Once you look into the abyss
There is no going back
You will forever carry
The abyss with you
“Sean! Sarah! It’s Elodie! Niall! Help!” Nicholas ran back upstairs, as fast as he could go with no eyesight, tripping and falling and hitting his face on the stones.
“In my old room!” he screamed, ignoring the blood coming from his lip, where he’d hit it. He ran down the corridor, bursting through the rosewood doors and feeling his way across, calling Elodie’s name. He felt something jump on his face and attach itself to him. Instinctively, he fell backwards, falling heavily to the stone floor.
Sean had found Elodie’s room empty. He’d gone to see how she was feeling, if she had got any sleep.
Stepping into the hall, he saw Nicholas barge into the room with the double doors, and followed. He nearly tripped over Nicholas, who was lying on the ground with a demon-spider on top of him. It was already weaving its deadly web. And on the stone floor there was something else, a white cocoon, as big as human being – a slight, thin form – blonde hair escaping from the silky threads . . .
“Elodie!” Sean threw himself on the ground beside her, clawing at the threads until he freed her face. “Elodie . . .” He took her head in his lap. “Please wake up.”
Close behind were Sarah and Niall.
Sarah knelt beside Nicholas and buried her hands deep into the Surari’s skin. She saw Nicholas’ fingers sparkling with blue fire.
“Don’t! You’ll set me on fire!” she warned him. At that moment, Sarah’s hands began to prickle – it was as if she’d touched a nettle – and then they were hurting, a searing pain. She howled as a liquid as corrosive as acid seeped from the Surari’s skin together with the Blackwater and burnt her skin.
Nicholas couldn’t breathe any more; the demon-spider was covering his nose and mouth. Dreadful sounds were coming from his chest as he desperately tried to draw oxygen into his lungs. Sarah didn’t move; she kept dissolving the creature, even though her hands were so sore she feared they were going to melt away.
Niall’s song rose into the air, but all of a sudden he noticed the open window, banging in the wind. He leapt towards the glass, but it was too late. A black leg covered in thick, coarse hairs had slipped in. He stabbed it with his dagger, trying to keep the window closed, but it was no use. The blade couldn’t penetrate its thick hide. The demon-spider crawled inside and crept down the wall with a horrible scuttling sound. Niall’s song rose again as he watched the creature climb onto one of the columns of the four-poster bed and perch itself on top of the canopy, waiting to pounce. But before it could attack, an arrow broke through the air and embedded itself between its pincers. Niall turned back towards the window, just in time to see that another demon was on the windowsill, trembling with the pain of his song – but it wasn’t stunned enough. It leapt on Niall and silenced him, making him fall backwards.
Alvise growled with rage. He, too, tried to stab the demon-spider over and over again, but the blade couldn’t find a way in through its armour-like shell. He had to hit the creature between its pincers, to try to make it turn around, to expose its soft spot . . .
Sean saw the creature attaching itself to Niall’s face and Nicholas trying in vain to breathe. Still on the ground with Elodie’s head in his lap, he started tracing the runes, red lights condensing into ribbons in the air. The ribbons tightened on the Surari clinging to Niall’s face, dragging it away from him, strands of a silky web hanging from its pincers. They threw it on the ground, and Alvise was on it at once, piercing its soft spot with his pugnale, black blood spraying from the wound. Some of the liquid sprayed Alvise’s face, and he screamed. It burnt like acid. Right at that moment, Sean realised that Sarah was moaning softly. He turned to see her on the ground beside a puddle of Blackwater, holding her red, raw, blistered hands in her lap. Nicholas was free.
“Sarah!” he called, horrified. “Are you hurt?”
She dragged herself up and kneeled beside Sean and Elodie.
“It’s okay. I’m alive, anyway. Elodie?” she whispered, gazing at her friend’s grey face, the remains of silky webs still all over her body.
“I feel a pulse, but she’s so weak. It’s like there’s no blood left in her!” Sean took her bloodless hands in his. After all they’d been through, to die like this, in this alien world, from a wound they couldn’t even see.
Nicholas felt his way towards Elodie, white threads still hanging from his face, sticking to his skin. Yes, my father is a man of his word, he thought bitterly. “The demon-spider couldn’t have had enough time to feed on her,” he said, his voice shaking. “It’s the Azasti, making every little wound deadly. She’s bleeding inside.”
To die of rotten blood. “No. Not Elodie,” Sean begged without shame. “Nicholas. Nicholas, please. Is there anything you can do for her? The cure your father promised . . .”
“There’s nothing I can do. He didn’t have a cure,” Nicholas said.
Sarah’s eyes widened as she heard the pain in his voice, saw it etched all over his face. He wasn’t lying. He cared for her, she realised.
Nicholas felt for Elodie’s hands and took them from Sean, and surprisingly, Sean let him.
A million thoughts were racing through Nicholas’ mind. He couldn’t possibly do it. He couldn’t possibly inflict that on Elodie. It was better for her to die . . .
“Nicholas, if there was even a grain of truth in your father’s promise . . . If there’s anything you can do . . .” Sarah pleaded.
“He. Was. Lying!” he stated. Nicholas was telling the truth. There was no way he could have given them the cure.
Because the cure was him: Nicholas. And the side effects were too horrible for words.
He couldn’t do it.
And then Elodie opened her eyes slightly, and she saw Nicholas above her.
“Don’t let me die,” she whispered.
It was a moment. A split-second decision. For once, he wouldn’t let someone who loved him die – like his mother, like Martyna. “Sean. Your dagger,” he commanded.
Sean looked at him for a moment. He’d never thought he would give Nicholas his sgian-dubh, but something in his voice made him obey. Nicholas grabbed Sean’s sgian-dubh, took off his jacket and rolled up his sleeve. He cut his own arm, digging a deep, bloody trail from his elbow to his wrist. Blood began dripping from it in a scarlet stream. For a moment there was perfect silence, except for Elodie’s ragged breathing.
Nicholas took Elodie from Sean and sat her up, one arm around her shoulders, the other – the bleeding one – against her face . . . He let his blood drip into her open lips, smearing her face and chin. Sarah gasped, while Sean and Niall were frozen in silent horror. Alvise stood aside, memories of his sister’s marking stronger than ever. Micol clasped her hands over her mouth – Elodie’s aura was turning from grey to black as she drank.
“Sean . . .” Sarah whispered. Sean shook his head, revulsion and dread painted all over his face. He would not stop him. He couldn’t stop him, or Elodie would die.
They all watched Elodie drink Nicholas’ blood, her chin and lips smeared with it as if she’d been butchered herself. She fell into what looked like a deep sleep in his arms, the back of her head resting on his chest. Her breathing wasn’t ragged any more, but deep and slow.
Nicholas carried her onto his bed, laying her down gently.
“Is she cured from the Azasti?” Sean’s gaze wasn’t leaving Elodie.
“Look at her nails,” Nicholas replied. Elodie’s fingernails weren’t blue any more.
Sean’s legs gave way with relief. “She’ll live, then,” he said, stroking Elodie’s bloodied face. Only then did he notice that she wasn’t wearing her own clothes, but a long, embroidered dress.
“I don’t know,” said Nicholas. “My blood has . . . consequences. But she’s strong.”
“What consequences?” whispered Sarah, and couldn’t keep the rage and suspicion out of her voice. “Is she going to obey your orders now? Have you turned her into a minion?”
“Elodie is alive and breathing. It’s all we can ask for now,” Niall said in his gentle way. A thud interrupted him – it was coming from downstairs.
“So much for your powerful spells!” spat Sarah. “There are Surari all over the place!”
“Elodie opened the window,” Nicholas explained simply. “The spells were broken. I’m sorry. I should have warned you . . .”
“Too late now!” she replied, and her eyes glowed green.
“Niall, get Elodie up,” Sean commanded. “You can still sing while holding her, but I need my hands to trace the runes. Alvise, you’ll lead Nicholas—” Another thud interrupted him, and this time it was closer. It came from the corridor . . . and then another bang against the door, and scraping, and scuttling. Niall’s song was rising already as he held Elodie’s unconscious body in his arms.
“Micol, open the door and jump aside,” whispered Sean. Micol hesitated for a moment, but she steeled herself. She jerked the door open and immediately a fan of electrical charges spread from her fingers as she jumped back. A landslide of spiders, some as big as a human head, some as small as rats, rolled into the room. The battle was a frenzy. Everything was so fast that only instinct kept them going, directing their blows, telling them where to hit next. There was just one thought in all their minds: don’t let them jump on your face and weave their webs . . .
“Out! Everybody out!” Sean bellowed over the din.
“Our stuff!” shouted Sarah. They needed their jackets and blankets and food. They couldn’t survive in the forest without them.
“No time!” Sean replied as they ran, the demon-spiders after them, impossibly fast on their thick black legs.
They made their way down the corridor – and then there was a thump.
Micol had fallen, but just as a spider leapt on her she raised her electrical hands, enveloping the creature in blue charges. The Surari fell on the ground, but another one was on her at once, and another. She screamed. Would Sean and the others not stop? Would they not stop to help her? And then she heard Sean’s whispered words in her ears, and Alvise’s grunting as he stabbed the spiders with deadly precision. And she was free.
A strong hand held her up – Sean’s – and she kept running blindly, throwing herself down the stairs, through the open door and into the night.
The Surari would not be deterred, scuttling behind them and camouflaging their black hides among the trees and in the undergrowth. Alvise kept turning around to shoot arrows into the Surari pack. Every arrow he shot was one less in his quiver, and these ones he would never retrieve. Sean and the others had stumbled ahead, but Micol was running beside him – until suddenly, she stopped and turned to face the spiders.
“Micol!” he called. Did she have a death wish?
“I have an idea!” she shouted, and raised her arms, throwing her head back. The night lit up in a rainbow of colours, as lightning shot from her hands, her mouth, her eyes, lifting her up off the ground in an electrical storm. A lethal web of lighting spread in the air around her, hanging in between the trees and among the branches as if it, too, were a spider web.
Micol folded her body in half like a coiled spring, the edges of the electrical web trailing from her fingers, moving with her as she stepped aside and crouched among the trees. She’d created a kind of electrical fence, and her body was the generator.
Alvise watched in disbelief as one, two Surari threw themselves against the barrier and were immediately electrocuted, caught in the multi-coloured rays, their hairs smoking and flesh burning with a nauseous smell. The other spiders stopped and cowered, flat on the ground. Alvise took his chance, hitting the rest of the demon-spiders through the electrical web with a shower of arrows, leaving his bow one after the other as fast as the eye could see. They were both immobile, Micol crouching among the trees, shaking with the effort to continue the charges, and Alvise ready to shoot. There was no sign of the others, and the night was still.
“I can’t keep going for much longer,” Micol whispered, panting as if she were running, her hands, spread out with rainbow rays trailing from them, trembling. Suddenly the charges disappeared, and with a soft whimper, Micol let herself fall to the ground.
“Let’s go.” Alvise took her by the hand and helped her up.
A voice came from the darkness. “Alvise! Are you okay? Micol?” It was Sean, emerging from the shadows, his sgian-dubh glinting in the moonlight.
“She killed the lot,” Alvise told him proudly.
Sean was speechless for a moment. “I wish I’d seen that,” he said finally. “I left the others further on. Let’s go. Quickly.”
They ran towards the others – only then did Micol notice how cold she was. Her teeth were chattering so hard she could hear the noise inside her head. Creating the electrical barrier had taken everything out of her.
They were sitting in a circle facing outwards, Elodie in the middle, lying on the grass.
“This girl fried the spiders up,” Sean announced.
“All of them?” Niall asked.
“There’s no way to know. Let’s move. I want to get as far away as I can from that place. Elodie?”
“Still asleep.” Niall’s arms were aching, but he went to pick her up again, holding her against him. She’s as small as a bird, Niall thought with tenderness. He remembered when they first met. She mistook him for an enemy, and stunned him with her poisonous kiss. The deadly princess, he’d called her.
“I’ll take a turn,” said Sean, stepping towards him. “Stand by if I need to use the runes,” he added, and Niall nodded. He took Elodie in his arms, and was shocked at how hot she was. It felt as if she were burning with a fever, but when Sean placed his ear against her chest he felt that her pulse was slow and regular, and her breathing deep. “Will she sleep for long, Nicholas?”
“I don’t know.” His face was tight, his forehead creased in a frown. Sean’s heart sank – there were things Nicholas wasn’t saying, about what would happen to someone who’d drunk his blood. Sean didn’t want to ask.
“We’re left with this, and nothing else,” said Sarah patting her backpack as they marched on in the muted light of early dawn. They’d had to leave everything. They had no sleeping bags to keep them warm through the nights, no jackets, no food, no water.
“How did you manage to bring it with you?” Sean asked.
“I grabbed it as we ran. It was near the door. I hadn’t finished packing, though, it’s half empty.”
“So what’s in there, Sarah?” asked Sean, the strain of carrying Elodie evident in his voice.
“A water bottle, half empty, two packets of biscuits. Matches. A bar of chocolate. That’s all. The rest was still unpacked.”
“At least we were dressed,” Niall pointed out, forever the optimist. “Had this happened in the middle of the night we’d all be in our underwear now.”
“And we have our boots on,” Alvise added.
“Speak for yourself. My shoes are falling apart,” Micol said miserably. She could feel the ground at every step, with her feather-light ballerinas shredded from walking and running.
“Have we finished complaining? We’re alive!” Sean scolded them.
“For now,” Niall said in his ‘this-is-great-fun’ way that defied even the most tragic of circumstances. “After a night in the forest with no jackets and no sleeping bags demons will just lick us to death, like ice lollies,” he said.
“It’s not long to my father’s lair,” Nicholas intervened. “We’ll be there tonight.”
Micol shivered and wrapped her arms around her small frame. And then she saw it again, a warm orange light, hovering at the edges of her vision. Before she could turn around, the light was gone.
It was then that Elodie started screaming again.