He stumbled back, letting go of Gus as he stared at his hand like it belonged to someone else.Black spots spread from everywhere that had come into contact with the skin around her throat.It climbed up his wrist to his forearm as he struggled to keep his balance.
“How did you—?”Ryan demanded, his breath coming in short bursts.
Unable to hold him any longer, his knees gave out.Ryan fell.He caught himself with his arms briefly before they too lost strength.He ended up face down before somehow managing to roll onto his back.
Gus moved closer.Until the tips of her shoes brushed the edge of his clothes.
His gaze found hers, a demand in it.
“You and the others weren’t the only ones to receive gifts from the masters,” Gus informed him with a detachment that hid how sick she felt inside.
For all that she’d been the master’s favored pet, she hadn’t escaped their tender mercies.If anything, she was subjected to more horrors because of it.Fed a daily dose of poison to see how much she could take.
It turned out she could take quite a bit.
The result was immunity from most toxins in the known universe.A side effect of those experiments was that now Gus could secrete every poison she’d tasted from her skin.
A bitter smile touched Gus’s lips as Ryan lost consciousness.“I got some too.”
Watching Ryan struggle to breathe, Gus felt oddly numb.
Interesting.
She hadn’t realized this particular poison would be quite so fast acting.
For a moment, she considered letting Ryan die.After what he’d just tried, he kind of deserved it.
But no, that wouldn’t work.His faction was too powerful.They’d try to avenge him.
She could kill some but probably not all.As soon as they learned about her poison, they’d be sure to keep their distance and strike from afar.
She’d be forced to flee.There were already so many people she was running from.She had no desire to add to their number.
Ryan had to survive.
With an internal sigh, Gus crouched, popping an antidote that was similar to the one she’d given Anandra what felt like eons ago into his mouth.It dissolved on contact with liquid.He’d absorb it through his tongue and gums and be fine.
It did put Gus on something of a time crunch, however.
With that in mind, she rose.She needed to move quickly or she’d lose this opportunity.
Letting herself back inside her office, she headed straight for a shelf across the room.It was unorganized and full of clutter.As such, it took a moment of rifling to find what she was looking for.
Finally, she pulled a set of cuffs out from beneath a couple of precious gems and meteorites filled with rare metals that she kept on hand as a sort of slush fund.The cuffs themselves were made ofseikistone.One of the few known minerals capable of blocking a Tuann’ski.Gus had picked them up from a black market Tuann auction as an impulse buy.
Past Gus must have had amazing foresight because these things might just give her a chance.
Cradling the cuffs, she hurried back to Ryan’s side to put them on him.Once that was done and hiskiwas firmly suppressed, Gus stood back to admire her handiwork.
Much as she hated to say it, she doubted the cuffs would be enough to restrain him long enough for her to say what needed to be said.She needed to incapacitate him somehow.Otherwise, he could just overpower her with his bare hands.
Gus concentrated, staring at the floor around Ryan.
Carefully, she sent tendrils of her soul’s breath into the tree.The Lord of Titan responded to her request, tiny shoots sprouting from beneath the moss.They grew at an exponential rate, crawling over Ryan’s body to wrap around his torso and limbs until they covered every inch from his neck down.
Sweat beaded on Gus’s brow as she fed the tree more of her soul’s essence.
The sprouts thickened, becoming young trunks strong enough to hold someone of Ryan’s caliber.
