“Move aside,” the older woman said, her voice clipped. And then the feeling of the Pythian power swirled around me, dissolving the rest of the material all at once. The blast of cold air hitting all that raw flesh made me mewl like a hurt animal, and my whole body shake.

“What… is that?” Agnes whispered, her voice gone flat and shocked.

“I don’t know.” It was grim. “We need a healer.”

“A healer?” I could almost see the incredulity on Agnes’ face. “For what? Can’t you see—she’s already dead.”

Chapter Nine

Chapter Nine

I was shaking as I tore free from the memory again, with a helpless sound building in my throat. I cut it off, swallowed it back down. I was better than this, better than trembling by my bedside like a frightened child!

But getting up wasn’t an option right now. I sat there, gripping the end of the coverlet with one fist and my stomach with the other, sure I was about to throw up. Only I couldn’t because there was nothing left to work with, my breakfast having already floated down the Thames. I wept silently for a while instead, half in anger at my own weakness, half in confusion and pain. And, slowly, over a period of minutes, the complaints from my body became softer, from screaming at me to muttering darkly.

Finally, I felt myself relax back against the side of the bed in exhaustion.

The floorboards were chilly, and the thin robe I was wearing shouldn’t have provided much warmth. But for some reason, I didn’t feel cold. I didn’t feel much of anything, my overtaxed body having mostly gone numb.

My brain joined it for a while, zoning out, with a rushing white noise filling my ears. I stared at the dark room sightlessly, but eventually noticed that I was in the same position as this morning, only with no pie man to cheer me up. Someone had been in here, though.

There was a splash of golden light among the silver, coming from the bedside table. A half-finished cup of tea with lipstick on the rim resided there, under the flickering light of a single, half burned candle. The straight-backed, wooden chair from the dressing table had also reappeared, and been pulled over near the bed.

Rhea, I thought. The lipstick was her favorite shade of pinkish brown. She must have been keeping a vigil at my bedside, watching over me as she had during the fight.

As she always did.

“Let me through!” Rhea’s voice was shrill. “Damn it, let me through!”

“Get her out of here.” The older woman said again, her voice an oasis of calm among the fluttering crowd. “Get them all out.”

“No! You’ve no right! I’m staying—”

“Knock her out of you have to.” The voice was curt now, and ice cold.

“You’re not drugging me!” Rhea said, outraged.