Page 151 of Liar Witch

“It’s not,” Nos cuts him off. “I shouldn’t shift. This is just my beast acting out. He’ll calm down and there won’t be any more problems.”

“Bullshit,” I growl. “You need to get it into your head that you can’t just ignore your beast and at least try to accept him, or he’s going to keep putting our mate in danger.”

“And you?” Nos retorts. “You speak like you’re the expert in controlling your leviathan, but you’re worse than I am. At least I haven’t spent the last twenty years jumping off the deck every five minutes.”

“No, you’ve spent them crushing half of your soul because you’re terrified of being recaptured!”

“I’m a liability. A danger to everyone on this ship. Maybe it’s notmeI’m worried about.”

“Don’t keep using my torture as an excuse—”

“It wouldn’t have even happened if you weren’t playing nursemaid because you felt guilty that Fate touched me instead of yo—”

“ENOUGH!” Rysen roars.

The silence which falls is overwhelming. The rift which has been a white elephant between us for years is finally out there, exposed and bleeding, and neither of us knows what to do about it.

“No one on this ship is perfect,” Rysen continues, nostrils flaring. “We have shit we struggle with. My bloodlust, Kier’s curse, Val’s paranoia, even Klaus’s crazy mother. But our mate is right below us. A miracle that you two are unable to care for properly because you’re so hung up on your past. Nilsa deservesbetter.”

He drops that heavy, three-word bombshell and then pauses, closing his eyes for a second like he’s praying for patience.

In that moment of quiet, Nos slips into a vision. His whole body stiffens, then jerks as the seizure starts.

Any anger I have disappears in a flash as I scramble to cushion his head with my lap before he can do further damage to his thick skull. He hasn’t had a vision in days, and this one’s a bad one. His limbs are going everywhere, flailing and shaking with such violence that I actually wince as his arm makes contact with the deck and I feel the impact through the wood. I should’ve guessed that his beast being so active would only make things worse.

Val rolls his eyes, cursing Fate under his breath as he stalks towards the upper deck. Rysen takes a seat on one of the cannons to wait this out, but Klaus hovers closer.

“Has he meditated yet today?”

I frown. “What?”

“My sister meditates daily to invite Fate to send her visions while she’s calm to prevent this.” He waves a sympathetic hand at my brother’s tormented body. “She still has the occasional random one, but it’s easier on her if she’s purging them regularly.”

Goddess,nowhe tells us? I didn’t even know that it was possible to invite a vision. It’s not like we had a load of Seers there to teach Nos when he was Touched; our pack was too small and isolated to know much more than the most basic lore. Even our handlers at the circus never bothered to tell him more than he needed to know to make them money. My hands tighten into fists, wishing I could kill those bastards all over again.

Usually, when a vision gets this bad, the only thing I can do is talk to him and try to calm him, but I’m still too raw for that. My mouth opens and closes, failing to find the words that will help.

So I just hold his head in my lap and breathe in silence.

“We’re a fucking mess.”

I don’t realise I’ve spoken aloud until Rysen replies, “Yes, you really are.”

Chapter Forty

Nilsa

As relieved as I am to see everyone’s alive—if injured—I’m glad to leave the deck.

Nos pushing me away shouldn’t feel unexpected. He hates being taken care of, even when it has nothing to do with his blindness. But somehow, this time, it felt less like he was rebuffing an effort to help him, and more like he was refusing me specifically.

After four days of him not being able to get enough of my body, the rejection stings more than my pride will let me admit.

I try to shrug it off, knowing that shifting after so long has got to be uncomfortable for him. He can’t be happy that the first thing his beast did when freed was attack his twin and collapse Cirio’s Cove—somewhere that clearly holds a lot of good memories for them.

Still, Rysen’s tugging me away was a small mercy. The sensation of being watched, coupled with the hairs on the back of my neck standing on end, tells me that someone has managed to scry for me. That gives me the excuse I need to leave them on the deck and head for my workroom instead.

I’m so distracted by Nos that it takes me until I reach the Galley to realise Kier has followed me.