Page 164 of Lana Pecherczyk

“See?” Pandora whispered as the body slumped. “I told you I had claws.”

Chapter

Fifty

Blake hunched over the table in the nesting caravan, her fingers tight around a quill as she drew another diagram of the inner ear’s anatomy. Her hand trembled. Wavy lines replaced the precision she needed. Fucked up again.Gah. She crumpled the paper and tossed it onto the growing pile of failures.

“Bloody hell.” She massaged her throbbing temples.

The Donna’s paste had washed off, but the aftereffects lingered. Nausea churned her stomach. Feverish flushes made her sweat. Colors brightened until they seared her retinas. The marketplace gifts sat in neat piles around the caravan, mocking today’s failures with yesterday’s accomplishments.

She dipped the quill in a crystal inkwell, a gift from one of the grateful parents, and pulled out a clean piece of paper. She stalled. “How am I supposed to help Ada if I can’t even draw a bloody ear canal right?”

Saving that fledgling from drowning had been easy in comparison. Every child in Perth learned to swim during their school years. Drawing medical diagrams from memory while battling bat shit toxins? Not so easy.

Beside her on the table, Trix’s eucalyptus sapling still thrived in River’s vase. She ran her finger along the cracks in the ceramic, willing her magic to activate. A strange tremor ran up her arm through the Well-blessed marks, but then dissipated.

You’re not meant to be here.

The feather casting gave Blake no solace, only an ill feeling that something wasn’t right. Her dad, the warped memories, the strange signs and symbols. It seemed more like a nightmare than a vision.

She shoved the papers away and pressed her forehead against the cool wooden table. What good was her photographic memory if she hadn’t given herself enough time to study the diagrams?

The caravan door swung open.

River?

Her hope faded when Lark limped inside.

“Still nothing?” she asked.

Blake slid blank papers over the map she’d been recreating from Cloud’s trove. When she couldn’t recall the anatomy diagrams, she’d found herself reproducing other things. Words. Lyrics. Maps. Things she couldn’t get out of her mind.

“It’s shit,” she replied. “Everything keeps blurring together.”

“Aftereffects of the Donna’s paste.” Lark offered a steaming cup. “This helps.”

Blake accepted the drink with a hand sign of gratitude. She smelled the bitter liquid and grimaced. “It’s not spiked, is it?”

“Just a herbal relaxant.”

“What I wouldn’t give for a hot choccie with marshmallows.”

Lark slid onto the mended bench seat opposite. “How are you feeling?”

“I should be asking you that.” Blake gave a pointed look at the injured woman’s leg. “You were so brave. I can’t believe you leaped between the kid and a monster.”

“You’re the one who almost drowned.”

“Not really. I know how to swim.”

“Don’t sell yourself short. I know how to fly, but that doesn’t make what I did any less brave. Does it?”

The last words sounded hesitant. Blake lifted her gaze from the mug and met those unsteady eyes.

“Look at us,” she blurted. Scoffed. “Two badass cunts doubting ourselves.” She glanced outside the window and caught a glimpse of Talo arguing at the boundary between the roosts. “I didn’t see any of them jumping between a kelpie and a child.”

“Not even Tommas.” Lark snorted. Her humor faded. “He’s not a fighter like his brothers. But that’s why I love him.” She sighed. “Dad’s accusing him oflettingme get hurt.”