Page 24 of When Storms Collide

“Can you walk?” he asked, his voice barely above a whisper in Saanvi’s ear.

She squeezed her eyes shut for a moment, pushing her feet beneath her. As soon as she did, her knees gave out.

“We have to carry her,” Puck said, grasping Saanvi behind the knees and lifting her into his arms. Phineas’s man moved forward to wrap a strip of fabric across her back and chest to put pressure against the bleeding wound.

“Where are we going?” I asked, a weight of uncertainty filling my gut.

“You’ll see,” was all Phineas replied, a lilt of a smile lifting the corner of his lips once more.

He turned out of the mouth of the alleyway and walked down the street at a clipped pace, not bothering to glance behind him to ensure we were following. My palms were sweating as I slid Stormslayer back into the sheath at my thigh, rubbing the sweat off onto my soiled pants.

Tess cast me a wary glance, but I only shook my head in response. We couldn’t trust Phineas, but it was our only choice. He could easily be leading us into a trap. If we tried to take Saanvi up and out of The Shadow to get her help, she might not make it. Her face was chalky, her eyes squeezed shut. The natural golden pallor was draining from her face as Kenna walked beside Puck, grasping her thin hand within her own.

Saanvi would be alright. She had to be.

I cursed myself for leaving a throwing knife. It was a mistake I would surely never make again. I had been so incensed by the sound of Nik’s name coming out of Kane’s mouth that I had been distracted. I had allowed him to harm one of us in his final act.

We had left their bloody bodies in a heap across the alleyway’s dead end and it was sure to stir up some questions. So much for keeping a low profile in The Shadow. We needed to help Saanvi, find Alastir, and get thehellout of here before Donika’s men found us. We were practically leaving a physical blood trail behind us.

I pinched the bridge of my nose hard enough for black spots to mar my vision. This had all gone to shit, and we didn’t have much time left. We needed to get out of Prins sooner rather than later and return to the seaside cabin to regroup. We needed a new plan. We were leaving ourselves vulnerable wandering around the realm for this long, unprotected.

We twisted and turned along the streets of The Shadow, going back the way we had come when we were fleeing from Kane and his men. We made our way towards the Siraway mountains and the sea beyond, the area where the shop worker had told us we might find Alastir. Maybe we would get lucky and we could kill two birds with one stone, help Saanvi and speak with Alastir all at once.

Kenna whispered an incantation under her breath as we took another twisted turn, her eyes closed in concentration. She didn’t have healing powers as Annelise and Amiyah did, but I prayed to the Mother whatever healing magic shedidhave would help.

The uneasy sensation of being watched settled deep within my core once more, and I picked up my pace, joining Phineas as he stalked ahead of us.

“Are your men following us?” I asked, my brow lifted at him as I pulled up at his side.

He shook his head. “It’s only Baron with me today.” He nodded back towards the man who walked at Saanvi’s side with Puck and Kenna.

“Something doesn’t feel right,” I told him, my hand against my stomach to quell the growing nausea. “It felt like it did when Kane and his men were watching us, stalking us. Someone is here.”

Phineas glanced at me, holding my gaze for one long moment before putting two fingers in his mouth and letting out a sharp whistle. His speed increased, his long legs moving faster, and I increased mine as well to match pace with him. I practically had to run to stay at his side. A bald man with a long goatee exited the door ahead of us, and I skidded to a stop. Phineas said nothing as the man joined us, walking among our group.

After the next corner we turned, a man with a fedora pulled low over his brow joined the group, meandering out of the pub as if he were only a drunk patron on his way home. He kept his head low, his eyes darting left and right. Something soared in my vision to the left and I turned my head sharply to see a boy no older than fifteen scaling the rooftops. He was matching pace with our group as he jumped from one rooftop to the next, watching us from above the tattered and ripped awnings that shielded the street below.

Phineas’s men.

He would not let us be outnumbered. Whoever was following us had better turn back now, as more and more of Phineas’s gang came out of the woodwork to form a pack around us. Whatever we were going to find out from Alastir, Phineas wanted that information.Badly.

Phineas came to a stop at a closed shop, his hand on the door knob. He stopped suddenly and I almost skidded into him. He whispered a spell quietly enough that I couldn’t make out any of the words, and the door popped open beneath his touch. He ushered each of us in as he pushed everything on the large wooden table that spread across the open space onto the floor.

It was a modest shop with three large wooden tables, two of which were covered in beakers and bottles of liquids. There was a young man restocking the shelves against the left wall and he dropped a beaker and balked when he saw us come in. The bright green liquid spilled across the concrete floor.

“So sorry, sir. I will go get him.”

The young man scrambled up the staircase to the right of the cashier counter and disappeared onto the second floor.

Getwho, exactly? A healer?

My heart was beating out of my chest as they laid Saanvi across the table. She had lost consciousness at some point during the journey here, and her head fell limply against the worn wood beneath. Her hand was still clasped within Kenna’s, unwilling to let go.

Phineas moved towards the shelves on the left and scanned them quickly, muttering under his breath.

“Aha! Here it is,” he exclaimed, reaching out and snatching a test tube full of pink liquid off the shelf.

He moved to Saanvi’s side, helping Puck to sit her up.

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