Something Extra - Hungry Heart - Ch. 27

Chapter One  / Chapter Two  / Chapter Three  / Chapter Four  / Chapter Five  / Chapter Six / Chapter Seven / Chapter Eight / Chapter Nine / Chapter Ten  / Chapter Eleven / Chapter Twelve / Chapter Thirteen / Chapter Fourteen / Chapter Fifteen / Chapter Sixteen / Chapter Seventeen / Chapter Eighteen / Chapter Nineteen / Chapter Twenty / Chapter Twenty-One / Chapter Twenty-Two / Chapter Twenty-Three / Chapter Twenty-Four / Chapter Twenty-Five / Chapter Twenty-Six 

Chapter Twenty-Seven – A Curse At Sea

Varg growled and lunged toward the fight. He had yet to see clearly who was friend or foe, but Toru needed help. Something must have happened there, as his nose could tell him. The stench of death was everywhere.

“Getting to it without me, puppy?” Claw shouted behind him and, by the sound of heavy paws hitting the floor, following him.

“You’re free to get a chunk out of these wrongdoers,” Varg shouted back, his eyes on Toru and his fight with the giant shroud.

“Moony!” Naella hurried into the fray.

Varg threw a harried look back. “Duril, take care of her!”

He didn’t wait for the healer to reply, knowing very well that he could count on him. From the corner of one eye he noticed the caravan master Margrave holding a dagger at an old man’s throat. However, that wasn’t the most incredible thing he saw; that honor belonged to a group of men dressed in merchant fashion who were swaying and crying, while stretching their hands toward Margrave and that old man.

Their thin arms protruding from their large velvet sleeves were white like bones. Varg blinked. They were bones, whitened by the passage of time, and a chill coursed down his spine at the sight. All of this he observed in the blink of an eye, and then all of his attention was trained on Toru and his absurd fight.

At least the boy seemed to be keeping his position on top of Toru by gripping the fur at the scruff of his neck quite tightly. His little body was shaken to and fro as the tigershifter struggled to avoid the living thing that was the shroud, an ominous elemental that was trying to wrap around them both.

No explanations were needed. The time to dally was gone. Varg circled the shroud and caught one edge of it, pulling it as hard as he could toward himself. Claw got the gist right away and grabbed the thing with his sharp teeth from the opposite side. Toru bounced right off the middle and slid down.

“Friends of yours?” Margrave shouted over the whirlwind dying down, probably addressing Toru.

Varg could feel his jaw tightening as the shroud tried to pull away from him and jittered like a trapped animal. Without looking, he could tell Claw was in the same predicament, and they might not be able to keep it like that for long.

Naella hurried to take Moony from Toru’s back as soon as they were down, and Varg saw Duril taking both mother and child and pushing them through the broken wall and outside into the hallway, as far from harm’s way as they could be. That was one less problem to worry about for now.

However, the dark forces at work were putting up a fight. Never in his life had he ever thought he would have to go against an inanimate thing like a shroud. But this thing had some form of life in it and, while that was astonishing and hard to believe, it was also frightening.

“They are!” Toru replied to Margrave’s question.

Varg couldn’t say a word as the shroud struggled against the grip of his fangs, so he just watched as Toru hurried over to the caravan master.

***

He had never been happier to see Varg in his life. And was that… a bear? He had seen a few in the forests he had traveled all his life, but never one this big. Where could Varg and Duril have picked up such an impressive companion?

But this was no time for questions and stories. That time should come later. Right now, Toru realized with absolute certainty what he had to do. If what he had learned of fate and its mysterious ways so far was true, Margrave couldn’t have been put in his way by chance.

“I need your dagger,” he said in a noncommittal voice and opened his palm.

“That’s a big ask, young tiger,” Margrave said while holding Blayves tightly to prevent him from running.

The horrible undead merchant was not trying to get away, but he kept his hollow eyes on Toru, challenging him.

“I need to put an end to the shroud. And then, you’ll get all the treasures you want,” Toru promised.

It wasn’t like him to lie, but if there were any precious stones and other things the pirate thought of value in there, he was welcome to them. Shroudharbor would be saved, and getting rid of that treasure born from blood and lives that could have been was a small price to pay.

“The choir’s making me feel a little chilly. You know, to the bone.” Margrave gestured with his chin toward the faceless men that were gathered around them and continuing their wailing chants.

And where was the spindly man? Toru couldn’t see Geruf anywhere, and that was enough reason to be concerned, yet not one that he could allow to cause him to postpone what had to be done.

Behind them, the shroud billowed, animated by unseen forces. Toru knew it had to be a feat of strength for the wolf and his newly found companion to keep it from breaking away from them.

“The dagger, Margrave,” he asked in a strained voice.

The pirate sighed, frowned, shook his head, mumbled something to himself, but eventually released Blayves from his hold and placed the dagger in Toru’s open palm.

He wasted no more time. He grabbed the dagger and hurried toward the shroud.

“No!” Blayves bellowed, and Toru could tell, by how all the hairs on his head stood on end, that something foul was on his heels.

The swishing of clothes let him know that the sobbing choir of faceless men was after him as well. A short look into Varg’s eyes warned him that danger was upon him, but he didn’t hesitate. He jumped as high as he could and pushed the dagger into the fabric of the shroud which, as expected, began giving in as soon as he sliced a long gash into the quivering fabric.

“You senseless creature, how can you destroy something so beautiful, so perfect?” Blayves barked behind him.

Toru didn’t pay him any mind. He leapt and dragged the dagger through the shroud again, aiming to create an even larger cut.

***

“You two stay here,” Duril told Naella. “Toru will prevail against this evil, too.”

“Too?” Naella asked while holding her son and shushing him gently, a hard thing to do with the clamor of the fight and the shouts coming from the shroud room.

“I must go back and help him,” he replied quickly, not wanting to say more than he had already done.

“Be careful, Duril. And… thank you, and your friend.” She held Moony tightly, and the boy, maybe knowing that he was safe now in his mother’s arms, began crying.

“I will.” Without another word, Duril hurried to join the fight.

Toru was getting busy with a dagger, cutting chunks out of the large shroud, while Varg and Claw were holding it by the sides. The caravan master that had enlisted their services was on the ground, rolling away from a mass of velvet robes following him and trying to get their hands on him.

Duril stepped toward him, not knowing what he should do, exactly, but determined to help him get away from the clutches of his attackers. Right at that moment, the thin man that had acted as a guide for the caravan master only hours before moved toward Toru. He was holding a large rock in his arms, swaying under its weight, but obviously determined to hurt the tigershifter with it.

After another quick look at the caravan master who seemed able to avoid the other merchants despite his large size, Duril made his choice. “Watch out!” he cried out and broke into a sprint.

He slammed all of his weight into the thin man, making him tumble and drop the rock.

***

Toru heard Duril’s warning and turned to witness Geruf being thrown to the ground and dropping what looked like a heavy stone. He ground his teeth in anger and continued to chop away at the shroud.

“Do you think you can take me and my friends?” he shouted furiously.

Behind him, Blayves’ cries intensified. He felt something grabbing his leg and looked down. The master merchant’s face was laced by deep cuts, mirrors of the ones he had been slashing through the fabric until now, and the sickening smell of bad blood rose from him. “Stop killing it, beast! Stop killing me!”

Toru pushed him away or tried to because Blayves held on tightly. The next thing he was aware of he felt something sharp against his calf. This time, when he looked, he saw the undead merchant sinking his teeth into his leg.

The pain was sharp and made him lose his balance for a moment. He grabbed the shroud with one hand and continued his work with the dagger while his leg twitched in pain. Soon, he felt relief as the biting ceased and when he threw a look over his shoulder he saw Duril grabbing Blayves and pulling him away.

The shroud finally folded and fell to the ground, allowing everyone to see the frightening blanket of corpses covering the area it had concealed.

Toru breathed heavily and knelt on the floor. It wasn’t because of the fight or how quickly he had applied the dagger to the cursed shroud, but because of the harsh pain in his leg. It felt like there were still long teeth buried inside his calf, reaching the bone.

“Could someone bloody help me now?” Margrave shouted.

Toru watched as Varg and the bear hurried toward the mass of faceless merchants and began thrashing them around. They all fell on the ground as empty robes and piles of bones. Duril rushed to him, instead.

“Toru, what is it?”

“The leg,” he whispered, his forehead all sweaty, and the shirt clinging to his back.

He could tell Duril was worried. The healer lifted his pant leg and looked at his wound.

“Hey, he’s trying to get away!” That was Margrave’s voice, and Toru turned his head only to watch helplessly as Geruf dragged his master’s bloodied body away through a gap in the wall that closed as soon as they moved through it.

Toru wanted to shout, too, to tell them not to let them flee like that, but a cloud came over his eyes, and soon he felt nothing.

***

Duril saw Toru’s eyes rolling in his head and sensed him going limp. “Toru,” he yelled, “Toru!”

Everyone hurried toward them, Varg, Claw, Margrave, and even Naella with her boy in her arms.

The caravan master knelt by Toru’s side and touched his forehead. Then he frowned as he saw the bitten leg. “Did that bloody undead merchant take a bite out of his leg?”

Duril nodded. “Yes. It all happened so fast. I couldn’t reach him in time.”

“It wasn’t your fault,” Varg said.

Margrave continued to examine Toru’s leg. He caught the flesh between his thumb and his forefinger and pressed. The smell of brine rose from the wound. “As I thought,” he said.

“What do you mean?” Duril asked.

“You must take him out to sea,” Margrave said.

“There’s a storm raging outside,” Varg argued. “Or there was. Who knows.” He looked above their heads at the invisible yet dark ceiling.

“A curse of the sea can only be beaten in its den,” Margrave continued. “Your friend won’t survive unless we take him out there, and as fast as we can.”

“But if there’s a storm, no boat could go out on the water,” Naella intervened. “The waves would just send it back, making it crash against the shore.”

Despite of all the ruckus, Moony had fallen asleep with his head nestled in the crook of his mother’s shoulder. At least there was someone unaffected by the ugliness of the world, Duril thought. For now, for as long as he was still a child, it would be others’ duty to protect him from it all.

“No boat indeed,” Margrave said with a crooked smile. “I have something better.”

“What? A cure for what’s affecting Toru?” Duril asked. The caravan master could have done everyone a world of good by now if he had just offered the remedy without being asked.

“No.” Margrave stood proudly. “I have a ship.”

“A ship?” Varg intervened. “Didn’t you and your men come here by land?”

Another sly smile was the reply. “My Greed of the Sea can go out in any weather.”

“What kind of name is that for a merchant’s ship?”

Varg’s doubt was seconded by murmurs of agreement from the others.

Margrave patted his belly. “Let’s just say that I’m a very particular kind of merchant. The kind that takes what he needs, but always from those who have too much, mainly at sea, which he considers his real home.”

Duril exchanged a short look with Varg.

“Are you a pirate?” That was Claw who, in his human shape, was the only one in the room not dwarfed by the height of it.

Margrave made a bow. “Margrave ‘Vulture’ Earl, at your service.”

Claw snorted. “I doubt a pirate would be at anyone’s service but his own.”

Margrave didn’t appear affected by the bear’s open mistrust. “Truer words have never been spoken. You see, what we have right here,” he pointed at Toru who lay on the ground, motionless, “is a genuine hero, someone who saved this wretched place. I need him so that I can claim my booty, for which I ventured on land, unlike my usual way of doing things.”

“Glad you’re being honest about your reasons,” Varg said through his teeth.

Duril made an attempt to appease him by placing his hand on the wolfshifter’s shoulder. “If the storm is still raging out there, we don’t have many choices.”

“Can we trust this two-faced man?” Varg said, pointing at Margrave with his chin.

The pirate didn’t appear annoyed at all. “As I told you, it’s always good to have the hero on your side when you’re asking for the keys to the treasury.”

“All right,” Varg acquiesced. “But if you lied about Toru’s wound --”

“You’re free to have my head,” Margrave completed his sentence with an impatient wave of his hand. “Now, grab our wounded hero, and let’s hurry to my ship.”

***

With the demise of the shroud, it appeared that there were no more obstacles between them and the way out. Varg hadn’t allowed Claw to carry Toru when the bearshifter had offered. He wouldn’t admit it for the world, but seeing Toru motionless and livid in the face like that had him reliving the loss of his pack, a loss he had suffered not so long ago. The evil that lay there would suffer complete and utter annihilation if Toru –

He didn’t allow his thoughts to go there. Now, all that mattered was the cure, whatever it was. If that meant that today was the day he would end up entrusting his life into the hands of a pirate, so be it.

Outside, the people of the port city were still gathered in front of the house of merchants. However, Varg could tell from their faces that at least some of the struggle inside the building must have had an effect on the world outside its gates. They were all quiet, hands held before them in silent entreaties, while the rain was pelting their faces.

He said nothing while Margrave summoned his men. Behind them, thin smoke rose.

“There are people still inside,” he heard Duril telling the city dwellers. “You should hurry and rescue them. They… one of them…”

“One of them is dead,” Varg said. “Take him with you and give him a proper burial. Not whatever it is that you’re accustomed to doing with your dead here.”

A new kind of pain was growing inside him, laced with poisonous anger. These people, for hundreds of years, had lived in ignorance, not caring about the source of their wealth, surrendering their ill and dead so that people like those strange creatures pretending to be merchants could use them for their dark purposes.

So they were guilty, too, the way he saw things.

“Don’t let your pain get the better of you.” Claw’s voice was calm, yet firm. His hand on his shoulder was heavy, a warning.

Varg shook away both the bearshifter’s touch and his good intentions. “What do you know of pain?”

“Of yours? Enough,” Claw replied. “Of mine? I’ve been away from home for hundreds of years. When I go back – if I go back – the chances are that none of the people I knew will still be there.”

Varg stared ahead stubbornly. Every word of that was true, but in these broken hours, he didn’t have it in his heart to squander an ounce of sympathy on anyone but Toru.

“Right here, you have your hero,” Margrave was talking animatedly, waving both hands. “This man who I will save must be celebrated by you on our return.”

“What happened inside?”

“Who is this man?”

“You tainted the house of merchants!”

“You’re strangers!”

The angry murmurs were turning into shouts. Varg turned toward Claw and, without a word, placed Toru in his arms. Then, in a blink, he shifted into his wolf and jumped in front of the crowd with a bone-chilling howl.

Everyone fell silent and took one step back like a single human being.

“You don’t deserve this man,” Varg shouted. “Inside your precious house of merchants, the ones you deemed worthy of being your rulers desecrated the bodies of your dead so that they could grow rich.”

A few murmurs rose again, but no one dared to step up in front of the giant and enraged wolf and contradict him.

“It’s true!” Naella stepped to his right, cradling Moony in her arms. “I was there. The merchants are horrible undead creatures who did, until only hours ago, exactly what this good sir here says. I saw it all with my own eyes!” Her voice rose over the falling rain. “If it hadn’t been for them, for these strangers, as you call them, we would have never learned the truth!”

It appeared that the presence and arguments of one of themselves would tip the balance. Varg let out another low growl. He didn’t trust these people and their penchant for letting themselves be ruled by evil, while the veil of comfort was pulled over their eyes.

“All that Naella says is true.” The group of men who had run back during the fight emerged from behind them. They were carrying the dead man. “These strangers saved our souls.”

The angry sounds of mistrust from before turned into something else. The crowd parted before them, and Margrave seized the opportunity right away. The pirate gestured for them to follow. “Quick, quick, we must get to the ship!”

The fake caravan master no longer cared about being carried and he walked in front as his subordinates flanked him. He was quite fast for his size, and Varg followed, allowing Claw to hold Toru for a while.

Duril came by his side and placed his hand on Varg’s back and rubbed the tense muscles there. “It’s not too late. We’ll save him,” the healer said in a gentle voice.

“You gave quite the speech,” Claw commended him.

“I only said a few words.”

“It’s what they needed to hear. Now, let’s get this over with. We have a sea demon to fight.”

“Why do you say that?” Duril asked, glancing up from checking Toru’s condition as he lay in the bearshifter’s arms.

Claw sighed. “The pirate knows what he knows. And this shifter’s wound is bound to the sea, by the looks of it. I just don’t think that this sea demon that has called the waves to rise against the sky will give away the cure for free.”

“Then we’ll force her to if that’s what it takes,” Varg retorted.

“Versed in sea battles are you, puppy?”

Varg growled, but more quietly this time. “I will be. Anything it takes.”

“Then let’s grab a sea demon by her green hair. She might look like a woman, but I’ll tell you this. She’ll put up a fight.”

***

The Greed of the Sea was hidden not far from the port, in a small cove. It was a beauty, indeed, Duril thought, and Margrave wasn’t just vain to be proud of her. It rocked but not violently on the troubled waters, as the storm seemed more wicked far at sea, the sky above them the color of dark wool.

They jumped into a small boat while Margrave hurried them aboard. “Let’s beat the waves, lads,” he urged Otis and Gefroy, along with the other men, to push the boat and help it gain speed.

Margrave continued to instruct the men at the oars to go faster as soon as they left the shore. Meanwhile, Duril divided his attention between keeping an eye on Toru’s condition and watching the pirate ship. The figurehead was something to behold, a mermaid with a generous bosom. But it wasn’t her shape alone that drew Duril’s eyes, but the coin necklaces wrapped round and round her neck, looking nothing like a sculpture carefully made. The artist behind it truly had an aptitude for rending life out of mere wood. The mermaid appeared to lean forward under the weight of the treasure she wore. Her back arched as if she strained to cope with the burden while still holding her head high.

“What do you say?” Margrave asked him. “A beauty, isn’t she?”

“Indeed,” Duril agreed. “But will she be able to take us out there?” He pointed at the waves ahead, rising and falling to the height of hills.

“Ha! We’ve been through a lot, she and I! And you’ve yet to see my crew! Come on, lads, faster! We have a sea demon to catch today!”

It was difficult to tell the hour in that weather. All sense of time had been lost, ever since they had passed through the gates of the house of merchants. Claw was holding his head down, staring between his hands, at his feet.

“Hey,” Duril called softly.

The bearshifter turned toward him. His stare was opaque, like lead. “Would you laugh, potion maker, if I told you all this light hurts my eyes?”

Duril nodded. “After all of the time you spent in there, it’s only natural.”

Claw closed his eyes and sighed, but lifted his head. “However, the smell of the sea is like balm to my soul.”

“Not much of a bear thing, I suppose,” Duril said and afforded him a small smile.

Varg was holding Toru in his arms now that they were inside the boat. The golden head was resting against the wolfshifter’s shoulder as if he was asleep. At least he wasn’t hurting, Duril thought, his heart squeezing painfully.

***

Toru opened his eyes with difficulty. At first, he saw nothing, nothing but excruciatingly painful white light. He searched with his hands and felt sand under his fingers. Was he… on a beach? He straightened up and blinked, trying to adjust his eyes to the blinding sun sending spears through his eyelids. “Varg! Duril!” he called for his companions.

There was no response for a while. Toru finally managed to get to his feet and began to walk, all the while looking around and searching for the others. The gentle sound of the waves was the only thing breaking the silence. As far as the eye could see there was nothing but sand, a never-ending beach.

His soles got used to the hot sand fast. Toru liked warmth anyway.

Suddenly, his ears caught something. Was that someone laughing? He moved toward the source of the sound. It came from the water, so he stepped into the surf.

A playful splash that caught his right side made him turn. He stopped abruptly at the sight of his unexpected companion. There, in the water, was a woman, but half of her body was not human. She used her fish tail to splash him again and giggled.

“Hey, stop that!” he warned her.

Her green long hair hung in heavy strands that covered her chest, but otherwise she was completely naked. Algae of various tones of blue and green were tangled in her hair, and her large eyes were strange. They had no irises, and green soft light seemed to come from within them.

“Who are you?” Toru asked.

The fish tail moved lazily and splashed him some more. Unnerved by it, Toru grabbed a handful of water and threw it into the mermaid’s face. He had heard of such creatures, but he had never been out at sea, so he had never seen one.

“Who are you?” the mermaid echoed his words. Her voice was melodic, a pleasure for one’s hearing.

“I asked first,” Toru said and crossed his arms over his chest.

“What did you ask?” the mermaid blinked, and thin layers of a whitish color closed over her eyes as she did that.

“Who are you?” Toru asked again, emphasizing each word, unsure of whether the mermaid was all right in the head or not.

She laughed and threw her head back. Toru noticed the gills on the sides of her neck. So, she was more fish than human. “Who are you?” she echoed once more.

Toru shrugged and began walking back to the beach. The mermaid giggled and barred his way. Annoyed with her antics, Toru jumped over her, but this time, when she moved her tail, she hit him quite hard on his calves. A strange sudden pain made him wince and growl. As soon as it began fading, he focused until he had figured out where it came from. It was localized in one of his calves, so he pulled his pant leg up to check on it. There was nothing there.

“The pain is only in your mind,” the mermaid spoke.

As soon as she said those words, the pain disappeared completely as if it had never been.

“See?” the mermaid added. “Stay here with me, and you will never feel pain again.”

“I only felt pain because you hit me with your fish tail,” Toru said, a bit miffed over shouting in pain over something that wasn’t even there. “And I can’t stay here with you. I have to find my friends.”

The mermaid threw a lazy look around. “What friends? I don’t see anyone. What do they look like?”

“Varg is a wolf and he is this big.” Toru used his hands to describe his companion. “And Duril is a healer. He has big kind eyes, and he smells nice.”

The mermaid shook her head. “I haven’t seen them. Maybe they left without you.”

“They wouldn’t do that,” Toru said with self-assurance.

“Why?”

It wasn’t the easiest thing to explain, especially to a stranger. “They just won’t do that. They’re my friends,” he replied.

The mermaid shook out her water-soaked strands. “But they’re not here. Maybe you just dreamed about them, and they’re not real.”

Toru was more certain than ever that he was in a dream right now. “Ah, I just have to wake up,” he murmured to himself.

“No,” the mermaid said brusquely. “Don’t you like it here, with me?”

“What’s there to like?” Toru asked with a snort. “There’s nothing but sand as far as the eye can see, and water. And I don’t know your name. I don’t know you.”

“My name is Narissa,” the mermaid said. “I can be your friend.”

It was a strange dream and maybe, just maybe, he had just had a hearty meal and now he had to sleep it off. He would tell Duril and Varg about his strange dream when he woke up.

“I’m not friends with just anybody,” he said.

“I’m not anybody,” Narissa said back. “Look what I can do.” She submerged under the surface of the water, made a circle around Toru and jumped into the air, creating a rainbow that disappeared as quickly as it appeared.

Toru laughed. “That’s something,” he admitted. “Are there others of your kind around here?”

“No. What about your kind?”

Narissa caught his stare and held it.

Toru moved his head away first. “No. I don’t like my kind much.”

“Why?” Narissa cocked her head while still keeping her eyes on him. He could feel her stare like a blanket of heat.

“Because I grew up alone,” Toru confessed. “I was surrounded by other people, not them.”

“They abandoned you, didn’t they?”

Toru shrugged. Whenever he thought or spoke of such things, a dull ache awoke inside his heart. But now, under the blinding sun, with his feet in the cool and pleasant water, he didn’t feel a thing.

“I told you there’s no pain here,” Narissa said as if she could read his mind.

Of course she could. They were in a dream, and anything was possible.

“Aren’t you lonely?” he asked the mermaid.

She was frolicking in the water, as much in her element as she could possibly be. “I’m not. You’re here.”

“But I won’t stay,” Toru said.

“You will.” Narissa stood and under his very eyes, she turned into a complete human. Toru stared down at her feet. She was now dressed in a thin summer dress, and her hair was no longer green but brown. “I can be whoever you want me to be.”

She closed the distance between them and pushed his hair behind one ear. Toru stared into her eyes and saw kindness there. He knew those eyes. He had stared into them before. Amused by the thought that crossed his mind, he chuckled.

“What?” she asked silkily.

“Wait till I tell Duril that I dreamed him as a mermaid.”

The smile on her face faded, but only for a moment. “Aren’t you thirsty?” she asked.

“There’s nothing but salty water around,” Toru pointed out. “That’s bad to drink.” He knew that much.

“No, it’s not,” the mermaid contradicted him in a gentle voice. “Have a bit. You’ve never tasted anything as sweet as this.”

Toru licked his lips. He was thirsty, even if he hadn’t noticed before. But drinking water from the sea was bad and could kill you. Even as someone who had lived only on land, he knew that to be so.

***

“What is he doing?” Duril asked, very worried, as he saw Toru thrashing in Varg’s arms.

“I think he’s asking for water,” the wolfshifter replied.

“Hey, hold him,” Claw warned as Toru, in his dreamlike state, suddenly jolted upright and leaned over the edge of the boat.

Margrave hurried to grab Toru and pull him back, too. His lips were set in a grim line. “That wretched demon,” he said through his teeth. “She’s trying to get him. I need a cup. Fill it with rainwater. Don’t let his lips touch the sea, you all hear me?”

Duril hurried to hold Toru’s head in his lap, stroking his hair while Varg held him by one arm. Claw moved to his other side. “We won’t let him move.”

“Water,” Toru begged, but his eyes remained shut.

“Nothing but rainwater,” Margrave ordered. “Until we send her back where she belongs.”

Duril nodded. Toru’s skin was so hot, which was strange with all of that cold rain pouring over them. His skin felt as if he had stayed in the sun for hours.

TBC

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