I tried, but Lorian was too damned distracting with his intent expression and his stupid stones. Not to mention, most of the time when I thought about the bearded man, my mind showed me the way I’d seen him last—hanging from the roof of that inn, his body reflecting unspeakable damage, and the key he’d used stuck between broken teeth.
“You’re not trying,” he said mildly.
“I am.” It wasn’t my fault he’d removed any and all threat that the bearded man had previously presented.
Lorian’s expression turned colder. Remote. It was the same way he’d looked at me when I’d been lying next to the river, coughing up water. That expression told me that he didn’t see me as a fellow human. I was just a problem that needed to be addressed.
Back then, Lorian had left me behind. I knew he wouldn’t do that now. After all, he needed me. Somehow, that knowledge made it worse.
“I didn’t want to do this,” he said, pulling Beard’s rope from the pocket of his overcoat.
Black spots danced around the edges of my vision, and my heartbeat pounded in my ears. All I could feel was the rough rope around my neck. All I could see was the sick grin on Beard’s face when he told me how he was going to hang me up.
Lorian stepped closer, and I reacted like a hunted animal, jumping a foot-span to my left. My hands shook, and I held them up in front of me defensively. Uselessly.
He was so fucking big.
My throat constricted, and I almost choked on my next breath.
A muscle twitched in his jaw. “Show me you can use your power, wildcat.” He leaned down and threw another stone. It bounced off my thigh.
He held up the rope. My mouth turned dry. I backed up a step, stumbling over the rocky ground.
Obviously, we were wrong. Terror didn’t help me use my power. If it did, that rock would be hanging frozen in the air.
Lorian followed me.
“Don’t come any closer,” I hissed.
All life had left his expression. He looked inhuman, his eyes glittering with an ancient knowledge.
I blinked, and he was Lorian again, his brow creasing. But he took another step. Turning my body, I prepared to run.
He moved so fucking fast. Screaming, I turned toward the clearing. Rythos and Marth appeared to my left, hands on their weapons.
Lorian’s hand grabbed the back of my tunic, and the rope brushed my shoulder.
I went wild. Lashing out, I fought like a cornered cat, hissing and clawing and howling.
“Use your power,” Lorian gritted out, but I couldn’t.
I was nothing but terror. Terror and betrayal.
“Prisca.” Lorian’s voice was a dark warning. I was choking myself with the neck of my tunic. Dimly, I realized he wasn’t moving, but I was also rooted in place, my feet kicking up dirt and stones.
The feel of the rope on the side of my throat was what did it.
A pit opened inside me. A pit filled with endless rage and icy vengeance. A scream burned up my throat, and something deep in my belly roared its wrath.
Rythos was running toward us, his mouth open as he bellowed at Lorian.
I pulled, desperate, hiccupping a sob.
The world froze.
Rythos paused midstep.
I wouldn’t let time unfreeze until I was miles from these men. Until I was on one of their horses and several villages over.
My terror was married to fury in a way I had never felt before, and I could feel my power coiled within me. This time, I memorized the feeling.
I tore myself out of Lorian’s grasp. My tunic ripped, but I was already pulling the rope from his hand and throwing it into the river. Then I hauled my foot back and slammed it between his legs with everything I had.
I was running when the grip on my power slipped.
Rythos was still frozen. But Lorian’s vicious curses told me he now felt that kick. Dark satisfaction wrestled with grim determination.
Suddenly, Rythos was moving, and his eyes were wide as he came to a stop. To him, it must have seemed like I’d shifted places between one moment and the next.
“Keep him away from me,” I choked out. “I’m leaving.”
Rythos glanced past me, and his expression turned grim. For some reason, Lorian had shaken off my power earlier than Rythos. But how? I chanced a look over my shoulder to find Lorian bent almost in two, breathing through pain that likely would have driven a lesser man to his knees.
I should have kicked him harder.
Grabbing my cloak, I reached for my boots and sat on an overturned log, pulling them on. Marth strolled along the clearing. “You try to leave, and he’ll just drag you back. You made a bargain.”