This was worse than anything she’d ever suffered.
Evalle moaned and curled into herself, holding her hands against her chest. Blood oozed through her fingers. She’d lost track of time and shivered against the cold. Probably her body fighting through shock.
Where had her clothes gone? Why was she being kept in this dark pit? Every time she opened her eyes, she saw a black wall of nothing.
She drifted in and out of consciousness, longing to stay unconscious and avoid the agony racking her body.
But she was awake again.
Her body tried once more to heal. She’d feel a trickling of power, but never managed to truly repair the damage, leaving her in this constant half-alive state.
What little energy she could drag up from her beast tried to heal the worst damage first, which would be the hole gouged out of her chest. Even now, the ravaged skin was a raw wound that throbbed viciously with every labored breath. Her right leg had partially healed, but it was not straight.
She was ready to let life slide from her fingers. Death had to be better than this.
You will not die! yelled in her head.
And now she had the mysterious voice in her head again. It had been absent since she’d finally found some happiness these recent months.
You know who I am, Evalle.
An idea had niggled at her, but she’d never had reason to believe it. Was this really her mother?
Yes. Who else would watch over you?
Evalle’s throat hurt from screaming. She swallowed and croaked out a whisper. “I do want to die.”
No you don’t. You have too much to live for.
Was she really going to have this conversation with the woman who had died birthing her? Evalle murmured, “Is being dead so bad? You had to suffer delivering me, and then you died.”
I would suffer it again and more just to have had one minute to hold you. Death is not peaceful for those of us who can’t pass on. You would not be happy watching Storm grieve for you.
Tears spilled from Evalle’s eyes. Where was Storm? He had never failed her, but Storm couldn’t track teleporting and she was sure that’s what happened when her body lifted in the air at the wreck site. “I want to go back, but I don’t think I’ll live long enough for him to find me,” Evalle admitted.
You have to fight death with every breath.
Evalle drifted into a fitful darkness.
Wake up, Evalle!
“Leave me alone.” When no sound came into her head, Evalle mumbled, “Why are you here now? I thought you were gone.”
I tried to let go of your world once I believed you would be safe and loved with Storm, but then I heard you screaming. I felt your pain. I will not leave you.
A thought struck Evalle. “Do you have any power?”
No. I’m sorry. I was only a human in life. I had no powers to bring with me.
Defeated, Evalle grumbled, “You can’t help me.”
I intend to try.
“Do you know who took me?”
Only that he is not human.
That didn’t narrow down the possibilities much, but her mother was nothing more than a spirit who could speak in Evalle’s mind. The woman was not to blame for what she couldn’t know.
Her mother said, It takes a lot of effort to reach you. I can’t stay much longer, but I’ll be back. Promise me you won’t give up.
Her mother was actually leaving? Well, that sucked.
Evalle, please promise me.
Whispering in a dry voice, she murmured, “I’m in no place to make deals with anyone.”
It’s not for me. Her mother’s voice drifted off, but Evalle heard her last words. Storm is hunting you.
Evalle blinked, trying to see, but she stared into a void.
Storm. She loved that man with all her being. He loved her just as much, if not more considering the battle he’d waged to tear down her defenses and plant himself in the middle of her world. She would fight a million battles to keep him.
What about now? Her conscience picked up the torch after her mother withdrew. Storm would be disappointed if Evalle gave up.
She’d expected him to fight with all he had when he was captured in a demonic underworld.
Shouldn’t she do the same for him?
But how long could she hold on? She was lightheaded from loss of blood and not healing.
Warm liquid continued to ooze around the hand she had clamped over her chest wound.
How much blood had she lost? And why couldn’t she heal? She could barely feel her beast. The hole in her chest might take all decisions away from her.
Who had done this?
For what purpose?
Power swirled around her. She hated tucking into herself like a frightened creature, but she couldn’t deny the truth of feeling like one.
She waited for someone to speak to her, but instead she heard murmuring close by.
Male voices, if she had to guess. Duh, she had no choice but to guess unless someone wanted to turn on some lights.
In a nasally voice, one guy asked, “You are certain that he is hunting it?”
The other one spoke in a smoother tone when he responded. “Yes. If you want to be free of this place forever, then hand me his head.”
“If all you say is true and he does show up as expected, I will keep my end of our bargain. I expect to be not just free, but immortal. Understood?”
“Yes. Why do you continue to ask me the same thing?”
“I want there to be no confusion when I claim my due,” nasal voice said. “But this will not work if the Alterant dies, or escapes.”
“I told you neither of those things is going to happen,” smooth voice said. “Remember my demonstration earlier with the wyvern?”
“I do.”
Mr. Smooth said, “Observe closely as I will do this only one more time to aid you in keeping her contained.”
A soft glow broke through the darkness far away, like a pinpoint of light, then gained power as it came closer. Adrenaline surged through her body, which hurt like a bitch because it made her heart beat faster.
“Hello, Evalle.”
“Who are you?” Evalle asked in a rough voice. Someone had stomped a dusty path through her raw throat.
“You have no need of my name.”
Evidently she had no need to see his face, either. All she could make out was a foggy image of a dark figure wavering through the field of light.
“What do you want with me?” She grimaced, determined not to moan or whine in front of this bastard. If she planned to live, she’d do it with her ego intact.
“It’s not what I want with you. It’s what I want in exchange for you.”
He was trading her to someone?
She snorted, but it sounded rusty. “Gonna suck when I die before you get what you want.”
“I do have to ensure that you will live, although upon closer inspection, you appear to be losing ground faster than I realized.”
She listened for any inflection in his voice that would give away his identity. She wanted to say she heard a soft accent underneath what sounded like a pretend voice, as if he wanted to shield even that clue to who he was.
Her mind couldn’t work that hard right now.
Stick to what he was sharing.
He wanted to trade her? She’d have a better chance of escaping if she survived. Her mind struggled to think and come up with a way to get an edge. She dragged in enough air to say, “Something ... keeping me from healing. Free my powers. I’ll heal myself.”
“I’m sure you probably could, but that would be too risky. You might attack me.”
Ya think? Of course, attacking him would require being able to at least stand until she had her kinetic power back.
She slumped back into herself. “Tough shit then. You lose.”
“I never lose. Open your arms so I can patch your chest.”
“Sure thing. You stand there and hold your breath.”
“Don’t be difficult.”
Did he really just say that? “Listen, you piece of shit, I ... ” That disgusting Noirre odor was back. So incredibly strong, like nothing she’d ever smelled before around the Medb.
This guy had to be Medb. Was he acting on his own or supported by Queen Maeve and Cathbad? Daegan would smash both of them if those two were doing this. Evalle had to keep telling herself that for any hope of clinging to life.
Storm would make people pay, but Daegan had ancient demigod powers. He’d use them, too.
The burnt lime stench clouded around her and smothered every breath she took.
On the heels of that returned the creepy feeling slithering over her skin that she’d experienced right before she’d passed out at the crash site.
What was he doing? The dark majik pushed and prodded around her face and over her arms, which she still had tucked close.
Her arms began moving away from her body.
She fought to keep them in place, but was quickly losing a tug of war to control her arms. “No! Stop it,” she snarled.
Maybe not so much a snarl as a whine.
“If I don’t do this, Evalle, we both lose if you die.”
His light blinked out.
She hated the dark. It reminded her of the child she’d been, locked in a basement where a man ...
Chilling majik crawled over her body, much stronger this time, wrapping around and around her until it finally burrowed into her chest.
He whispered words that blurred in her ears.
His dark majik came alive all at once, stinging her chest like a thousand bees dumped into the wound.
She screamed and screamed, wrenching back and forth to get away, but she couldn’t move.
He shouted at her.
She couldn’t hear him over her shrieks of pain.
Nasal voice yelled, “You’re killing my Alterant!”
“No, no, no. That shouldn’t have been too much. Listen to me. You have to ... ” was the last thing Evalle heard.