He went to Jacob’s side.
‘How did he open the gate?’ he asked Fox. ‘It was easy, wasn’t it? It simply let him in.’
Fox didn’t answer him.
The Bastard drew the bow.
‘He himself explained it to me. The time spell only gives back life if it captures a relative. I most definitely don’t qualify, but Guismond was quite alive. Which means . . . ?’
Jacob could barely hear what the Goyl was saying. His own heartbeat was too loud, his laboured breath, his body’s final attempts to hold on to life.
‘That’s why the gate let him in. That’s why he was faster than I.’ Nerron’s throaty voice was getting louder, as though he could convince himself that he was the crossbow’s rightful owner. He caught himself doing it, and his next words again sounded as cool and cynical as they usually did. ‘Well, well, who would have thought, Jacob Reckless has the Witch Slayer’s blood running through him.’
Jacob would have laughed had he the strength for it. ‘Nonsense.’ He barely got the word out.
‘Really?’ Nerron stepped back and lifted the crossbow.
‘Let me shoot. Please!’ Fox’s desperate voice cut through the rush in Jacob’s head.
‘No.’ Nerron took aim. ‘How else can we prove this isn’t about love?’
Fox’s cry was stifled by the Waterman’s hand.
And the Goyl shot.
His aim was good. The bolt struck Jacob’s chest right where his blood was painting the moth on his shirt. The pain stopped his heart. Dead. You’re dead, Jacob. But he could hear his heart. Strong, and no longer stumbling. It hadn’t beat this regularly in a long time.
He opened his eyes and closed his fingers around the bolt that was sticking out of his chest. His heart hurt with every beat, but it was beating. And the wound did not bleed.
He gripped the bolt more firmly. His chest was numb, and he managed to pull it out with one tug. It didn’t hurt half as much as the moth’s bites, and the sharp point was clean, as though he’d pulled it out of a piece of wood instead of his own flesh.
The Bastard came towards him and took the bolt from his hand.
‘Let her go,’ he said to the Waterman.
Fox was shivering as she knelt down by Jacob’s side. Shivering with rage, fear, exhaustion. He wanted to take her away, far away from Bluebeard chambers and enchanted palaces.
Fox looked at him in disbelief as he got to his feet. The skin above his heart was flawless. Even the wound left by the moth had healed. He felt as young as on the first day he went treasure hunting with Chanute.
The Bastard looked at him with a wry smile. ‘That would also be a good story for the papers: Jacob Reckless has the Witch Slayer’s blood.’
He pulled a swindlesack over the crossbow and dropped the bolt into it.
Jacob looked at the mirror. The Bastard could be right, even if not exactly the way he thought.
‘You still want to sell the crossbow to Crookback, or did Louis ruin his father’s chances?’
Talk, Jacob. Play for time.
He’d made a promise to Dunbar.
Fox looked at him.
Two against two.
‘What will be your price? A castle? A medal? A title?’ Jacob looked at the mirror again. Fox had noticed it as well.
What if he was wrong? It was worth a try.