Sorcerybound (World's First Wizard Book 2) by Aaron Schneider (best color ereader .TXT) 📗

As predicted, the elixir took some time to work. Rihyani’s eyes fluttered teasingly as her limbs trembled and her fingers twitched. Milo could feel Ambrose’s gaze shifting from the fey to himself and back, checking to see if anything the contessa had done was a good or bad sign. He could have told him that he had no idea if any of it was a good or bad sign, that he was flying blind, but he had a feeling Ambrose already knew that.

Milo watched silently, half-remembered prayers overheard in his youth going up with every twitch. He’d seen demons and he walked with a half-angel, so it wasn’t beyond hope that someone was listening, though in Milo’s experience, fathers and mothers, divine or otherwise, were never around when they were needed.

That thought, one thorny musing amongst a field of bitter brambles, dug deep into the prayers. The entreaties became pleadings, became demands, became accusations. Gradually, as his eyes bored into Rihyani’s supine form, he saw through her to the flow of essence he’d issued into her, which sparked and tickled along chords of magical power suffusing her frame. His will and fury stoked by his prayers-turned-condemnations lashed at the essence, driving it onward.

God was not here, but Milo the Magus was, and he would be damned if he let this fail.

“Milo!” Rihyani cried, and Milo’s eyes focused on crude matter once more.

The fey’s body was sinking down from a cruel imitation of ecstasy’s arch, her limbs still trembling.

“Milo,” she murmured softly, one hand reaching out to him feebly. “You hurt me.”

Milo, blinking and wondering at the wetness upon his cheek, met her searching wine-dark eyes and nearly gasped at the sadness rippling behind those golden pupils. Pain he had expected, anger he had accepted, but sadness struck him where he was unhardened and unguarded.

“I’m sorry,” he said, deflating as his guilt sucked the bile from him and left him aching. “I needed you to wake up.”

“All for the best, chéri,” Ambrose said in a steady, soothing voice.

The sadness still swimming in Rihyani’s eyes told him that neither of them was afforded the ignorant innocence of the bodyguard. Milo inwardly cursed himself for letting his emotions, and such powerful and bitter emotions at that, interfere with his magic.

As she stared up at him, Milo felt the urge to run and hide like a child, such was his shame, but then a shudder wracked her body, and he realized what was happening. He was making it about him again, and it was costing them time they didn’t have.

“The cowboy, Ezekiel, was hexed,” Milo began, his words coming clean and fast. “The knife was cursed too, so your wounds are cursed. That’s why my magic can’t heal them and they won’t mend on their own.”

Rihyani seemed to be struggling to maintain focus, her gaze drifting, but as he finished speaking, she began to nod.

“A Death Hex,” she whispered, and her eyes slid to half-mast. “We should have known. Should have und…understood…”

The words slid out, then the contessa lost the understanding of where she was, her head lolling one way and then the other. Milo hadn’t expected her to burn through this much of the elixir this fast.

He dropped down and took the hand he’d been too ashamed to hold before. Her skin was cold to the touch and rolled freely over the delicate bones of her hands.

“Rihyani,” he called, hating how weak he sounded. “Please, can you break the hex?”

Her head stopped rolling and she looked at him, her lips spreading into a glorious sleepy smile.

“No.” She sighed, her eyes drooping a little lower. “But you can.”

Milo’s fingers tightened around hers as though by his grip, he could keep her from succumbing to the trauma-induced slumber.

“How, Rihyani?” he pleaded. “Tell me how.”

With what must have been the last of her strength, she drew Milo closer to her.

“Tsminda Sameba,” she whispered. “Go there.”

Milo’s heart sank. He didn’t know where Tsminda Sameba was, but he knew every town and landmark within a day's travel. If it were farther than that, what hope could there be that she would last that long?

“Rihyani, we don’t have time for that,” he implored, his heart sinking. “You are dying.”

Rihyani shook her head.

“I’ve strength enough to wait for you,” she muttered softly. “Climb to Tsminda Sameba and ask to meet the marquis.”

Milo pulled back so he could look at her face, his heart beginning to beat in his ears as he felt the magic weakening in her and her grip on his hand loosening.

“The marquis?” Milo asked, the questions springing from his tongue before he had time to even consider them. “Who is that? A fey? Will he help me, teach me how to break the curse?”

Rihyani’s eyes were closed now, but her smile was even more brilliant, as though transported by whatever she saw behind her eyelids.

“He won’t want to,” she said, a laugh she didn’t have the strength for dancing behind her words. “You’ll have to make him see.”

“See what?” Milo demanded even as he felt her slipping away. Ambrose’s big hand descended on his shoulder.

“Easy, Magus,” the big man muttered thickly. “Easy.”

“See what?” Milo repeated miserably.

But Rihyani was unconscious once more, fresh blood seeping from her bandages.

10

The Truth

“Not that I mind you taking a concern outside your study,” Lokkemand called sharply as he strode into his office, heels snapping on the stone floor. “But I do prefer it when subordinates ask to enter my office rather than assume the privilege.”

Milo straightened from gazing over Ambrose’s shoulder as he sketched out a rough imitation of the map before him. Goat-toothed Dieter watched, helpless and befuddled, from the door until Lokkemand firmly shut it. It wasn’t a slam, but it was hard enough to punctuate his entrance.

“Do you care to explain to me exactly what it is you are doing?” he asked in a tone that made it very clear it was a courtesy. “Or do you want me to start filling in