He bit back a response that would only get him in more trouble.
She set down the blade and hauled the tiny dragon off Vesper. Once she placed the creature down, it scrambled behind the privacy partition in the room. Then they both stared at each other and something foreign passed between them—a flicker of fate or promise or fuck he didn’t know.
Vesper’s brows pulled together. “You’re going to think I’m insane, but I was looking for this woman for a few reasons. One of them being this prophecy. You’ve surely heard of it.”
“That poetic crap about the world ending? Yes, I’ve heard it.” The woman’s lip curled. “We’re in enough trouble as it is. We don’t need you coming in here and upending things. We’ve allbeen dropping like flies because of the bloodlace. The fever is the least of our worries.”
He stared at her, not sure what to say. He obviously knew the bloodlace was bad, but the two combined were catastrophic. And, like him, maybe she was lost and looking for a light at the end of the tunnel. And if there was anything that could help, he would take it. He wasn’t sure what Zyphira meant by his past, present, and future waited, but maybe answers to all these problems could be found here.
“What if—” He cleared his throat. “What if I said I had a solution to all your problems? That I’ve been sent to this woman with purpose. That I’m supposed to find others with the burden of mimicry. Likeme.”
Her eyes widened but she let him continue.
“And what if I said I’ll find a way to rid this bloodlace if you give me a chance? That an Oracle sent me here—”
“The Oracles have been gone for a hundred years.” She reached for her blade and slid it into her belt, then rolled her eyes and said, “And I would tell you that you’re out of your mind.”
But a questioning look bled between them.
Vesper took his best guess, took a chance, because something had led him here and now and this felt like fate. “You’re her, aren’t you?”
She clenched her jaw and looked away.
But her name punched out of him in a breathless plea of both hope and surrender. “Kyrith?”
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
EMMERY
Emmery was blind. Her hold on Destonne’s hand ripped away as the frigid waters stole the air from her chest. Without him, only an endless expanse of nothingness stretched on forever. Fear consumed her like white light cut through shadow, and even when she swept her arms out, she found neither Brennen nor Destonne.
Shit. Well, she was on her own now.
She had lost all sense of direction, and the water became a disorienting maze. To get her bearings, Emmery released a spurt of air from her lungs and watched the bubbles rise. Without hesitation, she descended the opposite way.
The obsidian water invaded her nose and mouth and her eyes burned as she tried to peer through the nothingness. Panic accompanied the constriction in her lungs, but she clamped a lid over it.
She couldn’t afford it. Not now.
No life existed in this water, be that fish, plants, or even a current. Only the bubbles disrupted the blackness.
A shiver worked its way up Emmery’s spine, but not due to the chill. A creeping suspicion prodded her that, in spite of the barrenness, something watched her, hunted her, salivated over her—
But it couldn’t be possible. What could live in this lifeless pool of shadows?
The water stirred and a current formed around her, ensnared her in a tidepool. Her stomach dropped as she spotted a strange blur in the water cutting through with inhumane speed. She turned—
But too late.
It slammed into her and sent her spinning backward.
Its claws circled her ankle and wrenched her toward it. She barely caught a glimpse of its jagged teeth before it tugged her down. She flailed her arms as it dragged her to gods only knew where, and she futilely fought, even as her feet connected with some part of it. The impact wasn’t enough to loosen its grip. Her heel struck it again, but its hold only tightened. She inhaled a mouthful of putrid water, and the second the liquid hit her lungs, she knew she was in trouble.
The thing swiped at her arm and claws skimmed her skin. A bloom of blood seeped from the shallow slice to speckle the water.
Emmery struck again, with more force this time and panic-fueled limbs. The thing spun and she got her first good look.
Wholly black eyes like sullen charcoal locked on hers. Emmery tried to flail away but its grip on her tightened and all the air thrust from her lungs as a deep needling fright stole all the oxygen inside her. She could barely think, barely feel her body as she met that depthless gaze. That inhuman sinister expression on a skeletal face of sharp bones and skin stretched too tight. So tight it threatened to crack. Its body was a slimy mass of black with scales like chipped paint. And this creature had long, jagged nails sharp enough to peel her flesh like flakey cheese.