by Tara Grayce
Essie stopped next to Illyna. “How is it coming?”
Her jaw set, Illyna used a pestle strapped to her forearm to grind herbs and ingredients in a mortar. “We will have plenty of salve by the time the armies move out. I just wish I could go with the army to help rescue Farrendel.”
“Every little bit helps, and this is no small thing. Thanks to you, the elven healers will be able to conserve their magic. That will save lives.” Essie smiled and waved at the tent. “Thanks for all your hard work. Truly. It means a lot.”
“It is the least we could do.” Illyna reached out with her hand and squeezed Essie’s shoulder. “Farrendel has been a good friend to all of us. He stuck by us when few others would. We will do whatever it takes to get him back.”
“I know.” Essie squeezed Illyna’s shoulder, then stepped back.
After talking to a few more of the elves in the tent, Essie left and made her way toward the mess tent since it was nearly lunch time.
“Essie!” Edmund jogged up to her. “Jalissa and Leyleira are waiting by the command tent for me to bring back food. Want to help carry all the trays?”
“Sure.” Essie fell into step with him. “Do you think it will be chicken or—”
The iron wall slammed across the heart bond, cold and hard. Essie hunched, pressing a hand to her chest.
Edmund gripped her elbow, steadying her. “Are you all right?”
“I’m fine. It’s Farrendel.” Essie straightened, forcing herself to take a deep breath. “They’re torturing him again.”
Edmund’s expression held no trace of his usual smile. His fingers clenched over the hilt of the elven dagger belted to his waist. The same dagger Farrendel had given him. “How is he holding up? Can you tell?”
“He’s...” Essie wasn’t sure how to explain the impressions she felt. Or how much she should tell Edmund. “He’s going hard. Cold. I guess it’s to be expected, but he feels more like Laesornysh than my Farrendel.”
Edmund didn’t try to reply. What was there to say to something like this?
The iron wall crackled, then crumbled, tearing a wave of agony through Essie’s chest. Stars burst across Essie’s vision as darkness crowded in. She curled over her stomach, fighting to breathe. Her lungs burned, and it felt like her heart might tear itself apart at the rate it was beating.
“Essie!” Edmund’s voice was distant, barely audible past the ringing in her ears.
Her lungs were tearing. She struggled to draw in another breath.
Farrendel...
THE DOOR TO Melantha’s cell slammed open. With her hands pressed tightly over her ears, she had not heard the tramping of boots down the passageway nor the locking bar lifting.
Prince Rharreth marched inside, grabbed her arm, and hauled her to her feet. “I hope you meant what you said about healing.”
Melantha had to trot to keep up as he dragged her along with him from her cell. What was going on? Only seconds before, the dungeon had been filled with Farrendel’s cries of pain.
Prince Rharreth turned in the direction of Farrendel’s cell, his stride long and hurried. Melantha had to just about run to keep up with him, nearly tripping several times as she had never quite gained her balance. His grip on her arm was firm, tight enough that she could not wrench free, but not painful.
Her heart was pounding, her shoes scrambling on the stone in an off rhythm to the troll prince’s steady, swift stride.
The door to Farrendel’s cell stood open, and Melantha was thrust inside before she had a chance to take a deep breath or steel herself for seeing her brother again after betraying him to this torture.
He lay on his back, pinned to the stone floor. A steady trickle of blood ran from him to a drain in the corner. His eyes were squeezed tightly shut, his body shuddering as he choked in wet gasps, a thin film of blood coating his lips.
A punctured lung. Melantha tore from Prince Rharreth’s loosened grasp and crashed to her knees beside Farrendel. Lying on his back as he was, he was suffocating. He would die within a few minutes if she did not do something.
She pressed a hand to his chest and reached for her magic, ignoring the faint throbbing at her temples caused by all the stone around them. Her magic surged in her chest, down her arm, into Farrendel.
Pain jolted her arm, and she snatched her hand back as if burned. Farrendel thrashed, a moan escaping between his ragged gasps for breath.
All the stone and troll magic inside him had reacted against her magic, causing him more pain instead of helping.
But, even in her brief flare of magic, she had sensed enough of what was happening inside him. It was not an image, exactly. More a detailed impression so that she knew the state of his bones, his blood, his internal organs. And knew how to craft her magic to fix the damage that had been done.
Glancing over her shoulder, she pointed to Farrendel’s right rib cage. “The stone needs to be removed. Now.”
King Charvod stood a few feet away, arms crossed, something almost like a smirk on his face as he watched Farrendel struggle to keep breathing. Prince Rharreth shifted, glancing at his brother.
Melantha gritted her teeth. Prince Rharreth had dragged her here. He was not allowed to just throw up his hands and ignore what needed to be done. “Unless you want him to die right here, right now, it needs to be removed.”
Prince Rharreth pushed from the wall and knelt next to her on the floor. He rested a hand on the stone next to Farrendel, and an icy white glow spread from his fingers into the floor.
Farrendel cried out again, and Melantha pressed her hand to his shoulder, though she was not entirely sure why. It was not as if she needed to hold him down. He was already thoroughly pinned. Nor would he wish comfort from her.
If only there was a way she could ease this pain for him. If her magic reacted that painfully to troll magic, his must be worse.
Could she help? If she could work her magic alongside the troll magic, as if using her magic as a shield between the troll magic and Farrendel...
It was worth a try. She called on her magic again, this time easing it into Farrendel far more cautiously than she had before.
Pain flared up her arm, behind her eyes, but she gritted her teeth and kept going. With her magic, she sensed the active troll magic and coated it with a layer of her own. Her whole body was throbbing now, but Farrendel’s thrashing had stilled, though he still struggled to breathe.
Prince Rharreth removed the stabbing stone from Farrendel’s body. When he drew out a few of the other daggers of stone piercing Farrendel, Melantha refrained from commenting. She had not asked him to do that, and she did not want to draw attention to it with King Charvod watching.
Instead, she drew on more of her magic and sent it into Farrendel’s lung. Troll magic still sizzled against hers, but she pushed the pain aside as best she could, shielding Farrendel from the war of the two magics.
She cleared his lung of blood, steering the blood back to the vessels where it belonged, then knit the tear the stone had caused.
Farrendel stilled, gulping in a deep, non-choking breath. He turned his face and spat, probably trying to clear the taste of his own blood from his mouth.
Melantha rocked back onto her heels and withdrew her hand. She was shaking, her head throbbing.
“Well done, Melantha.” King Charvod’s voice rumbled behind her, sounding far too smug for someone who had nearly killed his prisoner with his over-enthusiastic use of torture. “Your aid has been invaluable once again.”
Wait, what? Melantha stiffened. The way he had worded that sounded like she had been complicit in this.
Farrendel’s eyes snapped open, flashing a deadly silver-blue and filled with more anger than Melantha had ever seen him direct at anyone, much less at her. “You should have let them kill me. It is what you wanted.”
The snarl in his tone, the venom in his voice, stabbed at her. She opened her mouth, but her words caught in her throat. What defense did she have? She had wanted him dead. She w
as complicit, even if not quite the way King Charvod had made it sound.
But she had just proved to King Charvod that she would heal Farrendel and save his life if necessary. That meant King Charvod could push his torture farther, take Farrendel even closer to death, than he would dare without a healer present.
And he had just implied to Farrendel that she was willingly and knowingly helping to make the torture worse.
Before she could think of a response, Prince Rharreth dragged her to her feet. She was nearly at the door before she thought to struggle. “Wait. No. It is not like that. I did not...”
But Farrendel had his face turned away from her, his fists clenched.
King Charvod followed them from the cell, slamming the door and the locking bar into place.
Heat burned in Melantha’s chest, down into her hands. She screamed and clawed at Prince Rharreth. “Let me go! Monster! I am not helping you hurt him!”
Prince Rharreth wrapped an arm around her, pinning her arms to her sides as he hauled her down the short stretch of passageway. He shoved her into her cell. Before Melantha had a chance to regain her balance, he had slammed and locked the door.
Melantha gripped the bars and shook the door as hard as she could, filled with the longing to break something. But the stone did not budge. As ever, the burning rage had been denied an outlet. Another scream built in her chest, then tore out her throat past her gritted teeth.
Healing was such a useless power. Sure, she could save Farrendel. But she could also be used against him, turned into a weapon of his torture. What she would not give for the fiery crackle of his magic. Then she could blast this door off its hinges, tear down the walls of this dungeon, and kill all who stood in her way.
The door at the far end of the corridor slammed and locked into place.
With one last shake of the bars, Melantha forced herself to calm with deep, steady breaths. Giving in to her rage helped no one, and only gave the trolls another reason to scorn her.
She had to be calm. Calm as a forest lake. Calm as a bird soaring on a steady breeze. Calm as a perfect elven princess ought to be.
When her heart rate returned to normal, the heat subsiding back to its background simmer in her chest, Melantha gripped the bars set into the window of her cell’s door and peered in the direction of Farrendel’s cell. If she listened closely, she could just make out his breathing, still ragged, still pained, though not with the choking gasp of earlier. “Farrendel?”
A hitch to his breathing, but that was her only answer.
Had she really expected him to talk to her after King Charvod had implied she was helping them torture Farrendel? On top of the betrayal she had actually done?
You are not my brother. Her own words echoed in her ears as she leaned her forehead against the cold stone bars. Callous. Cruel. So despicable even the trolls despised her, even though they had been willing to use her treachery for their own ends.
“I am sorry, Farrendel.” More, broken sincerity filled those words than the last time she had said them two days earlier. How many times would she have to say them before he believed she meant them?
Still no answer. Perhaps nothing she said now would erase her earlier words.
With her eyes squeezed shut, she could all too easily picture the look on her father’s face if he had been alive to know what she had done. The hurt. The anger. The way he would draw back from her. The same look Weylind, Rheva, Machasheni Leyleira, and Jalissa were sure to give her if she ever saw her family again.
Their father had died to save Farrendel’s life, and, in her anger, Melantha had turned that sacrifice vain and empty by placing Farrendel right back into his tormentors’ hands.
She could not undo what she had done. But she would not allow her father’s sacrifice to be in vain. Somehow, she would make sure Farrendel survived this, no matter what it cost her. Perhaps it would be best if she died here. Better for her family to mourn her after she had given her life to save Farrendel’s than for them to try to decide what to do with a living, traitorous sister.
Leaving the bars, she stalked across the room and sat on the one wool blanket she had been provided. She needed a plan.
About an hour later, the door at the end of the passageway opened again, and Prince Rharreth strode inside, carrying two bowls of the stew that seemed to be the only thing the trolls served their prisoners. He set one bowl on the floor outside her cell while he opened the locking bar.
Melantha stood a few feet from the door, back straight, her hands clasped in front of her where he would be able to see them. This was a battle she intended to win, and that started with appearing cooperative and meek.
He held the bowl of stew out to her.
She did not take it. “Prince Rharreth, I respectfully request to be allowed to tend to my brother.”
He raised a thick, white eyebrow at her. “Why should I allow this?”
She kept her tone even, her face serene. She had a lot of practice hiding her inner turmoil. “My healing was rushed earlier. I should examine him to make sure there is not more internal bleeding that I missed earlier.”
Prince Rharreth studied her face with his dark eyes, and she had a feeling he was seeing right through to her true motives.
So what if he did. Melantha clenched her hands. He could refuse her. If he were as cruel as his brother, he would.
But she did not think he was that cruel.
“I am a healer. I cannot break stones with my magic. I cannot free him. I have taken the oath of a healer, a magical binding so strong I would likely die myself if I attempted violence against you or anyone.” Melantha let some of her anger seep into her voice as she pointed in the direction of Farrendel’s cell. “All I can do is provide him with a little comfort. Surely you will not deny him that. You claim to be honorable, but can you truly call it honor to torture even an enemy like this? You would not keep a rabid animal in the deplorable conditions that my brother is currently suffering.”
Something flashed through Prince Rharreth’s eyes a moment before he glanced away from her. His broad shoulders were tense beneath his leather jerkin.
Melantha suppressed her reaction. She had guessed right. Prince Rharreth did not approve of Farrendel’s treatment. “And you call me despicable. At least I am willing to do something.”
His jaw tightened, his fingers flexing on her bowl of stew. “Very well. I will allow you to examine him.”
She resisted the urge to breathe a sigh of relief. She could not let him see how much she wanted this or that it was just the beginning of her plan.
Prince Rharreth thrust her bowl at her, and this time she took it. He spun on his heels. “Come.”
She snatched her blanket from the floor, draped it over her arm, then hurried after the troll prince. She paused to retrieve Farrendel’s bowl of cooling, watery stew from the floor, then quickened her pace as much as she could without sloshing the stew. It would not do to waste even a drop when they were already given so little.
Prince Rharreth unbarred Farrendel’s cell door and waited for her at the door, his expression stony.
This time, Melantha took a moment to take a deep breath and brace herself before stepping inside.
Her deep breath had not been enough. Last time, she had been in too much panic to notice the details. This time, the smell struck her first. The trolls so feared Farrendel they did not even allow him to take care of the most basic of needs.
She would not allow herself to flinch. She was a healer. This was, after all, what she had trained for. She had managed to fake compassion well enough to fool her instructors into training her and allowing her to take the oath even though her heart had never been in healing. Surely she could manage it when, for the first time, she truly felt compassion amid all the burning anger.
When she stepped through the door, Farrendel’s gaze flicked to her, enough for a glimpse of pain, before swinging back to the ceiling, his jaw hardening. “Melantha, if you ever loved me at all, then, plea
se, do not help them torture me.”
So much pain in those words that even his attempt at coldness could not hide it.
With her freely walking inside under Prince Rharreth’s escort, it must appear as if she was willingly working with the trolls. But she had known it would take more than simply helping Farrendel once for him to trust her again.
Melantha knelt next to him, set the bowls aside, and spread the blanket over him. Held unmoving on the stone, he would be cold. “I know you do not trust me, but I am here to help.”
He did not thank her. Nor did he look at her. If anything, he turned his face farther from her as if he could not even stand to see her in the corner of his eye.
Calling on her magic, she reached out and rested her hand on Farrendel’s forehead, letting her magic seep into him, relieving the headache she could sense pounding at his temples. Most likely the result of being surrounded by so much stone.
With her magic, she had been able to heal her own headache. But Farrendel could not heal himself and he had always been more susceptible to the stone than the rest of them were.
Some of the tension in Farrendel’s jaw and the tightness around his eyes eased. But he kept his face turned away from her.
She moved her hand from his forehead to his shoulder and poured more of her magic into him, making sure she weaved her magic between the troll magic and Farrendel to prevent paining him further.
She could not heal him completely. Not with the amount of stone still lacing through him. But she could heal as much damage as possible.
By the time she pulled her hand away, her fingers shook with the amount of power she had expended. Her head pounded, and she did not have the magical strength to heal herself.
But the way Farrendel’s tense muscles eased made the expenditure of her power worth it. He would rest easy for a few hours, at least.
Melantha sat back on her heels and glanced over her shoulder. Prince Rharreth remained leaning against the wall by the door. Guarding her in case she should try an escape, but not interfering.