Ryatt is off to the side, holding his hands up the moment he hears the growl tear from my throat. “What happened?” I demand.
“No idea. I was just watching over her like you said, and all of a sudden, she started leaking gold all over the place, and I still couldn’t get her to wake up.”
I’m at her side in a second, eyes skating over her figure.
“Auren.” My call to her whips through me, but she doesn’t wake. “Auren, can you hear me?” Gold continues to drip from her, just as calm as her expression.
The bed is losing the battle to its slow but constant rise, as the metallic liquid begins to spill over and drip onto the floor. It doesn’t gild anything, just puddles there like water from a leaky roof. My hands hover over her as I call her name again and again.
“You cannot touch her, Sire,” Hojat says from the doorway, not daring to come in any further. It seems even my unflappable army mender knows to fear her magic.
“Fuck.”
The fact that I can’t touch her makes frustration needle through me.
Turning, I rush to the door, and Hojat jumps out of the way as I dart down the hall. I hit the first bedroom next to mine—Ryatt’s—stripping his bed of every blanket before I come running back to Auren’s side.
“What are you doing?” Ryatt asks.
“I have to get her out—get here away from here in case she starts gilding the whole fucking village,” I tell him as I dump the blankets onto the floor before draping the two thickest ones over my arms. Even with my gloves on, this is risky, but the gold doesn’t seem to be doing anything other than staying in its collected pond. It’s not turning anything solid, it’s not gilding the fabric on the bed. Instead, it’s just pooling out of her and keeping her buoyed.
But at any moment, that could change. It could start moving, rushing, attacking.
“Ryatt,” I bark out, and in an instant, he’s at my side.
“Got it,” he says with a grim nod, and as if he’s read my mind, he grabs a blanket and lets it drape along his arms the same as me. “Ready?” he asks.
As soon as I give him a nod, he goes to Auren’s side.
“Even with your gloves and sleeves, you need to be careful,” I caution. “I don’t know if the gold is going to do anything.”
With complete confidence, he carefully rolls her body, keeping the blanket as a layer between them. As soon as he moves her, the pooling liquid begins to cascade down the side of the bed.
“Watch it!” Digby calls from the doorway, rushing over with another blanket to toss over the liquid spilling on the ground.
Ryatt doesn’t get deterred, even when the viscid substance splatters on his boots. He’s able to turn her enough so that her body is out of the deepest parts of the pooled gold, and as soon as he does, I swoop in. Using the covering of the layered blankets, I gather Auren into my arms, though some of the gold seems like it tries to stick to her inert body like honey on a stick, not wanting to part with her.
“Sire—” Hojat’s worried voice cuts off when Digby starts to drape another blanket over Auren for good measure, until all that’s visible is her face, beaded in gold perspiration.
Wasting no time for the gold to react to me taking her, I rush out of the bedroom and down the hall, while Digby limps as he tries to keep up with me. “Where are you going to go?”
“As far away as I can.” When I make it to the front door, Hojat is already there, yanking it open for me.
“What do you want us to do?” Ryatt calls behind me.
“Keep an eye on that gold. If it starts to spread, get the fuck out of the Grotto and evacuate the villagers,” I call back. “It won’t be safe if she can’t pull it back.”
“It won’t be safe for you either,” he says back, but I don’t have time to reply. I rush out of the house, and I hear the door closing behind me.
Hurrying, I race out into the storm, debating for a split second which direction to go, before I turn to the right. This time though, I don’t go to the Perch. With gold already starting to soak into the blankets, I can’t risk bringing her on top of Argo. Not only could her gold suddenly lash out at him, but the worst place to be when it happens is up in the sky where a fall could kill us all.
“Auren, wake up,” I tell her.
Dusk is clutching the sky as securely as I’m clutching her. I’m trying my best to keep her tucked securely against my chest, taking the brunt of the wind and the snow as I carry her. A new line of gilded perspiration smears her brows, and panic crawls up my throat. “Listen to my voice. You have to listen to me and wake up.”