Taking a single step forward, I flinched back when the bodies of the dead closed ranks in front of me and kept me locked away. I fumbled for the golden threads trailing off him, but they refused to respond to my touch, or to slide around my skin and do as I commanded.
“I guess we know Caldris meant it this time,” Fallon said, forcing an uncomfortable smile to her face. I grimaced, looking back toward the boundary where the Veil had once shimmered, and to the man who stood there as if he had any right to still be breathing. The Guards at Lord Byron’s side wheeled a woman toward the boundary, her brown hair plastered to her head as rain pelted down on them. Her chair bumped over the uneven surface of the ground, jarring her from side to side as she fought to hold on to the armrests in the crude chair he’d had crafted for her as a favor to me after my father’s death.
“That’s my mother,” I told Fallon, ignoring her touch as she reached down to take my hand in hers. Between my mother and I, a battle raged. The sounds of death and fighting wrought the air, and the tang of blood filled my nostrils.
Fallon hurried out of the cart, gripping my forearm tightly. Her nails dug into the bare skin there as she peered toward the witches gathered at the edge of the Veil, and she realized who they had taken with them. Caldris, the Wild Hunt, Imelda: all of them were fighting except for the small group of the dead left behind to guard the group of us.
There was no one around to summon to my side. No one I could shout to without risking their life as they battled with the Mist Guard. The Guard that Brann had stabbed that day in the woods hadn’t been unique. There were dozens of them fighting in the gardens, larger than life and almost inhuman in the way they functioned.
“You can’t,” Fallon said, shaking her head from side to side with an urgent warning. I gritted my teeth as I turned back to the Guards who wheeled my mother’s chair up to the Veil, where the witches waited beside Lord Byron. Caldris was too busy with his fight, splitting his power between controlling the dead who guarded us and fighting four of the unnaturally large guards who shouldn’t have existed.
“I have to. I’m sorry,” I said, darting forward suddenly. I slid in the mud, dropping onto my ass and pushing through the spread leg bones of a skeleton. Its head spun in a full circle on the vertebrae of its neck, those hollow, empty eye-sockets following me as I jumped to my feet on the other side and ran forward.
Caldris spun quickly, as if he felt the moment I broke free from the circle of protection he’d created. I focused my attention on my mother, ignoring the heavy weight of his stare as he cut down the man he fought with.
The tinge of iron coated the air, the weaponry of the Mist Guard making the hair raise on my arms. If I was so affected by the proximity of it, it was no wonder why Caldris seemed subdued from his usual overpowering presence. The threads around me felt hazy, as if my fingers might slip through them should I try to reach out and grasp at them.
I bent down as I ran, grabbing a sword from one of the fallen corpses. My skin sizzled against the iron, burning my flesh. “Estrella!” Caelum growled, the warning of his deep voice sinking inside me.
I shook my head, warding off the thoughts that plagued me. The instinct to turn back to the safety of the circle of the dead, a command that pulsed down the bond between us.
I severed the thought, picturing my bedroom window slamming shut in his face. I glanced over to watch as he stumbled back as if he’d been struck, nearly taking a sword to the chest. He turned at the last moment, narrowly avoiding the blow as the iron blade cut through the flesh of his arm. Blood flowed freely from the wound, spraying into the air and mixing with the rain pelting down around us.
Closing myself off from the stabbing wound of guilt that threatened to consume me, I strode forward toward the edge of the Veil. I ignored the burning of my palm, and the way that I didn’t think I’d be able to remove my hand from the sword intact. My skin melted against the iron in a way that would peel the flesh from my bones when I tried to let it go. The growl of the wolves and hounds sounded behind me, mixing with the sounds of the battle. I knew Fenrir had to be occupied for him to not come to my side, and my heart throbbed with the realization that I’d left Fallon behind. I didn’t know if she had any ability to defend herself, but I couldn’t turn back to find out.
Something slithered along through the grass beneath my feet as I forced myself to move forward with steady steps. The ebony lines of serpents traveling through the snow emerged from the woods behind me to follow as I walked, and I swallowed back the impending sense of doom I felt with every pace that brought me closer to the boundary between Nothrek and Alfheimr.
The magic of Mab coursed through my veins.
I approached the witches, ignoring my mother’s wide-eyed stare as she twisted the best she could to look at me over her shoulder. One of the witches stepped forward, deep blue hair hanging down to her waist in loose waves. Her hand glowed with a blue swirl of magic, a ripple of energy radiating from her as she narrowed her glowing sea green stare on me.
She flung the magic at me, a leading wave of sea water tearing through the air between us as I thrust the sword in my hand up to block the attack. It struck the iron of the blade, making it vibrate in my grip painfully, but the magic broke, the wave bursting into droplets of water that parted around me and further soaked the ground.
I glared at her from behind my iron blade, wishing I didn’t have to choose between the power in my Viniculum and the comfort of a weapon in my hand. The snakes slithered forward, closing the distance between the sea witch and I. She screamed as they approached and wrapped around her ankles, pulling her down to the ground along with them.
I dropped the tip of the sword to the ground beside me as I watched in horror, the twisting, writhing shapes of their mass covering her as she struggled. Pinning her arms to her sides, they encased her in a tomb of serpents and squeezed.
Her eyes bulged in her face, the sea green light of them fading slowly as she fought for breath.
My sword moved at my side, one of the midsize serpents winding around the blade itself until the scales of its face touched the tips of my fingers. A forked tongue slithered out of its mouth, licking my hand and the blood that dripped free from my melted skin. It wound around my hand, up over my wrist and twirled its body around my forearm and bicep.
Finally, it draped the heavy weight of its body over my shoulders, its face pressed against my cheek. I swallowed back the surge of fear, closing my eyes as the sea-witch died and breathing in the comfort of the presence of the snake resting on me.
Its tail wound around my sword arm, thrumming as one of the others sank its fangs into the sea witch’s corpse. As if it had devoured her soul itself, it transferred her life energy through them and into me. The skin of my hand healed enough that I was able to pry my fingers free, burning red flesh sticking to the hilt of the blade as new skin formed to cover my bones. The snake wound its tail around the hilt, wrapping it in its entirety and giving me something to grip that wasn’t poisonous.
At least not to me.
His scaled flesh formed a barrier for me to grip onto as I hefted the heavy blade once more and strode forward. I passed by Holt on my way, striding right by him and the Mist Guards he fought with. “Gods,” he muttered, his shocked eyes meeting mine for a moment as I walked by.