I arrived at Cadmus's house ahead of the rest of his men, and Sparrowfoot took me straight to his stall to eat and drink. I half-jumped, half-fell off his back before working to undo his saddle and tack. It was difficult to get his bridle off while he was drinking and scarfing down food, but I managed it. I even managed to get the saddle off, despite the darkness in the stable and my own yawns interrupting me. Unfortunately, two days of physical labor I wasn't used to and napping on the ground had left my arms way too sore to lift the saddle off the ground. I had to drag it out of the stall and over to the saddle posts sticking out of the wall.
As I straightened, my head throbbed. I leaned against the wall to catch my breath and hopefully ease the pain.
Something touched the base of my skull. I jerked forward, and cold metal dug into my neck, holding me back. Spinning around, I clutched the solid metal collar at my throat.
Falek stood to the side, watching. A red-orange scalewing reached for me with a steel chain. I dodged. He caught my arm and twisted me back to face him. The room spun.
[Help me,] I shouted to every drykon within range.
A click at my neck. The chain, he'd attached it to my collar. Why weren't the drykons helping? Falek knew I had a guardian. He couldn't- Mark said- My head hurt so much. Why was the room spinning? The ground was hard. And smelly.
"You said you wouldn't hurt her unless-"
What was Raeve doing here? Was she that little blur?
"It's just an arka suppressant. She's faking." That voice was new.
I couldn't feel my fingers or toes. "Please-" Only a whimper came out.
"Are you sure-" Thyr started.
"It's only a suppressant collar. I checked the equipment myself." The new guy sounded unsure.
Falek cleared his throat. "It must be faulty. I'm still reading twenty gerts coming off her. Switch it out for the stronger one."
"Twenty gerts?" the new guy muttered as he leaned down to unclasp my collar. "It can't be broken already."
As soon as the collar was off, I regained enough energy to lift my head, but the second collar dragged me down again. My neck burned, sending bolts of pain down my spine and through my skull. I couldn't feel my limbs or move them. I wanted to scream, but only the faintest whisper escaped me.
"She looks like she's in pain," Raeve insisted.
"She does," Thyr agreed.
"She can't be. It's a-"
"-an arka suppressant, I know. But have you ever tested it on a human?"
Before he could answer, Falek interrupted. "I'm reading forty gerts."
"Then it's your meter that's full of prip; my collars work. If she was really emitting forty gerts, I would feel-" He paused. "I would feel-" He gagged and luckily turned away before vomiting.
"Felk," someone cursed under their breath.
"Get the collar off her," Falek snapped. "She must have a protective charm."
The new guy staggered over. He touched my collar with a sizzle and a yelp. "Damn thing is burning."
"Then put on some gloves. And hurry, she's at fifty gerts."
"I told you this was a bad idea," Rave shouted.
All the blurs ran around looking for gloves and generally sounding chaotic. Darkness crept into the edges of my vision. I couldn't seem to fill my lungs with enough air. Were they even moving?
A roar made everyone fall silent. People ran in from outside. One of them immediately staggered away. The other grabbed my collar.
"Give me the felking key," Mark shouted.
There was a pause, followed by a thump. Mark ran away, and then he was back. He tore off the collar and threw it so hard that it clanked against a distant surface. Everything hurt. And smelled like charcoal. Still blurry, too.
"All of you, get the prip off my land before I sic the drykons on you." Cadmus sounded almost as angry as Mark had.
The blurs were scrambling to leave. One of them dragged another one away. The littlest blur didn't leave, but it stood a long ways away.
Mark pulled me into his arms and cradled me against his chest. He wasn't blue anymore. I liked it better when he was blue. Blue was my favorite color.
"She needs a healing potionâthe best you have. And keep everyone out."
"Mar'kost, I can-" Raeve started.
"Shut up." He took a shuddering breath. "Cadmus-"
"Got it." He ran down the stables.
Mark was trembling. He was blue again.
"Such a nice color." My voice sounded more like gurgles than words. The darkness covered more of my vision.
His breath caught in his throat. "You- you'll be alright." He stroked my hair. "Everything will be alright."
[He should not lie to you. You deserve to know what is coming.] Glacier was here too. She was the big white blur. [Yes, it is me. You will not die alone.]
I was dying?
[Yes.]
Oh. I didn't want to die.
[Few do.]
Muffled footsteps. "I can't come-" Cadmus gagged.
"Gira." Mark pressed the mouth of a bottle against my lips.
I barely felt the glass or tasted the potion. My entire body, including my face, was a mixture of pain and numbness. I couldn't tell if I was swallowing. Or breathing. Was this what it felt like to die? I didn't want to go, not now. There was so much I had to do. The other Earth people needed me. But there was nothing I could do about that right now.
There was only one thing left I could do. I had to let Mark go before it was too late. I needed my Interface.
[Here.] Something nudged my hand.
I tried to move my finger to activate the Interface, but I couldn't tell if I was moving.
[You are.] The same something as beforeâprobably Glacier's beakâgently gripped my hand and moved it in a circular motion.
Mark caught my wrist. "You're not dying." His voice broke. "You'll be fine. We- we'll be fine."
"Is she trying to unbind you?" Raeve called from a distance. "Let her do it. If she's dying, there's no point letting her bring you down with her."
"She's not-" A wretched noise tore from him as he clutched me to his chest. "She'll heal."
With his magic, he could sense my insides. He wouldn't be so upset if he really thought I wouldn't die. I strained my eyes to see the Interface display, but it was a blur of light on blackness.
[I can't see it,] Glacier admitted.
I needed a different Interface, one that wouldn't hide my information. Maybe Cadmus had one?
She moved away.
"Hey-" Cadmus started.
Glacius was coming back. Then everything fell dark. Quiet. Too quiet.
[I will move your hand.] She paused before sending me an image of the words she saw on the Interface. [What do these-]
Even my head was silent now. Peaceful.
***
A sob shook Mar'kost as the arka running through Liza's body just... stopped. Deep down, he'd known she would die from the moment he'd taken her into his arms. The feeling of dread that had drawn him here in a rush had told him something was terribly wrong. Now he knew what it was. The collar had somehow caused the crystage growth to speed up exponentially. It had overtaken her vital organs faster than a healing potion could regenerate them.
She was solid crystage now and weighed over a hundred stonesâmore than heavy enough to flatten his legs. Even if it'd hurt, he wouldn't have cared. Liza was dead. Nothing could hurt more than watching her die.
"What happened to-" Raeve stopped, wings buzzing. "Your face-"
Mar'kost realized he'd allowed his face to melt into his head. Normally, he would've been horrified to be seen like this, but he didn't care anymore. He couldn't imagine ever caring about his appearance again. Fury drove him to rise up like the shifters of legend, formless except for a host of undulating tendrils.
Raeve backed away, looking like she wanted to flee.
Cadmus raised his hands in a futile effort to calm the shifter. "I know this is hard. I can't begin to imagine what it's like to lose someone this way. But you'll regret killing her or going outside looking like that."
Mar'kost was torn between ripping Raeve limb from limb and throwing himself outside so Cadmus's men could end the pain consuming him. The barest scrap of reason held him back, but it wasn't enough to stop him from hurling a saddle at Raeve. It slammed her to the ground.
Tendrils dragging behind him, Mar'kost moved to curl around Liza's body. He pressed against her sides, wishing he could press life back into her cold, hard body.
If only he hadn't sent her ahead of them, she would be alive. They would be inside, eating dinner and talking together. She might even smile. He would miss her smile. Her warmth.
"Let's go," Cadmus muttered. He helped Raeve to her feet.
She shook her head. "I just- I have to say something." She turned to Mar'kost. "I told Thyr and Harker not to work with Falek, but they wouldn't listen, so I made him swear not to take her unless we could prove you were only protecting her because she enchanted you. They said they would just use an arka suppressant collar. It shouldn't have hurt her. They must've done something else. I- I'm sorry, I never wanted to hurt you. I thought-"
Mar'kost reached up a tendril to take a bridle off the wall and throw it at her.
She dove behind Cadmus. "Not in the mood to talk, understandable." She rushed out of the stables with Cadmus.
When Cadmus returned the next morning, he brought a wheelbarrow of meat for Glacierâwho'd stayed by Mar'kost's side all night.
With a sigh at Mar'kost's lack of movement, he poked the shifter. A tendril poked him back, hard, and he fell on his tail.
"You need to come inside. The workers'll get here soon, and they need access to the drykons. You can bring Liza. You'll have the guest bedroom to yourself." When Mar'kost didn't move, he added, "If you stay here, they'll attack you and tear Liza's body apart. Is that what you want?"
Mar'kost made a displeased noise. It was a stupid question; of course he didn't want anyone desecrating Liza's body. He squeezed his tendrils beneath her, forming a makeshift stretcher with his body. Lifting her a quarter-tail off the ground, he carried her toward the side door like a giant blue millipede with a statue on its back.
"Let me make sure it's clear." Cadmus stepped out the door and looked around before nodding at Mar'kost. "You can come out."
Mar'kost scurried over to the house and opened the door himself. He ignored Cadmus's wife as the longstrider let out a shriek.
"Sorry, I meant to warn you." Cadmus ran in, blocking an insistent Glacier from following suit. "You can't come in. You're too big."
Glacius snarled and snapped her beak but didn't try to force past him.
Mar'kost scurried through the living room and down a hall to the guest room. He arranged himself on the rug, looping around Liza's body.
After a while, Cadmus brought a plate of food and set it within range of Mar'kost's tendrils. The shifter ignored it, instead preferring to carefully brush off the ash that covered Liza's body from head to toe.
"You can stay here as long as you want, but I'm sorry; you can't keep her body forever."
Hissing, Mar'kost wrapped Liza in his tendrils.
"I won't take her away... until she starts to- become one with the soil. You'll have to bury her then."
He wrapped Liza tighter. He wouldn't let her fall apart.
Cadmus left.