Page 50 of Of Blood and Banes (The Arterian #2)

Fighting against the raging disappointment, in both him and myself, I smack his forearm off me and rise to my elbows.

He backs up off me. “I think we’ve trained more than enough tonight.” He grabs the shackles we left on the floor, clamps his wrists in, and readies himself for another night on the cold, hard floor.

“Wait…” I whisper.

He whips his head to me like I screamed it—or he imagined it.

I stand, shaking my head. “Not tonight.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Get up.”

He snorts, his eyebrows pinching at the authority in my voice.

“Get,” I growl and thunder to him. “Up.”

Once I stop two steps away from him, his features fall still. A painful, long silence ticks between us. He finally grunts and rises to his feet, towering over me.

As I stare up at him, I swallow back the tension collecting in my throat. “There’s no reason for you to stay on the floor.”

A small grin lifts his lips, but it doesn’t touch his eyes. “Oh, are you going soft on me, kitten?”

Clenching my jaw, I grab the long chain leash connecting his shackles to the brick wall. I swivel back to the bed and secure the chains to the headboard rails. Ripping open the sheets, I pluck the pillows off from the top of the bed and place them in a line to split the mattress down the middle.

Turning to him, I motion to the left half. “Your side.” Then I gesture to the opposite side of the pillow wall I’ve constructed. “My side.”

“What about…” He takes the pillows and shifts them until the line splits the top half from the bottom. With that wicked grin, he mockingly gestures to the top half of the bed. “Mine.” Then he gestures down to the bottom half where someone’s feet would go. “Yours.”

I snag a pillow and smack him with it as he snickers. Quickly rearranging the pillow line back down to split the left and right side of the bed, I glance back at him. “Now get in before I change my mind.”

We both settle into the bed. It feels far too intimate to face him, so I turn my back to him and close my eyes.

“Remember that night when you moaned my name in your sleep?” he chuckles.

My eyes flash open. “Is this you asking for a death wish?”

Silence. He takes the hint. My eyes flutter closed again.

Marge and I stand in the darkness a few hours later, staring out at the shadowy figures of trees stretching into the starry sky. My mind wanders to Darian, second-guessing if I properly secured his chain around the iron-wrought headboard before I left with Marge.

Marge nods at me, encouraging me to begin our training session.

I crouch down, staring at the dirt, not quite touching it.

Exhaustion has become my constant state, lingering over me like a blanket.

I can’t recall the last time I’ve gone without training with Marge, flying with Sethan, or fighting with Darian.

I hesitate as a soft breeze carries my hair off my forehead and brushes it across my face.

“What’s wrong?” Marge asks.

I stare at the ground, already sensing the energy humming beneath the surface. Without looking in her direction, I murmur, “What if…what happens if I lose control?”

“You won’t.”

“You have so much confidence in me.” I turn to look up at her. “How do you know I won’t?”

“Would you die for the ones you love?”

It’s not a question in my mind. “Yes.”

“Would you kill for someone you love?”

I flinch at the thought, and my mind immediately drifts to Daeja. I would gladly kill the King if it meant she was safe. Does that make me a terrible person? What if it meant having to kill Darian, Melaina, Marge, Archie, or even…Cole? Where can I possibly draw the line?

“I…I don’t know,” I admit in a whisper.

She nods, as if she already knew my answer long before she even asked the question. “Maybe you won’t ever know. But the world we live in today is not one to make that decision lightly. You hold the entire fate of the realm in your hands, Katerina. Make sure you make the right choices.”

I blow out a breath. “Is that supposed to convince me you trust in me?”

She shrugs nonchalantly. “No. But it’s the truth. And sometimes you need to hear the truth, no matter how painful and hard it may be.” Her eyes are soft, concealing something painful and raw behind them.

“What are you hiding from me, Marge?”

Her lips form a tight line.

I stand up, refusing to practice channeling until she tells me. “I can see it in your face. Tell me. I’m not pulling until you do.”

She shakes her head, then turns, attempting to leave.

I snag her shoulder, keeping her from taking another step. “I mean it. If you truly trust me, then trust me with the whole truth. What have you not been telling me?”

“You persistent girl…” Her gaze falls to my hand wrapping around her thin shoulder.

I give her a gentle shake. “I’m serious.”

“The reason I know you’re capable of all these great things is because I once was you.

You were not the first one rumored to be the savior.

That’s why some of the rebels don’t entirely believe Sethan’s choice in making a blood pact with you.

Because the ones before you failed. And I was one of those failures. ”

I drop my hand from her shoulder. “You…you’ve been in The White before?”

“No, I never could channel like you. It nearly killed me.”

“And you survived? How?” My gaze falls to her hands. To the wicked scars wrapped around them, angry and haunting. My voice lowers, if only slightly. “Were those scars actually from when you were sick as a little girl, or was that a lie?”

Her expression stills. “A lie.”

I flinch, even though I knew deep down her story wasn’t all it seemed. She was hiding things. The depths of those secrets were unknown, but some intuition told me they were there. Lurking beneath the surface.

I whisper, “What were they from, Marge?”

Silence.

“Answer me!”

She flicks her gaze down at her hand and clenches her fist. “They were from taking dragonblood. I am a Spoiled—that much is true. When I was your age, I fit the description of who they thought the savior would be. I was young, with long icy-blonde hair so much like yours. I knew far too much of dragons, and my grandmother taught me the secrets of medicine and magic. When a Close Circle member got wind of it in my town, I was taken to the King. The King thought I was the chosen one. He dragged me through the halls and demanded I try to hatch the dragon eggs he had been collecting. But it didn’t work.

He beat and tortured me, pulling me back from death every time with dragonblood.

And when that didn’t work, he raided my town, pulling people to use against me and force my hand into helping him.

He killed friend after friend in front of me.

My eldest brother escaped to the Dragon Lands, while my other brother stayed behind.

For me. But my eldest brother was killed in battle.

The King tempted me to pull the ley line magic so I could see my brother again and raise him from the dead if I tried hard enough.

Eventually, the King realized I wasn’t who he thought I was.

He knew I couldn’t do it. So, he sentenced me to a life as a healer for the throne, figuring he could at least make use of my knowledge.

Just as you are bound to your blood pact with Sethan… ”

She flips her hand open, exposing her palm and a sliver of white scarring her skin. “I am bound to the Arterian throne. To heal those in the royal family, regardless of whatever my reservations may be.”

“You…you signed a blood pact with the King? That’s why you always gave Darian alcohol?”

“No. Well…sometimes he might have swiped some. But what he was really after was dragonblood.”

The confession smacks surprise across my face. “Darian’s a Spoiled? That’s why he’s so much weaker now without it? Why he has so many scars? Why…”

Why he’s been shaking. It was never the cold. It was withdrawals . Was that also why he was so damn aggressive in the early days?

“Yes…go on?” Marge urges.

“I’ve noticed him shivering. And I thought maybe he was weakening because of the lack of training. He’s always been a bit of a temperamental man. But…it’s withdrawals, isn’t it?”

“Yes.”

“So…what happens if he doesn’t get more dragonblood? Will he die?”

“We all die eventually, do we not?”

“Will you just give me a straightforward godsdamned answer?” I hiss.

“Fine. It’s possible he could die a slow, painful death the longer he goes without it, yes. Though, it’s hard to say how long it would take. He’s been taking it since he was a boy. Could be months, could be decades. Side effects and long-lasting repercussions vary depending on each individual.”

My stomach twists as I recall one of the last few nights in Arterias.

“I drank from his flask one night. And I thought perhaps my alcohol tolerance was lacking but…I hallucinated. And one night when Archie and I swiped a bottle from the healer’s quadrant, I had a similar feeling. Was it all dragonblood?”

“Indeed. Though, the dragonblood I kept in the healer’s quadrant was much more diluted, and a different strain than Darian normally carried. The unrefined blood was designated for him only.”

The crates. The night Darian and I slept together, I turned the corner of his room and kicked a crate with liquid. Not wine, but dragonblood.

I take a small step back. “So, the times you used medicine on me…you were using dragonblood? You’ve…you’ve essentially tainted me to be a Spoiled? And everyone else you’ve treated?”

“Now, now, Katerina. Consuming diluted dragonblood a few times will help speed up the healing process. It won’t automatically make you a Spoiled. You need a strong dosage of dragonblood and at a consistent rate for it to taint your blood permanently.”

“So then if you’re a Spoiled…you’re still taking dragonblood?”

“No,” she answers softly.

“Then how did you survive coming off of it?”

“It was no easy feat. The withdrawals alone can drive you insane. But I slowly reduced my intake over months, until I was only taking a drop a day. Mixed with a softer dragon’s breath, eventually, I was able to completely stop.

There were times I slipped, but what mattered is I kept pressing on.

But Darian… that boy has been taking it almost his entire life.

I’m uncertain if he’d be able to do the same. ”

“How could you not tell me all of this before?” My voice pitches in irritation. All these revelations rocked me, throwing me off balance as I scramble to grab hold of the truth. What if this information could have changed the course of things if I had known earlier? “I thought you trusted me?”

“Sometimes there is a time and place for everything. You weren’t quite ready to know of that yet?—”

“And so you use the excuse of time as to why you never told me?”

“Katerina,” she warns. “There are many things you need to learn, but at the top of the list is controlling your anger. Being angry doesn’t constitute the right to be rude.”

“What else do you think I’m just ‘not ready’ to hear, Marge? As you’ve alluded to several times, the days are ticking by. Every wasted moment is time taken from what we can be doing to stop this war. To stop King Aaric!”

“And yet, things must be done in order. You cannot rush this, Katerina?—”

“It is so easy for you to say these things, Marge, when you aren’t the one responsible if people die!” I flick my hands up to the sky, my chest heaving with each angered breath.

“I know. I understand. You seem to forget I was the one who was in your shoes not long ago. Except, there was absolutely nothing I could do. I was misled and misguided. And yet, I still paid the price for hundreds of innocent lives.”

“Then if you understand me so well, cut the bullshit and tell me the Gods-honest truth. If you keep thinking I can’t handle it, then how do you expect me to grow enough to be able to? I have proven myself again and again to you that I can!”

“Let’s not get carried away here. You haven’t been entirely forthcoming with me either, so let’s not pretend you’re the shining example of honesty.

Don’t think I didn’t notice the dragon’s breath I specifically commanded you to only use on yourself is now gone.

And, miraculously, Darian seems to have made a full recovery after he should have been dead ,” she bites out.

My mouth parts, my breath coming out in an audible pant.

“Exactly. So don’t pretend you’re any better than I am.

I know you have your secrets, just as I have mine.

When I feel it is imperative for you to know, then I’ll share.

But until then, you just respect my advice.

” She looks me up and down in irritation.

“Now. Are we going to stand here and argue all night? Or are you going to put your coin where your mouth is and pull?”

I narrow my eyes, holding her stare until I relent and drop back into a crouch. I brush my fingertips across the ground, stirring the magic lying beneath the surface. It tugs at me with a familiar magnetic pull, calling to me with a desperate urgency.

As I press my fingers down into the dirt, welcoming the call, a zap of energy explodes into my skin. I tip away from reality. The environment around me is drowned out in bursts of light, fading in and out as they grow larger and form into one.

The last thing I see is Marge; her eyes trained on me and expression fading into the light. “When you get to The White, don’t touch anything or anyone. Just listen.”

A wave of pain ripples through me, my eyes roll back into my head as it nearly takes me over.

The next wave hits, and my control slips, the energy shooting up my fingers and through my arms like liquid fire, unlocking a guttural scream from my lips.

The pain is so blinding I can’t even silence myself.

I swim in an endless abyss of agony, until all at once, the instant stretches into eternity.

Like the snap of a finger, everything falls silent.

I’m stuck in an endless expanse of white, waiting. But nothing calls or whispers to me, and nothing shifts in the blank, colorless sheet surrounding me. My heart calls out to see my brother, mother, and father.

But no one comes.