Page 61 of Poisoned Kingdom (Secrets of Dagome #1)

Roksana

T he healer’s clinic should have smelled different.

With all the ingredients on the shelves, a polished wooden table for patients, and meticulously scrubbed floors, it should have been a place of peace and healing, but right now, it was anything but.

With so many people crammed inside, it was pure chaos.

Tova’s hand hung limply from mine, the slimy flesh peeling under my touch. I didn’t know what to do, but I couldn’t let him lose it.

He’s resilient, and the healer said it’ll save his life.

The voice in my head sounded reasonable, but I was past reason. Tova would eventually adapt and overcome the disability, but I couldn’t stand another man losing a part of themselves because they’d helped me.

‘Not fucking happening,’ I whispered through my tears.

The power that had awakened inside me once again silenced the voices in the room, allowing me to focus on my injured friend. I may not have known what to do, but the aether surrounding me felt almost sentient as it seethed.

I recognised the emerald inferno that had stopped the healer. It was the pressure I’d felt all my life—the desire, the need to touch the power, to feel it coursing through me . . . and now, for the first time, it had answered my call.

Tova’s hand twitched in my grasp before his fingers hung limply again. I looked down, battling the stench of gangrene threatening to overpower my senses.

If I can purge the pus seeping from his wounds, it would stop poisoning the rest of his body. Poisoning . . . If I treat this like it’s poison . . .

An idea emerged, and I didn’t question the inspiration.

Anything was better than sitting here uselessly watching him die.

I inhaled, shaking with an emotion I couldn’t identify, and focused on Tova's life energy.

It felt wrong—corrupted by the sickness that consumed his flesh.

I called to it, following my instincts, accepting the poison as my own, welcoming it, but the putrid liquid resisted.

‘Fuck. No, not like that . . . I need to merge with it first,’ I muttered, preparing myself. I wove my aether into the tainted strands in his body, just like I had for Jagon’s apprentice.

Agony burned through my chest, my free hand squeezing into a fist so tight that my nails drew blood, and I stifled a moan. I can control this . I’m no longer a clueless, uneducated apprentice. Pain will not defeat me, I told myself over and over again until my despair gave way to sharp focus.

I searched my memories, trying to recall everything Ciesko had taught me, everything I’d learned from Jagon and the dusty volumes I’d studied during my time in Wiosna. My fingers weaved all the sigils I remembered, desperate to find one that would help.

‘Sana, please, let the healer work,’ Reynard said, appearing behind me and placing a hand on my shoulder.

I shrugged him off. ‘Step away,’ I snarled, focusing on my task while the power inside me strengthened, spreading its tendrils until I understood what to do.

Reynard’s grasp tightened for a moment, but he let his hand drop and took a step back.

I concentrated completely on the aether, marvelling as it changed from barely visible threads to solid, interwoven strands that filled the world with life-giving energy.

They were bright and powerful everywhere except for Tova’s hand.

I could still see the traces, the echoes of what had been, but the aether there was a mess of blackened, withered fibres, the emerald streaks of my power flashing within.

‘Come to me,’ I whispered, calling on my power.

The flashes transformed into pulses, growing in strength and anchoring the damaged strands.

They flowed towards my hand, twisting and weaving with my essence, becoming a part of me.

They resisted at first, refusing to detach from Tova, but soon my magic overwhelmed them, and they peeled away from his flesh.

My breath hitched when I realised it had worked. Tova moaned, jerking in response, but the flesh, now free from the rot, warmed under my touch, telling me exactly what I must do.

I briefly looked at Reynard. ‘Hold him.’ I issued the curt command, uncaring that I was ordering a king.

Rey put his hands on Tova’s shoulders, pressing him down.

‘If you know what you’re doing, I’ll help the best I can,’ he said, ‘but Sana, don’t let him die because you’re worried he’ll blame you. As long as he survives, he won’t—just like I don’t . . . at least not anymore.’

His voice was so calm, so reasonable, but I could barely hear him as I was worked like a woman possessed.

Broken strands were cut away, and as I whispered beneath my breath, new strands blossomed into life.

My mind directed and wove them into the damaged areas, creating new, healthy prongs and supporting those weakened or crippled.

As I worked, something happened. Tova’s breath deepened, his heartbeat steadied, and the tissue, which, moments ago, looked rotten, started bleeding.

Fresh, brownish dwarven blood replaced the foul slime, while fragments of bone and flesh fell to the ground, pushed out by strong white bone and pinkish flesh.

‘Zivie, Mother of Healing, help us. What are you doing, woman? This is forbidden magic! You can’t transform his essence. He is a sentient being. Stop it—you are creating a monster!’ The healer behind me was frantic, trying to pull me away.

‘Take him away and ensure he doesn’t disturb her,’ Reynard snapped, and the commotion that followed nearly distracted me from my task. I worked as fast as I could as the healer continued to shout, still struggling with the guards.

‘You may stem the infection,’ the old man said, ‘but his hand will never work again! There’s too much bone and muscle missing. You will condemn him to a world of suffering where even a touch of wind will cause him pain!’

The healer was determined to stop me, but his words had the opposite effect.

‘And how is chopping his hand off any better?’ I sneered, but he was right. I’d removed the gangrene and its corruption, but though the flesh now looked healthy, it was still broken and torn. Unable to feel any sort of triumph, I felt a sob trying to break free.

Tova would live, but his hand was more a pointless outgrowth than a working limb, useful for his inventions. Worse, I didn’t know how to stop the bleeding. The rejuvenated tissue oozed profusely, but I didn’t trust the healer to ask him for advice. I suspected he wouldn’t be keen to help, anyway.

‘Fuck!’ I cursed, slamming my hands on the wooden table. Aether spread over the surface like green lightning, hitting the dwarf before sinking into his body, which absorbed it like a dry sponge.

Tova moaned softly, his spine arching, eyelids fluttering as whatever sedative they had given him wore off.

Whatever my outburst had done to him, he no longer appeared to be on the brink of death.

Colour returned to his face, his muscles tensed under my touch, and I faced the dread of telling him he might never have use of his hand again.

How does anyone give this kind of news to a friend?

I shut my eyes, squeezing them so tight my head hurt. My hands tightened on the wooden planks, digging into its surface so hard a splitter pierced the sensitive pads.

I knew no one could create flesh out of thin air, but had anyone ever tried?

Tova groaned again, the remaining fingers of his mangled hand twitching on the table. If he were awake, he would tell me not to worry, that he would build himself a prosthetic—

That’s it .

I didn’t need flesh, but something that could replace it. He was a tinkerer—he didn’t care for a pretty hand, but he needed it working.

But what could replace the missing tissue . . .

My mind latched onto a memory: Tova bounding into my infirmary, waving around his newest invention, a contraption I didn’t understand, but remembered commenting that it looked just like a light elf’s hand.

The power inside me responded, weaving itself around my hand and his, seeping into the table.

The wood swelled, glowing and changing, becoming pliable as it enveloped my friend’s ruined hand.

I bit my lip while the aether flowed like water as it merged with Tova’s life force, the wood transforming into bone and tendons.

I watched with perverse fascination as it became whole, a seamless fusion of fibre and flesh.

Thought made form. I’d imagined his hand whole, the memory of his invention brought to life by my magic. I blinked, seeing veins on the back of Tova’s new hand. Did that just pulse? Did I . . .?

‘Monster!’ the healer howled, startling me. ‘You’re a godsdamned monster!’

The power I’d used for this miracle slipped from my control. The dwarf’s hand tightened into a fist, the three perfectly formed wooden fingers moving in unison.

I didn’t have time to admire my work. Tova’s eyes flew open, and he screamed my name.

His dark pupils held an ocean of suffering, but when I tried to withdraw my aether, I couldn’t.

Panic flooded my mind as the power grew angrier, unwilling to return to me.

Untamed and restless, it sought a new target.

‘Sana, stop! Please stop!’ Tova shouted, pulling his hand away, tearing the connection between us.

I tried, but I couldn’t. The precarious control I’d had over my magic was gone, and I became the tool of my power rather than its master.

‘Get him away from me,’ I hissed through clenched teeth, unable to look at Reynard, begging fate for him to understand.

I cried in relief when Tova was dragged away, and I watched helplessly as the table came to life, growing new branches, each one reaching for Reynard and his burden.

I now understood why Ciesko wouldn’t teach me vivamancy, why the healer called me a monster.

I didn’t wield the power of creation; it wielded me .

It was as if the aether possessed my mind, and it wanted to change, to transform, to shape life into countless fresh forms.

I was helpless to stop it.

‘Leave! I can’t control it . . .’ I muttered, bent over the table, coughing up blood while I desperately attempted to restrain the flow of power.

Pressure built in my head as blood dripped from my nose, staining the wood.

My knees buckled, and I would have crumbled to the floor if Reynard hadn’t caught me, hissing when the emerald magic reached for him.

‘Don’t touch me!’ I screamed, afraid of what it would do to him, but he didn’t let go.

‘Tell me what to do! How can I help you? I’m not leaving you, Viper. Not even your power can cast me out.’ He grasped my chin, forcing me to look at him, but all I could see was his eye glowing gold with wild magic.

The berserker took the reins. I looked into the soul of a beast, knowing he stood with me against this monstrous force, but in my attempt to save Tova, I’d doomed us all.

‘I don’t know . . .’ My throat was so tight that even those words barely escaped. I used all my energy to stop the magic from reaching for him, directing it inwards.

Let it be me. If you need to tear something apart, let it be me. Don’t hurt him, please, I cried, bargaining with a force I didn’t understand.

A crash shook the room, the door bouncing off its hinges as Irsha stormed in, roaring my name like a raging bull, his face still marked with traces of my sleeping powder. He looked me in the eye, shock twisting his face into a terrifying mask as he rushed towards me.

Reynard shouted a warning, but Irsha was faster. Before the king could stop him, Irsha grasped my neck with well-aimed pressure, and I fell into a welcome oblivion.