“Do as she says,” the prince ordered, his voice tight with barely contained fear. “Now!”
As they hurried from the room, I turned to Alain. “Keep his head tilted back,” I instructed, guiding his hands to position Thibaut’s head properly. “The poison swells the throat. He needs to breathe as long as possible.”
Alain complied wordlessly, his fingers trembling slightly against Thibaut’s sweat-slick skin. The moment the door closed behind the guards, I placed my hands over the wound, feeling the heat of infection radiating from it.
“What are you—”
“Shh,” I cut him off. “I need to concentrate.”
I closed my eyes, reaching inside for the warm flutter I’d felt earlier. It responded instantly, as if it had been waiting for my call. Not the borrowed power I’d used to shield myself from Gaspard, not the forest magic that flowed through the castle, but something that belonged to me alone.Goddess-blood, the Dark Lord had called it. My birthright.
The warmth spread through me, flowing down my arms and into my fingertips, creating an electric tingling where my skin met Thibaut’s. I whispered wordlessly to it, asking rather than commanding, guiding rather than forcing.Find the poison. Draw it out. Save him.
At first, nothing happened. Then, slowly, I felt a resistance beneath my palms, like trying to pull a splinter from deep flesh. I pushed harder, mentally tugging at the poison molecules, asking them to recognize they didn’t belong in this body.
“Look,” Alain whispered, his voice thick with awe and horror.
I opened my eyes to see black droplets rising from Thibaut’s wound, defying gravity, hovering in the air above his skin. Just like with Bastien in that other realm. The sight made my heart surge with triumph and fear. It was working, but now Alain had seen indisputable evidence of my power.
Thibaut’s body suddenly went rigid, a scream tearing from his throat as more poison began to extract itself from his veins. The black droplets multiplied, forming a small cloud above his arm, each one containing enough toxin to kill a man.
“You’re hurting him!” Alain cried, his grip on Thibaut’s shoulders tightening instinctively.
I shot him a withering glare, not breaking my concentration. “It’s not comfortable to have poison ripped from your veins,” I snapped. “But it’s better than dying. Hold him still.”
Thibaut thrashed against us, his body fighting both the poison and its removal. His screams would likely bring the guards running back before I was finished, but I couldn’t stop now. Not when I could see the poison responding, rising like reverse rain from every infected part of his body.
“Trust me,” I told Alain, softer now, my glowing eyes meeting his over Thibaut’s writhing form. “Please. I can save him.”
Something in my expression must have convinced him because he nodded once, grimly, and tightened his grip on his friend.
The last of the poison lifted from Thibaut’s body, gathering in a swirling black cloud above my hands. Now came the hard part…the price of this magic. I couldn’t simply release the poison into the air. It would seek another host, perhaps multiple hosts. Magic required balance, exchange.
I took a deep breath and willed the poison cloud toward me. Alain’s eyes widened in horror as the black substance flowed toward my chest, disappearing into my skin through myfingertips. The effect was immediate. Fire racing through my veins, my lungs seizing as if gripped by an invisible hand.
“What are you doing?” Alain’s voice seemed to come from very far away, though he stood just across the bed. “Isabeau, stop!”
“It’s the price,” I managed through gritted teeth, fighting to remain conscious as the poison dispersed throughout my system. “Don’t worry. I won’t die from it.”
“How can you know that?” He reached for me, but I waved him away.
“Because,” I gasped, my vision blurring at the edges, “this is my second dose today. Bastien’s poison... from across the veil... last night.”
His face contorted with confusion and fear. “Bastien? Who is—”
Footsteps approached in the hallway. The guards were returning with the herbs. I forced myself to straighten, though every movement sent daggers of pain through my body.
“The herbs,” I whispered urgently. “We need to make it look like that’s what healed him. He can’t know. None of them can know.”
The door swung open as the guards returned, arms full of the plants I’d requested. Thibaut groaned on the bed, the color already returning to his face, though he looked as if he’d been through hell. To anyone entering the room now, it would appear I hadn’t yet begun to treat him.
“Perfect,” I said, my voice steadier than I felt as sweat beaded on my forehead. “Crush the yarrow and comfrey together. We’ll make a poultice for the wound.”
I worked quickly, my fingers increasingly clumsy as the poison worked through my system. Unlike Bastien’s poison, which had been demonic in origin, the pufferfish toxin was natural, something my body might eventually process. But combinedwith my already weakened state and the earlier magical drain, it was pushing me to my limits.
The room tilted and swayed around me as I packed the herb mixture onto Thibaut’s wound and bound it with clean linen. My head pounded, each heartbeat sending fresh waves of poison through my bloodstream. But I finished the task, tying off the bandage with fingers that felt too large for my hands.
“He’ll live,” I told Alain, my voice slurring slightly. “The... the fever will break by morning. Bring him to me when his wound needs new dressing.”