My friend is clever, cleverer than I’ve ever given him credit for.
I can’t help but assume he has a backup plan.
Even though I can’t see the Rip, I can feel it. Thrumming. Whistling in the faint breeze. There’s a sliver of the air in front of us that seems to call to me more brightly, and I find myself reaching for it, though I’m not sure what I’m expecting.
It’s not for my fingers to find solid air, the silky sheen of a Fabric invisible to my eyes.
My entire body shudders at the chill of it. The Fabric, invisible as it is, is cold. I wonder how far I could trace the Fabric. If I clung to it, could I follow it all over Alondria, feel the Fabric that separates the realms, or could I only feel it because of the energy emanating from the Rip? Once I reached a far enough distance, would the connection then fail?
A hand traces up my arm, Az closing in on me from behind. The heat of his torso presses to my back, and my stomach turns over.
He traces his fingers up my arm until he too touches the Fabric I hold between my fingertips.
“You feel something, don’t you?” he asks, his warm breath shooting shards of icicles into my ear.
I nod. Az knows anyway, and it’s to my benefit that he believes I trust him. Maybe then I can convince him to remove the gag.
Wouldn’t that be nice. Imagine what we could do to him, then, says my magic.
I don’t particularly want to imagine, but I can’t really blame my magic for its excitement over the idea of torturing Az.
“Blaise, bring me my satchel,” he says. There’s shuffling behind us—Blaise, doing as he says.
Tools rattle as Az reaches into his satchel behind me.
What he produces from the bag, I can’t see, but he lets out the slightest of gasps, and when he brings his fingers to mine again, they’re dripping with blood. His blood, I realize.
I flinch as he spreads the warm, wet substance over my fingertips, whispering hushing sounds in my ear, as if to soothe a child after a minor fall and scrape.
Once my fingers are coated in Az’s blood, he takes my hand and begins to use it as a quill.
The runes Az traces on the Fabric in his own blood are unfamiliar to me.
My magic scoffs. Are you so familiar with any runes?
I’m not, so that’s fair.
Still, these aren’t like any script I’ve ever read, and though some of them look like pictures, others have shapes that trigger absolutely nothing in my memory.
Blaise must recognize some of them, though, because her voice goes stony. “Where did you find those?”
“Written all over the floor of that wretched dungeon they kept you in,” says Az. “As well as those you couldn’t seem to manage to scrub off the floor in that dazzling ballroom. I made a few modifications of my own. Do you like them?”
Blaise’s expression melts back into the impassivity she seems to have perfected.
This is one of those moments when being gagged is rather inconvenient, because I, for one, would love to ask what in Alondria they’re talking about.
“I don’t think there’s any use in binding Asha’s magic to her body,” says Blaise. “It seems she and her magic both like the setup they already have.”
Az shakes his head, causing his cheek to brush against mine. “I’m not binding Asha’s magic to her body. Like I said, I made some modifications. Besides, does it look as though I’m drawing these runes around Asha?”
When he’s done, he pulls me away for a better look.
The runes written in Az’s blood sear hot, then settle into a pale white circlet that hangs suspended in midair.
“You’re binding the Rip? I thought you wanted to open it,” Blaise says.
“All in good time,” Az says.
I don’t like this. I don’t like this at all, says my magic.
Yeah, well, I don’t like it either.
You can’t open it, Asha.
Part of me wonders if I already have.
But then Az brushes a strand of my matted hair, tucking it behind my ear, and whispers, “It’s time. I need you to open the Rip.”
I nod frantically, as if in understanding. Perhaps Az really is delusional enough to think Kiran has been forcing me to love him, and that the separation from him will have caused the effects to fade by now.
But Az just shakes his head, and when he speaks, anger boils in his voice. “I hate what he’s done to you, bending your mind like he has. Forcing you to forget how much we love each other. That you were mine first.”
My entire body stills at that comment, tears of fury springing into my eye at the audacity of it.
But Az knows my allegiance isn’t with him.
So how does he plan to force me to open the Rip?
