Page 115 of The Ever King

I slumped back, then forced my limbs to keep moving and crawled, hand over knee, to the king.

The sword remained lodged in his back, and the soft bronze tint to his skin had gone pale. Blood soaked his tunic and the soil beneath him. Too much blood.

Erik let out a curse when he tried to shift. He’d taken a strike in my place. Teeth clenched, I leveraged behind him and took hold of his shoulders. When I tried to lay him back, Bloodsinger leaned forward. “Don’t.”

“Stop shifting,” I urged softly. “You’ll cause more damage.”

For a few moments he resisted, but soon enough, pain or exhaustion took hold and he slumped onto his side, his head on my lap. Mindlessly, my fingers raked through his thick hair with one hand, while my other kept a hand on the hilt of the blade, trying to keep it from sinking deeper.

“I mean what . . . I say, love.” Erik lifted his dazed eyes to mine. “Shouldn’t . . . touch me. Not with all the blood.”

Three hells. I closed my eyes, desperate to steady my pulse. His blood was poison, and here I was practically bathing in it.

He coughed. “Don’t get . . . any inside you.”

I nodded briskly, shifting my legs to avoid the open wounds of my thighs touching him. He would fight me off if he knew there were gashes on my skin, and if he fought me off, he’d bleed out, no mistake.

“I’ll do my best not to eat your blood, Bloodsinger.”

Another cough, but it sounded more like the bark of a laugh. He winced. “I should’ve . . . filled your . . . ass with sand, love.”

I placed a palm on his cheek and forced a smile. “You should’ve, you stupid fool.”

“Erik!” Tait’s rough voice came from the bedchamber.

I didn’t think of who spoke and shouted, “Out here!”

Tait filled the garden doorframe, shirtless, and his dark hair wilder, as if he’d been sleeping. Perhaps not alone. Two guards had blades raised at his back, and behind them, Celine and Larsson tried to get a look.

“Get your hands off him.” Tait’s face twisted with rage.

Well, damn.

How it must look. Blood all over my hands, my grip around the blade stabbed into the king. One dead man, and two more impaled by roots.

In quick steps, Tait was at my side, and yanked my hair. I cried out against the burn, but kept a tight hold on Erik’s shoulders.

“Release her, cousin,” Erik slurred. He tilted his chin toward the guards. “Look elsewhere for your king killers.”

You’re not going to die, I repeated the thought over and over, afraid to speak it out loud.

“I might,” he whispered, glassy eyes on me.

“No. I’ve seen worse wounds,” I whispered. “It’d be a shame to die over this one, Bloodsinger.”

“Right.” He closed his eyes, a sly grin twisted in the corner of his mouth. “I . . . forgot you were the one . . . with a blade in your gut.”

I snorted. My fingers stroked his hair swifter, as though the race of my pulse determined the speed of my touch. “It’s not in your gut. It’s lower; quit making this worse than it is to get sympathy.”

“Bring Murdock,” Tait snapped at Celine and Larsson in the doorway.

“He’s drunk,” Larsson said. “I mean it. Bastard is passed out in the great hall with his hands on the bare breasts of Sheeva.”

Larsson shuddered and grimaced.

“Then get him a damn tonic to clear his head,” Tait snapped.

“No time.” I tugged on Tait’s arm and pointed to the blood pooling under Erik.