Page 111 of The Moorwitch

“No! Wait! Conrad—”

“I have a job to do. I never should have thought that I could ...”

“There’s still a way out,” I whisper.

“No. Mrs. MacDougal was right,” he murmurs. “You were trouble all along, and I ... I wanted too much.”

He sweeps out of the room, still drawing in ropes of energy, and with his exit, every candle in the room and even the fire goes out, as if he pulled out all the air with him. He leaves me in darkness, tethered to the wall, my heart ripping in two.

Chapter Thirty-One

I shout and kick the wall, but neither Sylvie nor the MacDougals come running. I wonder if he placed a muffling charm outside my room, or a sleeping charm on theirs, to keep them from hearing my pleas.

In either case, I realize I’m the only one who can possibly free myself. I look around at everything within my grasp; there is nothing. Conrad’s mother’s shawl has slipped off the footboard and piled on the floor, its threads just out of reach. My hands are securely fastened, and though I pull and twist and curse, they will not come free. I keep trying until my wrists are raw and stinging.

Then, gasping out a sob, I slump over, strands of my hair stuck to my lips and my neck from sweat.

What will Morgaine do to him?

He may claim she is not the villain I think her to be, but I saw the dread in his eyes when he turned to go. She took one of his ancestor’seyesfor simply trying to run away. He swore to take responsibility for me, and yet I fooled him. His love for me put her rule at risk. What punishment will she exact? An eye? A hand? His life?

I have to reach Elfhame and explain myself. Perhaps I can offer her information on Lachlan in exchange for Conrad. More deals. More bargains. Fates, I’m a fool, but I am a desperate one.

With renewed vigor I struggle, thrashing and yanking my wrists until they bleed. Finally, panting and sore, my heart a hot coal in my breast, I force myself to draw even breaths and think.

There is not a chance of reaching my threadkit; the box lies out of my reach by nearly a yard. Nor could I reach the tasseled edge of the Anatolian carpet, or the ribbon tied around the window drapes.

Only one potential material lies within my grasp, I realize.

Steeling myself, I grasp several strands of hair and yank them loose. The pain is sharp but fleeting, and nothing to the pounding mallet of my heart. My ribs feel like they’re beginning to splinter, as if one more fit of pain might shatter them entirely and pierce my heart through with their jagged ends.

Concentrating hard, eyes shut against the darkness, I rely only on my sense of touch, on my five nimble fingers and the impossibly fine hairs twisted around them.

The first attempt I fumble at once, and the hairs fall from my fingers without so much as a whisper. Growling, I pull out more. Fates, if at the end of this night I have a bald patch—

Oh, you fool, if there was ever a worse time for vanity ... !

The next attempt goes better. I manage half a knot before the hair snaps.

Taking a moment to recenter myself, I try again.

I close my eyes and picture the hair, one single strand finer than any thread, pinched between my thumb and forefinger. My wrist stings where it chafed against the manacle of the mangled sconce. I push away the pain, pack it down and stamp on it until it’s nothing more than a dull prick at the back of my mind. Slowly, carefully, I catch the hair with my little finger, securing it taut against my palm. Then my middle fingers go to work, dipping, looping, pulling. Twisting themselves as no finger is meant to twist.

I can barely feel the hair at all, so light and thin it is, as insubstantial as the faerie queen’s spiderwebs. Will she kill Conrad with magic, Iwonder, or will she resort to a more traditional method—a knife, poison, a garrote?

No, no, I cannot lose my focus now.

Third loop from the left. Pull taut. Wind behind middle finger, pull through fifth loop. Pull taut.

It is no complex spell, really; with thread and two hands and good light I could Weave it in a heartbeat. Curse Conrad! He could have at least left me one free hand.

Thread beneath sixth layer. Over the fourth. Pull taut—

The hair snaps.

A feral cry of frustration rips from my throat before I can stop it.

But I still have the rest of the knot woven, and a finger’s length of hair left pinched between my thumb and little finger. If I can only manage to loop it over my middle finger ...