Hearts in Zenith (Four Husbands and a Lover)

37. My Curse

Drowning was bad enough, but drowning in the wrong water was worse.

Instead of the black mush of crushed ice and skeletal remains, I floated in water that was gentle, verdant and clear. It was perfect, except it was wrong. And the glow high above me was wrong too. Also, I could breathe.

Something coiled around my elbow, ever so gently, pulling me down. I twisted my neck and nearly vomited. Long strands of hair attached to a coin of a face far down in this green weird water. I still clutched my dagger, so I slashed the weird bond with it and struggled to the surface.

The face below sang for me to come back. Her voice was more seductive than a mother's lullaby.

Above me, someone frantically yelled, "Ismar!"

This voice was seductive in its own right, though not melodic at all. Ondrey, it belonged to Ondrey. Washed over by the glowing aura, he plunged his face into the green water and yelled my name. I reached to grab him by the beard and tell him that it was his fault. He chopped the ice. He threw me into this weird water. And now I was drowning!

Going toward his ice-crusted face was better than going toward the singing woman at the bottom of the pool, but harder. So much harder. My hands wouldn't lift even to strangle him for trying to kill us. The distance between us didn't diminish.

I wanted to be lulled by the living water instead, by the temptress' voice, lulled to sleep. To fall like a leaf. To dissolve and disappear. How perfectly...

...dead.

I opened my eyes—when did I close them?!

Ondrey's face was nearly gone behind the golden light.

"Ondrey!" I yelled. Whimpered, actually. He heard me, because I could now see his face better, right over mine. The flutter of a butterfly wing on my forehead was his lips, kissing me.

Pain seared my armpit. I screamed and screamed until the green dissipated and Ondrey's face emerged from the fog.

His skin was scoured red by the ice and cold, the split lips bled, the hair was matted and a colorful bruise spread deep into the beard. I sobbed with some satisfaction. After trying to drown me, that's the least he could do, look dog-ugly.

He held me down, supine, one arm twisted over my head. I wriggled, blinking the last tears out of my eyes and snapped my teeth just short of his nose.

"Hold her still." This was Yadwiga's voice.

I didn't notice her before, absorbed by Ondrey's appearance, but she was there. And she had an iron rod used to cauterize wounds in one hand.

Mythra's fangs, the burn I woke up to, it was real! In my armpit!

"Thank Ondryusha for this idiotic notion to burn your armpit. He said not to brand you where the ignoble wound could be easily seen."

When Yadwiga said brand, all I could think of was a mark of scorpia on Parneres. The scorpia must have caught up with me and branded me! I almost snapped my neck twisting to see the brand. The red welt had no particular shape. Not the scorpia then, Mythra be praised!

But what?

Sweat trickled, making the temples itch. My head dropped into Ondrey's lap as I sagged against him. A weird thing is the heart of a man, always changing. He was ready to doom me to the cold grave, now his arm curled around me gently. I needed an explanation, but I was too weary to ask for one.

Meanwhile, Yadwiga put her length of iron back into a medic's brazier, unaware that fright very nearly stopped my heart.

"Senhora-as-Sovereign used her last bit of magic to curse you, send your soul to the River Vash. Your body continues senseless here, your soul sinks and wanders in oblivion. A soul cannot be reborn into a fresh vessel until the body dies. I called the soul back with pain—"