Fearless (Mirrorworld 2)

The pain was stirring again in his chest, so suddenly that he could barely suppress the scream that wanted to explode from his lips.

Damn.

He clutched his bound hands to his chest. It will pass. It will pass. How many times now? Try to remember, Jacob! Five. This was the fifth. One more bite. There couldn’t be much left of his heart.

‘What is this?’ The Bastard looked anxiously at Jacob’s pain-stricken face. ‘Did Louis give you anything to drink?’

Jacob could have laughed, if he’d had any breath left. Not a baseless suspicion. The royal house of Lotharaine had a long tradition of poisoning its enemies.

The Bastard pulled Jacob’s hands from his chest and tore his shirt open. The moth was now as black as the onyx in Nerron’s skin, and the red outline of its skull-spotted wings looked like fresh blood.

Nerron recoiled as though he was afraid he might contaminate himself.

Jacob leant against the cave wall. The pain was subsiding, but he probably made quite a pitiable sight. Was this what the Red Fairy had in mind when she’d whispered her sister’s name in his ear? Had she pictured this while she kissed him? That he’d be writhing like a wounded animal, paying with his agony for her pain? Only that she wasn’t going to die of her broken heart.

She has no heart, Jacob.

Nerron poured out the wine he’d brought, and filled the beaker with a brown liquid. ‘Drink slowly,’ he instructed Jacob before putting the beaker in his bound hands. ‘I’m not sure your stomach can take Goyl spirits.’

It tasted like sugared lava.

The Bastard pushed the cork back into the bottle. ‘I have to be careful Louis doesn’t find this. He’d kill himself with it, and his father would execute me. This was the Dark One, I assume? I always wondered how you managed to steal your brother from under her nose.’ He put the bottle back in his sack. ‘The third bolt . . . you want the crossbow for yourself! What if that story is just a myth?’

‘I tried everything else.’ Jacob forced down another gulp of Goyl liquor. It warmed better than any blanket.

‘The apple? The well?’

‘Yes.’

‘What about Djinn blood? The ones from the north. Quite dangerous, but . . .’

‘Didn’t work.’

The Bastard shook his head. ‘Don’t your mothers tell you to stay away from the Fairies?’

‘My mother knew nothing of Fairies.’ Jacob ignored the curiosity in the golden eyes. What was the matter with him? Was he now going to tell his life story to the Goyl? Just one more bite. Maybe he’d die before he saw Fox again. He’d always assumed she’d be with him when he died. Not Will. Not the Fairy. Always the vixen.

Nerron got up. ‘I hope you’re not so stupid to think I’d let you have the crossbow as some kind of noble gesture.’

Jacob pulled his shirt over the moth. ‘You haven’t found it yet.’

The Goyl smiled.

His eyes said, I shall find it. Before you. And you will die.

‘What would you be searching for? If you weren’t busy trying to outrun death?’

Yes, what, Jacob? He was surprised by his own answer. ‘An hourglass.’

The Bastard rubbed his cracked skin. ‘I wouldn’t be racing you for that one. Which moment could be worth holding on to for ever?’ He touched the rock as though searching his memory for one that might have been worth it.

‘What would you like to find most?’ Jacob’s chest was still numb with pain.

The Goyl looked at him. ‘A door,’ he said finally. ‘To another world.’

Jacob suppressed a smile. ‘Really? What’s so bad about this one? And why should another be any better?’

The Bastard shrugged and looked at his speckled hand. ‘It’s my mother’s fault. She told me too many stories. The worlds in them were all better.’