‘Oh no. No.’
The blast of winnowfire had hit him from the left, it seemed. That side of his face – his beautiful face – was a red and black ruin, as was his neck, and from what she could see of his arm, it was in a similar state. The hair on that side of his head had been burned back from his forehead, and now hung in smoking clumps. Incredibly, he still held his sword loosely in one fist.
‘Fire and blood, no.’ She grabbed hold of his shoulders and shook him, not knowing what else to do, and to her surprise his eyes popped open. He seemed to focus on her for a moment, but his gaze was wild, skittering away from her face to the fires behind her. ‘Tormalin! You have to get up, come on.’
He shook his head once, and she saw him shudder with the pain. He fought to stay conscious, however, and one long hand came up to grip her arm. Standing up straight, she shook him off and looked around wildly. There was no sign of Vintage anywhere, and the smoke was thickening all the time. She took a few steps towards the wreckage.
‘Vintage! Vintage, where are you?’
There was no reply. She stumbled first to the left, and then to the right, desperately searching for any sign, but everything was mud or twisted moon-metal – no sign of the scholar anywhere. Turning back, Tor was briefly lost in the smoke and she felt a fresh stab of panic, but then she spotted his pale hand against the dirt.
‘Listen to me, Tor, we have to get out of here.’ She slid his sword through the loop of his belt, and with more strength than she thought she possessed, yanked the tall Eboran to his feet, staggering as he stumbled against her. She felt the heat of his blood sinking into her coat, and she swallowed down a white-hot panic. Moving him might kill him, but if they stayed here, the parasite spirits would come again and they would surely be dead.
‘Tor, have you seen Vintage?’
It occurred to her that he was probably in shock, might even have been deafened by the explosion. Pulling his arm over her shoulders, she yelled into the smoke.
‘Vintage? Vintage!’
There was no reply. The blasted remains of the Behemoth carcase remained merrily aflame, pieces of it falling around them, while a shuddering groan from inside spoke of some deeper, more fatal collapse happening. She peered up at the Behemoth, trying to make sense of the mess even as the boiling fire stung her eyes. Was that a human shape in there? A shadow, something curled in on itself. Another crashing groan, and more pieces of fiery debris flitted down around them. They had very little time.
‘Vintage!’
The parasite spirits had all fled, but at that very thought a surge of images she didn’t recognise forced their way into her head. Noon cried out wordlessly, staggering under Tor’s weight. She saw a man very like him, tall and beautiful, with hair like old, golden wine, wearing armour that appeared to be made of bright white scales. He smiled at her, and then the vision was gone. Noon shook her head.
‘Vintage? Where are you? Fuck.’
A shimmering of lights appeared through the smoke. Noon didn’t stick around to see what it was. Instead, she took hold of Tor as firmly as she could and walked him away from the wreckage and into the trees, hoping she remembered where the gate to the compound was. The sky was darker now, with the deep grey bruise that meant rain, sooner or later, and the shadows between the grotesque trees were long and deep.
The walk to the gate was nightmarish, and more than once Noon wondered if she was trapped in some terrible dream. She was walking too slowly, Tor was a silent weight, his blood soaking into her, and hidden things watched them from the dark places. Vintage was surely dead, and they would be turned inside out by a spirit before they ever reached the gate. When she did see the enormous doors, she almost fell to her knees with relief.
‘Tor, we’re nearly there. Stay with me.’
A figure stepped towards them out of the growing shadows, and Noon was surprised to see Esiah Godwort, his eyes wide with shock. Outside of the great house he looked wilder somehow, and lost. There were cobwebs caught in his hair.
‘There is a fire,’ he said.
Noon nodded. ‘We were caught in it. Can you help me get him back to your home?’
‘My boy is in there,’ said Esiah, but he looked away from the forest and pulled Tor’s other arm over his shoulder, and together they staggered back to the courtyard of the house. At the door, Esiah turned to go.
‘Where are you going?’ demanded Noon. She realised, faintly, that her voice sounded muffled to her own ears. ‘I still need your help!’
‘My boy is in there,’ he said again, as though this were all the explanation required. He turned away from them and walked back across the courtyard. Noon called after him, telling him to look for Vintage while he was in there, but he didn’t turn back. They didn’t see him again.
Inside the house, Noon had an unsettling moment of light-headedness, black spots jumping at the edges of her vision, and she had to stand still, taking deep breaths. The chorus of voices she had heard at the moment of the explosion had not entirely gone; she could still hear them, a tide of whispers that gnawed at her every thought. Her head pounded sickeningly.
‘Come on,’ she said to Tor, trying to gather the last of her strength. ‘You heavy bastard.’
She couldn’t manage to drag him up the great sweep of stairs, so instead she found the servants’ quarters by the kitchens and there she laid him down on a bed. He muttered to himself as he stretched out and started to tremble all over. Noon slumped against the wall and slid down to her knees.
‘I got you here,’ she said. ‘I have to go back.’
Tor did not reply. She wondered how long this shock would last, and what would happen when he finally came back to himself; when he realised what had happened to him. When he realised what had happened to Vintage. Wincing, she pushed herself to her feet and went to his bedside again, forcing herself to look at him clearly.
She swallowed hard. The injuries were terrible. She knew from all of Mother Fast’s stories that Eborans were fearsomely strong and healed quickly, but that was the Ebora of old, the one fed and nurtured by the sap of their tree-god. This Eboran was far from home, in a time when his people were weak and dying. She doubted he would live to see the morning, and knowing that, she couldn’t leave him.