Hoping against what I already knew, I said, “You fought with the Coracks. How could you betray them like this?”
“Without you, the Coracks will be extinguished anyway.”
“Without me.” Now my heart sank. I bit my lip and nodded in understanding. “Because I’m the second demand.”
“You, with your newfound powers. He can take them from you now.”
“And once he does, he will become even more powerful.” I was terrified and fighting the instinct to run, but mostly I was angry at the feelings of betrayal, the coldness of her having pushed magic on me and then traded it away with my life. I said, “Whatever he’s promised, he will come for Brill eventually.”
“But not today,” she said, refocusing the bow at me. “I really do wish we could have been friends. This isn’t personal.”
My heart thundered against my chest as I spoke. “I disagree. What is about to happen is very personal.” Even at the expense of my life, Lord Endrick could not have my magic. Holding my breath for what was coming, I leapt at Wynnow, arms out.
Immediately, she fired the disk, which sliced into my shoulder. Pain seared through me, and I looked down to see the black disk embedded deep in my flesh. I had seconds to live.
“Why did you make me do that?” she screamed. “He’ll be angry!”
“Good.” I fell to the ground.
“He’s come all this way. If you die now, he’ll destroy us.”
“Starting with you, I’m sure.” I was in immense pain and felt my body shutting down. But I’d use my last breath to get at her.
Wynnow knelt beside me. “Maybe if I take the disk out, you’ll live until he gets here. I can save you until he arrives.” She ripped the disk from my shoulder, which hurt almost worse than it did going in. I cried out and the lights began fading around me.
I grabbed her arm, holding her near me so that when Endrick walked in, he would know this was her fault, that she had broken her own promise. I wished she could feel my pain.
In that very moment, Wynnow gasped and started to pull back. I’d have thought little of it, but just as she weakened, I felt a surge of life.
Her life. I was pulling her life back to myself.
“What are you doing?” Her voice sounded weaker—it was weaker.
And I was beginning to understand why. My shoulder was healing, even as Wynnow was crumpling to the floor. I wouldn’t kill her, I never wanted to be that person. But I held my hand where it was until I was restored enough to sit up, then I staggered to my feet, leaving her on the ground in a semiconscious stupor. I didn’t know how long that would last, but since Brillians were superior at nearly everything, she was bound to recover soon. I had to leave now.
No, I should have already been gone. Behind me, in the palace, footsteps marched down the corridor, heavy enough that their echoes carried all the way out here. Endrick’s footsteps.
I looked around the open stables. There was nowhere to hide, and I had no weapons of my own. I grabbed Wynnow’s bow and her satchel that had held the black disk, hoping to find another one, but when I checked, it only held the stone tablet she’d shown me earlier. So I grabbed the sword at her side and sheathed it. And finally, I picked up the black disk she’d used on me and returned it to its pocket. Then I stood back, doing my best to aim the weapon at where I thought Lord Endrick would appear when he came through the doors. It wouldn’t kill him, but perhaps I could slow him down long enough to escape.
The door opened, and as soon as I saw his scarred face, I fired. The disk went higher than I’d hoped but still flew toward his shoulder. He reached up and grabbed the sharp disk out of the air with his hand. On it was the grip glove, and his hand was uncut. He crushed the disk with his fingers, dropping shards of black dust to the ground.
“I gather that crude attempt on my life means your memories are restored,” he said.
In my anger, I forgot to be afraid. “My memories are returned, along with my strength and my determination to complete my quest. You are no king, no Lord of anything. The Scarlet Throne does not belong to you, and I will not rest until the rightful king has the throne, and you are in the grave.”
He smiled, amused by what he surely considered my idle talk. “Then you will never rest, my dear. Certainly, you will not do so today. Go to your knees.”
My legs began to weaken, folding to his order, but I refused to kneel. I faced him with all the fire and determination inside me. I would not kneel.
“I gave you an order.” With the grip glove, he grabbed my arm like a vise and I immediately collapsed to my knees. He kept the pressure there, intending to punish me.
But I was furious. I would not kneel to him any longer, I’d decided that already. Not by choice or by force or by weakness, I would not kneel.
Or if I had to, then so would he. I put one hand over his as it gripped my arm and sent the full force of my magic into pulling at his life force, just as I had done with Wynnow. He cried out in anger and sent a bolt of pain through me. It weakened me, but I filled my strength again by taking it from him.
Again, he filled me with daggers of pain that I survived only by sapping his own strength. He believed he was hurting me, and he was, but if he continued this way, he might kill himself.
Endrick tried to pry my hand off his, but this cycle of taking and giving life seemed to have bound us together. As long as his grip glove was on me, I could no longer release my hold on him. Slowly, I stood again. His hand was still on my arm, flooding my body with pain, but I sent every bit of it back to him, pulling from his strength to make myself stronger.