When the silence finally settled around her and within her, she reached for her Talent.
It resisted.
Erinna pulled harder.
A low shudder ran through her body, like some untamed beast had finally come to heel. Temporarily.
Talent hummed to life beneath her skin. Sweat beaded her brow from effort as she pushed her Talent out over the earth.
Searching.
Listening.
She was met with unnerving silence before her Talent faded. Maybe she was doing it wrong. Erinna wasn’t well-versed in Talents, and from what she could gather, an aberrant Talent was different from the rest.
Something not as tangible. Harder to study. Harder to control. All she had was instinct. There was no mentor to help her. It was foolish to think she’d be able to do this all on her own.
Erinna shook the thoughts from her head. She knew better than to give up after one attempt. She silenced her mind once more, called on her Talent, and searched again for any threads of arcanum to control. For a few long arduous moments, she sat unmoving on the damp earth.
Her hands clenched into fists in her lap, jaw locked in steely willpower.
“Answer me,” she commanded. “I know you’re there.”
Ice crept into her veins, and for one hopeful second, she could feel something stir around her. Power filled her body. She found it. A faint thread of magic that tied her to something in the Realm Beyond. She grabbed it with her Talent, giving it a soft tug.
“You came back.”
The words rattled Erinna to the core. Invisible tendrils wrapped around her throat.
No, she panicked, opening her mouth to scream, but the hold was so tight it silenced the air in her lungs. She pulled too hard, reached too deep. Caught a nightmare instead.
Erinna blinked, and the cemetery was replaced by a world of eternal midnight. Large, inky evergreens reached toward a sky full of stars. There she was. The Weeping Queen. She was nearly within arm’s reach of Erinna, bony arms reached out until?—
A bosun’s whistle pierced the air. Erinna was back, standing among silent graves. Shivering in fear and relief. She pressed a hand against her chest to calm her rapidly beating heart. It wasn’t real. She was awake, where the Weeping Queen couldn’t reach her. Erinna would need more tea and made a note to use more leaves in her brew come night.
She stared at her hands, the numbness receding as her Talent went back to rest. Maybe it was also the tea that was dulling her ability to reach it. Erinna slumped in on herself. It was stupid to think any of this was going to be easy.
Another screeching whistle. A reminder for the crew to take their stations. Erinna shook her head and heeded the call. She needed to be busy, to distract herself from whatever lurked within her.
Brax would be expecting her soon, and she still had a stubborn witchstone to work with. She grabbed her bag and slung it over her shoulder, making her way to the ship to begin a day’s worth of manual labor.
Erinna wipedthe sweat from her brow and plopped onto the deck. Her body was getting used to the work, but that didn’t make it any less tiring. The stone rolled in front of her, hitting the tip of her boot with a mocking thud. She lost count of how many times she tried to get the stone to take.
People scurried about the ship, making sure it was as prepared as possible should they need to leave in a hurry. That only made Erinna worry more. What would happen if they all failed? If Haru and the academy made it to the island before she completed her project. Before they made it into the library. Where would she go?
Her attention drifted back to the small, covered boat attached to the side of theHellish Rebuke. She would take it if she had to. Use force if necessary. It wouldn’t survive Talon Bay, but she could take the northeast passage. The safest route in and out of Fort Solitude. It would add a few days, but at least she had a chance at making it back alive. It was likely the route the academy would take as well.
“Maybe I can give you a hand with that,” offered a gruff voice from behind her.
Brax stood behind her, blocking the light of the sun with his hands on his hips. The grizzled man scanned her handiwork with an approving nod.
Erinna stood and patted wood shavings off her legs. “I’ll take all the help I can get.” Of all the pirates, Brax was the only one she trusted not to fuck it up completely.
She placed the stone back into the wood. The edges of the hole morphed around the witchstone, responding to its power,holding it in place. But there were still areas where the wood refused the stone. For it to work properly, the stone needed to blend with the material—to willingly accept its new home. If not, using it would be clunky at best on a vessel this size.
“It looks good.” Brax leaned in to inspect the small stone and lightly tapped it with his index finger. The compliment was sincere, but Erinna couldn’t accept it, not over her growing disappointment with each passing day that ended in failure.
She didn’t care whether Kane’s ship could even sail; it was the bruised pride that stung. That and the objective truth that if she couldn’t hold her end of the bargain, she would be forfeiting whatever information Kane could spare.
