“Mika, we need to go,” Marcus said, his voice thick.
His magic burned inside me through our link—fire, too strong; earth, too generic. After the baetyl’s purity, his imperfect magic revolted me. Lashing out, I tried to sever the link between us. Elements so slender they may as well have been made of silk trickled from me. Marcus’s magic clamped down around the link, locking us together and seizing control. Panicked, I jerked my arm from his, stumbling to catch my balance when my wrist snapped free. The baetyl hummed at the edge of my awareness, an invitation to link extended as soft as a gargoyle’s offer of enhancement. All I had to do was open myself to the power, all that glorious power . . .
Marcus slumped to the side, eyes closed. “Fight, Mika,” he mumbled, his words slurred.
Confused, I sidled closer. Did he want me to fight him? I tentatively slid my awareness down the link between us, jerking back when I encountered the knot he’d made around our link. His usually sparking, fiery signature flickered, fuzzy around the edges despite how hard he held on.
I lifted my fingers and swiped sweat from my eyes. When had it gotten so hot? As if waiting for me to notice, the heat grew oppressive, the air thick with humidity. I sucked in a breath, my lungs laboring to pull oxygen from the moist air. Oliver had said the baetyl should have been warmer—
Oliver!
I spun toward the exit. It was barely visible through the weave of crystals, but I remembered sweeping Oliver up and Celeste with him. I’d helped the baetyl kick them out, and we hadn’t been gentle.
My body tilted and I crashed into the crystals next to Marcus. I managed to get my right forearm up to protect my head, but the impact jarred my brain, knocking my thoughts askew. When I refocused, I was staring at Marcus. He looked awful, but it was only my assessment this time, untainted by the baetyl’s perception of beauty. Pain pinched his mouth into a tight line, and his eyes were sunken, the skin around them tinged with gray and the rest of him flushed an unhealthy shade of magenta. The veins in his neck stood out with strain.
“We need to leave,” I croaked.
He dragged his gaze to mine, and the relief in his expression centered me. Then his eyes rolled back in his head, and he fell backward onto the sharp crystals.
13
I scrambled to his side, lifting his head to feel for cuts on his scalp, cursing when sticky blood coated my fingers. Fragments of how to heal human tissue floated through my memory, utterly useless, and the more intently I tried to remember, the more the pieces slipped away. I wouldn’t be able to heal him, and the closest healer was back in Terra Haven.
Oh, gods, we’d never make it.
“Wake up.” I tapped Marcus’s cheek. Heat weighted my already spent body, and I choked on each moist breath. I slapped him harder. “Wake up, lummox. I can’t haul you out by myself.”
The baetyl’s magic sang to me, welcoming me back into its embrace. I wouldn’t have to do it by myself. All I had to do was open myself to its tremendous power; then lifting Marcus’s puny body would be no problem.
I shook my head. There was nothing puny about Marcus. That was the baetyl whispering in my thoughts. If I let it back in . . . The thought of relinquishing all that power a second time dredged a sob from my chest. I didn’t think I could do it twice, and once I was reconnected with the baetyl, I couldn’t guarantee it wouldn’t take over and bury Marcus in the mountain.
Struggling to ignore the baetyl’s siren song, I slapped Marcus, holding nothing back. His head rocked and his eyes fluttered. I leaned closer, hand raised for another strike. Sweat and tears dripped from my chin to his chest.
Marcus’s eyes snapped open and he lashed out, crushing my wrist in his fist while his eyes searched mine.
“We need to move,” I rasped.
He released me with a ragged breath.
It took us four tries before we both got our feet beneath us. Marcus’s eyes lost their focus and he sagged against me as we stumbled toward the exit, his breathing labored. I wrapped my arm around him and did my best to support him on quivering legs.
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” I babbled. “You’ve got to hang on. A few more steps. You’re too strong to give up now. I need you to stay with me. I want you to. You were right: I like you. You can’t give up on me now before I have a chance to get to know you. You can’t let me have blown my chance with you. Just keep going. I’m so sorry. A little farther.”
We were five feet from the exit of the baetyl when Marcus toppled again, taking me down with him. Blood trickled from his nose, and I couldn’t wake him. Whimpering, I pulled my leg out from under him, scraping my knee on the sharp crystal floor.
I rolled Marcus onto his back, then fell across his chest when my body gave out. With the tiny crystals packed together like so many teeth and the strangling, moist heat, I couldn’t shake the illusion that we were inside a monster’s mouth, waiting to be crushed. Waiting. Waiting . . .
Marcus’s ragged breathing finally prompted me back into action, and I crawled to crouch at his head, wedged my hands under his armpits, and heaved. He inched across the jagged floor. When his mangled sword sheath caught on the crystals, I used a knife from his boot to cut it free, then left both behind.
“Mika?”
I tugged Marcus another three inches and collapsed. My butt felt like it’d been beaten with a porcupine, but the pain was distant. The only thing that mattered was getting Marcus out of the baetyl.
“Is that you?”
I glanced down at Marcus. His eyes were closed but his mouth gaped open. I stared at his slack mouth, uncomprehending as the voice repeated, “Mika?”
Finally I thought to look up. Oliver hunched inside the tunnel at the edge of the crystals a few feet away, eyes so wide they looked like circles.
“Oliver!”