Wynter’s face suddenly turned white as she stared at Viri in dawning horror, her quick brain putting the pieces together. Slowly, as if afraid to give voice to what she’d just realized, she said, “If you’ve known Ashton that long, then you must know how and when he became the Priest’s right hand.”
A reluctant nod from Viri.
“That means…” Wynter said. “That means…” Her throat bobbed, but she forced herself to ask the question Viri had beendreading for seven years—her greatest secret, her most devastating truth. “You know who the Reaper Priest is, don’t you?”
Viri couldn’t resist looking back at Reeve, finding his silver gaze unexpectedly soft, full of compassion. She closed her eyes, unable to bear the sight of him looking at her like that as she answered her best friend, her voice little more than a breath.
“His name is Braedan Solace.” A tremulous pause. “He’s mybrother.”
16
For a moment, there was nothing but silence in the laboratory. But then—
“The Reaper Priest is yourbrother?” Wynter shrieked. “I didn’t even know youhada brother! How—Why—What—I don’t understand!”
“How about we cure Reeve andthenhave question time,” Sage suggested tightly, gesturing to the vial clutched in Wynter’s white-knuckled grip. “It’s a miracle he’s still alive with how chatty you lot are.”
“I can wait a bit longer,” Reeve said, watching Viri carefully, his eyes still full of compassion. But it was clear he was in a great deal of pain, too, the color leaching from his face as the zingzest left his system. It wouldn’t be long before he lost consciousness again, and this time…he might not wake up.
“Sage is right.” Viri held her hand out to Wynter. “I’ll answer anything you want in a minute. Just tell me how to help him first.”
Wynter’s mouth opened and closed like a fish as she stared between Viri and Reeve, shock still splashed across her features,but she pulled herself together and handed over the pink vial. “Thirteen years should be more than enough.”
“I haven’t seen him for the last seven,” Viri said. “Will that matter?”
Wynter stared between them again, likely calculating what that meant in the timeline of Viri’s life, her eyes widening with realization. But she only said, “No. Magic isn’t fickle like that. It’ll still count as thirteen years.”
Viri turned the vial between her fingers. “Do I just shove it down his throat, like the zingzest?”
“I vote we come up with an alternative word to ‘shove,’ ” Reeve murmured, groaning as he leaned back against the couch, unable to keep holding his body upright without support.
“He can swallow it himself this time,” Wynter said. “You just need to be touching him while he does it.” Seeing Viri’s expression, she quickly added, “Holding hands is fine. Anything skin to skin.”
“Ahh, of course,” Jonas said gleefully as he skimmed Wynter’s notes. “Essence transconveyance.”
“Essence what?” Sage asked, squinting at her friend.
Wynter looked at Viri and explained, “When Ashton takes the cure, the poison will be forced to leave his body, and it’s going to do that through his connection to you. The magic demands a cost, and you’ll be the one paying it.”
“No, we’re not doing that,” Reeve said, his words stronger than any he’d uttered since being stabbed. “Come up with something else.”
“Easy, Ashton,” Wynter said, waving him down when he tried unsuccessfully to stand. “She wasn’t stabbed by the grimblade,so the poison itself won’t infect her. She’ll only feel the metaphysical essence of it, a fraction of what you’re experiencing, and for barely a second. Think of her like a wayportal—a one-way transit point. The cure sends the poison from your body into the ‘portal,’ and your connection to her pushes it out the other side, never to return. Understand?” When she received blank looks from everyone but Jonas, she threw her hands in the air and pointed to her runic book. “Fine, you don’t need to understand. Just do it because the instructions say so, all right?”
Not thrilled by being referred to as a human wayportal, Viri decided the best thing to do was to get it over with, and she moved back to Reeve’s side, passing him the vial and holding her hand out to him.
“You, uh, might want to sit down,” Wynter warned.
Viri looked back at her friend. “I thought you said I’d barely feel it?”
“I did.” Wynter shifted uneasily beside her workbench. “But, you know, just in case.”
Sighing, Viri lowered herself beside Reeve again, then held out her hand once more.
He didn’t take it.
“Go on,” she urged, and when he still refused, she rolled her eyes at the concern she saw in his expression and grabbed his hand herself. “Swallow the cure, or I’ll make you.”
His voice was quiet, just for her, as he said, “I don’t want to hurt you.”
