beyond being ordinary,” he said. “What you have. What I have. What most of the people above deck have.”
“Nyara doesn’t,” he added.
