Page 233 of Eldritch
I crept toward it and found the pregnant woman I’d met at the Somnial beside a man lying motionless on the floor. She sobbed into his chest, her arms stretched over him, as two other guards stood by.
“Get her away from him, you fools!” The priestess waved her hand as she entered the room. “He’s been bitten for goddess’s sake!”
The guards darted for the woman and hand thrashing through the air, she batted them off, screaming. “Leave me! Get away!”
I lurched toward her and placed a gentle hand on her outstretched leg. “Please. Let her help him.”
The woman lowered her arm, and her body shook with a sob. I flicked my fingers, urging her toward me, and she scooted across the floor, until she curled up beside me, clutching at my arm. Her trembling vibrated across my bones, as I held out my arm and allowed the priestess to prick my skin with her finger, and add my blood to a vial.
“You’ve treated the ones who’ve been bitten before?” I asked, looking toward the man on the floor. He’d turned paler—an unnatural shade of white that reminded me of the creatures back at the cottage.
“Not successfully.” She spoke low, glancing at the woman clinging to me. “But perhaps your blood might make a difference.” Just as she had with Aleysia, she pricked her own skin, adding her blood to the mix. Scurrying back to the guard’s side, the priestess spoke a chant. She raised the vial up into the air and tore away the man’s shirt, revealing thick, black, pulsing veins, not unlike those on Zevander’s face, but these seemed to be the beginning stages of the carapace seen on the spider creatures. No gash, like that on Aleysia and Zevander.
A bird swooped down from the rafters and flew itself straight into the wall, crushing its skull on impact.
Flinching, I turned away, burying my face in the Lyverian woman’s hair.
When the thumping sound faded, I turned to see the priestess gather up the bird, and she shook its blood over the fallen guard, then administered the elixir by pouring it down his mouth.
A sickly white pallor crept over the guard’s face as each second ticked off.
“Eryx?” The woman unraveled herself from my arm and leaned forward, reaching out a hand toward him. “Wake up.”
His body jerked, convulsed, but his eyes remained closed. Spiders crawled out of his mouth, one of them darting straight for the pregnant woman.
As I lurched to keep it from reaching her, one of the birds flew down and scooped it up into its mouth. More birds landed on the floor around the man, hunting the spiders, until every one of them had been consumed, then the birds flew back up to their perches.
The guard stilled again.
Silence settled over the room as everyone watched. Waited.
Seconds turned to minutes, and the pregnant woman whimpered as she rocked, holding her belly.
The priestess knelt beside the man, setting her fingers to his neck, then her ear to his chest. When she straightened, the expression on her face sobered. “The goddess has chosen to keep him.”
“No!” the woman cried out, crawling toward him on hands and knees. “Eryx!” Stretching across his lifeless body, she wailed, the sound of her cries stirring my worries over Zevander.
The priestess lowered her head and sighed. “What happened?”
One of the guards stepped forward, his lips quivering. “The man she arrived with,” he said, pointing his spear toward me, which trembled with his shaky hands. “I saw him. Moments before it cracked open and fire rose up from the rock. He did it.”
A sickness settled in my stomach as I swept my gaze over the faces staring back at me, angry and brimming with condemnation. Everyone except the priestess who seemed to chew on the accusation.
“You’re saying a man did this?” Frowning, she shook her head. “Was there anyone else with him?”
“No, Priestess. Only him. He spoke to himself, as if he were communing with the gods.”
“No.” She shook her head and slowly made her way toward me. “Only a god himself could ignite that flame.”
I stared off, silently absorbing her words. “Or a vessel?” Turning to face her, I searched for any possibility of truth in her eyes. “Perhaps he was chosen. Like me.”
“How? To be chosen by Deimos, a lesser god, would require?—”
“Sacrifice. He was sacrificed as a baby. Thrown into the flame and lived.”
A wheeze of breath escaped her. “And you brought him here? To us? To the vein?” Brows pulled tight, she shook her head. “I told you the danger and you kept this to yourself. Why?”
“Because I love him.” Tears wavered in my eyes. “Because I am not the precious vessel who was destined to lay with your warriors and bear your children,” I said through clenched teeth. “I love him, and I would put the whole world in peril to save him.” Hot tears spilled down my cheeks as anger and uncertainty burst inside of me. “And perhaps that makes me just as evil and wretched as any of the gods you fear, but it’s true.”
