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My heart pounds. I pull off my gloves and shove them in my pocket. My hands itch for a weapon, but I’m too afraid to drop my dagger in my nervousness. Henry fumbles in his pocket and then shoves a glass vial into my hand.
“Hold this.”
Henry yanks off his gloves and shoves them in his pockets. He unsheathes a vicious-looking sword and slows the horse. “Uncork it and pour it over the blade.”
I do as he says, with considerable difficulty at our pace, dribbling the liquid haphazardly over the blade. “What is it?”
“Well water,” he says, urging the horse on faster.
Our mount is steadier than I expected, but I place a hand on his neck anyway.
“Hold on,” Henry says.
I’ve learned about our history and the magic of the Drained Wood since I was a child, but reading a story in a book or hearing it around a campfire doesn’t do justice to the horror of hearing the deafening rush of the current of blood mist.
In the pub tales I’ve heard, it’s a magical current that flows through the Drained Wood in a seemingly random pattern, always with a horde of Drained coming just behind it. In reality, the mist rushes in like a furious river, giving me no time to orient to the path ahead before the red haze blocks out everything.
The air smells like iron and salt. I lean back into Henry, fighting against the suffocating smell of blood.
“Just breathe. We just need to stay on the horse and keep riding. But fear attracts them and your heart is pounding. Just take a breath,” Henry says.
“How do you—”
He shifts, and I realize I’ve grabbed his hand. “I can feel your heart in your hand.”
A startled laugh bubbles out of me at the thought of ever offering my heart to a man so freely. The laugh is cut short when something barrels into me from the right.
Henry curls around me, taking the brunt of the impact as we crash to the forest floor. I roll off of him and press up to a seat.
He’s on his feet in a second, turning in a slow circle with his sword at the ready. I stand and reach for my dagger. The moment my fingers brush the cool metal hilt, sharp claws curl around my wrist, and I’m dragged toward my bloody death.