He could make no sense of it, yet something instinctive told Andrew it would be incredibly bad if this thing trying to claw out of him got loose.
He clamped his will round it, despite the pain. It was difficult to scream through the mouthful of stuff, yet he managed. Then suddenly it was withering back, protesting, pulling back into him.
The relief that came brought his eyes watering; choking as if drowned. It hit him like a current, jolted his body back into life with the sharpness of electricity. His brain went blank. Numb.
Andrew let himself fall backwards, throat raw; unable to get air into his lungs. He twisted upon the carpet, raspy inhales coming in painfully. And his vision swam to black. He could feel hands grabbing at him, but he couldn’t see them. His world had disappeared.
* * * * *
Victoria couldn’t take her eyes off of Noel, and for the life of her, she couldn’t explain why. Was he handsome? Yes. He certainly was. And the smouldering gazes he kept casting her way were not helping keep her emotions in check. But beyond that she could not explain what was so drawing. He was not clever like Andrew—the look in his eyes she’d almost want to call him mad.
She shifted uncomfortably and went back to focusing on the dull chatter her family were keeping up. Reginald’s tone was growing increasingly hoarse.
‘If we managed our tribute more properly then we would have the funds to pay the servants!’ Reginald’s voice rose in frustration over Lucinda’s snide protests.
‘And just what are you suggesting we cut, then?’ Rovin demanded.
Reginald puffed out his breath. ‘Oh, I don’t know! The Queen’s wardrobe, for starters?’
Outrage ensued.
Victoria sat back, very much wishing she was off with Andrew instead of trapped here. Noel watched in disinterest at the growing argument, arms crossed across his broad chest. His muscles rippled. A wry smile was pulling at his lips, mind turned on some inward thought.
He was so different from Andrew, she found herself once again thinking. It was a comparison she wanted to stop herself from making.
Noel gave her an amused look to the now heated shouts coming. Victoria couldn’t help but laugh. She clapped a hand over her mouth in a desperate attempt to stifle it. What the hell was wrong with her? She was acting like a drunken schoolgirl. His lips twitched into a charming, toothy grin her way.
Lucinda stood suddenly in offence, surprising Victoria. Victoria was disappointed she’d missed the escalation.
‘I hope you are pleased driving all our traditions straight into the ground!’
Reginald glanced to Victoria, bemused, before once again facing her mother. ‘I can assure you, Madame, that is not my intention.’
Rovin became thunderous. ‘How dare you abuse your power in such a fashion? You, my son, to go against everything I have raised you to value! It is intolerable!’
Reginald bristled. ‘Times have to change, father. You either change with it, or remain stuck it the past. It is up to you!’
In a flurry of whipping robes, Rovin left them, Lucinda following.
Reginald heaved a sigh, looking a little lost. ‘I know it sounds terrible, but sometimes I wish they were still high on spores. Things were so much easier to manage!’
Victoria followed him with her eyes. ‘Ah, the joys of ruling.’
He crossed his arms. ‘You could help, you know. By right you should be queen, married to me or not.’
Noel leant against the table to study her. ‘Yes, no doubt you would make a fine queen.’
Victoria rolled her eyes, feeling warm. ‘I have no interest in that. I’m sorry, Reginald. I’ll help where I can, but I can’t deal with it.’
He nodded distractedly. ‘Yeah, you’d rather be solving puzzles with the Traveller.’
Victoria flushed as Noel’s burning gaze intensified. ‘I’m sorry; I’ll never be good at managing a city or anything of that sort.’
‘You still haven’t introduced me to this Traveller. I thought you knew him.’ Noel’s interest in her was near heart-stopping.
Reginald laughed before Victoria could think of a reply. ‘Know him? She’s practically married to him!’
Victoria shot him a warning glower. ‘Don’t let him hear you say that or he’ll turn running.’ She turned back to Noel. ‘I’m his friend. Assistant, when he needs me to be. I’m sorry he’s been so busy lately. I have mentioned you to him. Just difficult to gain his attention sometimes.’
Noel nodded very slowly. Victoria watched as his amber eyes lowered away from hers, lashes long. A look of deep thought. ‘You are very lucky,’ he said quietly after a moment.
Victoria felt herself blushing again. ‘Yeah. It’s…certainly an adventure being with him.’
Reginald rubbed his head. He’d drifted away from the conversation almost immediately. ‘Oh, there is too much to do…’
Noel stood from the table and extended Victoria his hand. ‘Shall I escort you back to your room, m’lady?’
Victoria’s heart gave an annoyingly violent lurch. She took his hand, praying he couldn’t feel the tremble, and stood. Noel flashed her a charming smile that Andrew could never pull off.
Reginald glanced to the two of them. ‘Well, enjoyable dinner. We should do it again.’ He bowed sarcastically. ‘Until next time.’
Suddenly being left alone with Noel, Victoria felt conscious about every breath she took. Noel offered his arm and she accepted it meekly. He didn’t ask her which way, but started off confidently in the right direction.
‘It is a pity the Traveller could not join us for dinner,’ he purred as they walked the dark hall.
Victoria sighed. ‘Yeah, well, he’s not really a fan of these types of things. And he and my mother don’t get on.’
Noel chuckled. ‘Imagine that. Though I suppose your mother is a very…fiery woman.’
‘And he had more important things to do this evening,’ she added quickly.
Noel gazed at her curiously. ‘Did he, now? And what curious project is he working on?’
Victoria bit her lip. ‘Afraid I can’t say.’
He laughed. ‘Top secret, aye? How quaint.’
Victoria gazed into the gloom, feeling a hollowness slowly well in her. She wasn’t sure she liked hanging on Noel’s arm. And she certainly didn’t like the tone he had taken as he spoke about Andrew, like he was some thing to be pitied.
She felt a bit useless now. Everyone had found their calling. Noel had landed in a blaze of glory and had only grown more popular. Andrew was becoming more feared by the day as some dark magician and the rumours around him swirled. Reginald was king. So, what did that make her? Just an assistant.
‘I don’t know who you think you are, thinking you can talk about him that way. As far as I’ve seen, he has done much more to benefit mankind than you have. What have you ever done? Being a little sparse on those prophesies of yours, aren’t you?’
Noel stopped to stare. She buckled under the heat of it. ‘I don’t have to prove my value by solving little problems.’
‘Yeah?’ Victoria lifted her chin. ‘Well, what good are you, then?’
Before she could react, Noel slipped his arms round her waist, sending a rocket of alarming excitement through her.
‘The list is long. I know how to protect those I have close. The time may come when you may regret dismissing me so quickly. That time will come. And come soon.’
She didn’t like his touch. It was too bold, too familiar. Intimate. Controlling. The look in his eyes was nearly hypnotic; as invasive as it was, she wasn’t sure she wanted him to look away, to be released from the prison he’d somehow managed to trap her in.
‘That your prophesy…?’ Her mouth went dry.
Noel smiled. ‘One.’
‘Victoria?’ a voice echoed somewhere down the hall. Distant. Not important.
Noel’s grip grew a bit tighter at the base of her spine. A bit more demanding now of her attention. ‘Our god is coming,’ he purred. ‘It’s waiti
ng just beyond. Coiling in the dark. Already it is the lord of thousands of worlds and now it is knocking on the door of this poor little planet. I’m here to let it in.’
‘Victoria!’ the voice was growing closer now.
She shivered. ‘What is it? I don’t understand…what god?’ She didn’t like the dreadful idea of a new god. She thought she was beyond that now.
He leant in closer. ‘You will understand. Stay with me.’ Noel’s eyes gleamed in the dull light.
His words should have terrified her, she knew that, yet all she could focus on were his lips…She had a mad craving to press her own to them. To experience what he tasted like. How his lips moved compared to Andrew’s reluctant ones.
She must have inclined her head in a more inviting way than she’d realised, for Noel was responding, dipping his head. The bridge of his nose brushed against her cheek.
‘Victoria?’ The voice became sharp behind her.
She jumped in guilt and whirled.
Marus was standing across the hall, wearing an uncomfortable, queasy expression.
The entire situation felt incredibly, horribly wrong. Marus was still, staring as if Victoria was wrapped in the coils of some venomous snake.
She pulled free from Noel’s embrace, flushing in embarrassment. His hands were reluctant to release her, one pressing to her spine, possessively.
‘Marus, what’s wrong?’
Marus swallowed, not taking his eyes from Noel.
A rip of fear tore through her. ‘What’s happened?’ A thousand horrible scenarios played through her head. Andrew’s condition was so volatile, anything could have happened.
‘You had better come with me,’ Marus said quietly.
Victoria swore and broke away from Noel’s side, heart twisting painfully.
Guilt bit at her insides with sharp teeth. What the hell had she been thinking? Contemplating kissing a complete stranger! Andrew wasn’t one who easily trusted. He didn’t let people in to his life. He cared for no-one, and yet for some inexplicable reason, he’d allowed Victoria to be his confidant—perhaps more. He trusted her, and, Victoria knew on some smaller, secret level, trusted his emotions to her. And now here she was, betraying that trust, for reasons she couldn’t justify. She shuddered.
Marus practically hauled her away from Noel once she reached him. He pushed her down the hall, hand on her back, like that of a bodyguard.
‘What’s happened?’ she repeated, not caring how greatly her voice wavered.
Marus didn’t answer.
Victoria bit her lip. Her fear grew in her like a living thing; and her only thoughts, running in maddening circles were: ‘Andrew, Andrew, Andrew…’
Victoria broke into a run when she caught a brief glimpse of Andrew’s prone figure on the chaise. She had never experienced the phenomenon of tunnel vision before, not when she was trapped on the ridge before the Passing, not when the Guardian had chased her through the forest. Yet in that moment she saw Andrew lying still, she saw nothing else. She pushed past the woman who was tending him and collapsed at his side.
He looked horrible: with skin a frightening grey tinge; eyes closed and sunken, ringed with dark circles; his lips were parted and each breath that passed through them was broken, laboured.
She gript his shoulders, panic blinding her. ‘Andrew?’ His skin was like ice. She shook him gently. ‘Andrew? Answer me!’
He was catatonic, unresponsive. Nothing but those broken, wheezing gasps.
‘What’s happened?’ she cried, tears beginning to blur her vision. She had taken care of Andrew through many a turn, but never had she seen him in such a state.
There was nothing she could do. Her fingers traced the curve of his lips. Black tinged them. The veins in his neck seemed too pronounced, too thick with that ugly colour, as if the very vessels were bruised.
The woman Victoria had shoved aside now pushed her back. ‘He’s overdosed on spores, among other things.’
A stab of enraged shock tore through her. ‘What? How the hell did he get his hands on those?’ Victoria had made sure she’d cleaned out Andrew’s hidden caches as thoroughly as possible. Of course, with someone like Andrew, there was no doubt she had missed some, but not enough to throw him into such a state—surely!
She finally cast her tear-blurred gaze to the woman and wasn’t so sure she liked what she saw. Her face was scarred beyond recognition and her jet black hair was tied back tightly in a fashion that was not at all common.
‘Who are you supposed to be?’ She did not at all take kindly to the fact some strange woman had been with Andrew for his fit whilst she’d been enjoying herself elsewhere. With a flare of protectiveness she covered Andrew as best she could. She hadn’t been with him for his turn. She had to make up for it now, hadn’t she?
Victoria could not hold him long, however, for Andrew’s body went ridged beneath her and he let out a strangled moan. She pulled away in alarm as his back arched as a frothy, black saliva began to bubble at the corners of his mouth.
‘Andrew!’
Before she could work out how to help, the woman pushed her away and dropped over Andrew, blocking Victoria from reaching him. Her mind went blank with outraged, Victoria scrambled to her feet. Just who did this woman think she was that she could better help Andrew? She’d been his companion for over a year, she’d earned her place.
She dove forward to protect him from this stranger but was snagged from behind with enough force that her feet came swinging off the floor. She shrieked and struggled against Marus’s commands to remain still.
‘He’s dying!’ Victoria distantly heard herself crying. She couldn’t focus. The only thing she could picture in her mind was that horrible, corpse-like state of Andrew, now seizing on the chaise.
As distressed as her mind was going, something incredibly strange began to happen. The woman holding onto Andrew began to glow. And she was glowing green.
‘What are you doing?’ Perhaps she was high as well. It would certainly explain her evening yet all she could accept as fact was how incredibly wrong it all was.
The woman didn’t acknowledge her. She was much too focused on Andrew; placing her hands on him.
‘Be still! She’s trying to save him!’ Marus was hissing in her ear. ‘Victoria, calm down!’
Something about Marus’s supplication sucked the fight out of her. Victoria sagged in his arms with a broken sob.
Over her own tears came a noise she would not under any other circumstances call glorious. Andrew was coughing. Horrible, deep, wracking coughs that were agonising to hear but he was coughing.
Marus released Victoria and she dashed back to her friend.
Andrew was leaning over the edge of the chaise, pale eyes fixed on the floor, heaving in deep breaths. Victoria put her hands on his shoulders to keep him from rolling off. It was impossible to tell by his slack expression if he was aware of his surroundings or not.
‘Andrew?’
He let out a groan and sniffed heavily, then pushed himself on wobbly arms, with the help of Victoria, to flop onto his back. He swallowed heavily; eyes still unseeing.
‘You all right?’ Victoria asked timidly.
‘He’ll be fine,’ the woman drawled, unconcerned.
She whirled on the woman. ‘Who are you, anyway?’
The stranger smiled. ‘Arkron Terrisan, archaeologist and Realm Witch.’
She’d met so many strange people with so many strange titles she nearly discarded it, yet, the name rang a very distant bell. She’d seen Arkron and Marus together before…somewhere… ‘Hey, you were at my engagement ball!’
Arkron rolled her eyes. ‘Real quick you are.’
It wasn’t worth concerning herself with. She turned back to Andrew. ‘Can you hear me?’
Very slowly, Andrew lifted his head to stare blankly with glassy, owl-eyes.
Victoria pulled his damp hair away from his forehead.
His attention was darting round the room, not fixing on any one thi
ng, eyes vibrating wildly as they went. Not comforted, she cupped his face in her hand. Her contact must have settled something inside of him for his eyes stopped roaming and finally locked with hers.
‘Victoria!’ he slurred hoarsely. He attempted to push himself up, swaying like a drunk. ‘What are you doing here?’
She saw something very closely akin to embarrassment flash across his face.
‘Marus came for me,’ she said quietly, attempting to keep her voice as soothing as possible, for Andrew’s mood was shifting rapidly towards anger.
He finally managed to sit up; eyes slipping away from Victoria’s face to fall on Arkron.
‘Welcome back to the land of the living,’ she said drily.
Andrew huffed. ‘Interesting choice of words.’
Arkron raised her thin eyebrows. ‘I thought it rather appropriate.’ Her blatant amusement punched each word.
Victoria couldn’t keep her frustration in check any longer. ‘What the hell happened?’
Andrew didn’t answer. He was still staring at the strange woman with a frozen expression.
‘Andrew had quite the unique, out-of-body experience.’
He snarled irritably. ‘I had no such thing! I overdosed and hallucinated. That is all!’
Victoria glowered with disapproval. ‘You what?’
Andrew now turned to her, an irritated look slapped across his face. ‘It’s not like it was my choice.’
‘Someone forced you to take them?’ She could strangle him. ‘Fat chance of that. And where did you even get them? The spores were destroyed!’
‘Oh,’ Andrew clenched his teeth, ‘don’t be thick, Victoria! Of course all the spores weren’t destroyed.’
‘Well, why the hell were you here taking them? You know what they do to you!’
Welcome Home (Alternate Worlds Book 3) Page 17