Page 17 of Death of a Mortal

Its palm on my forehead heated, and warmth spread from our point of contact to my neck and shoulders, through my core, and down my legs and arms, taking my mind away from the odd contrast of ancient and young, beautiful and weathered. I felt the magic working through my arteries and spreading into my blood vessels, seeking the infection.

The heat in my veins subsided, and I felt as if a veil of fog had lifted from my brain, the leaden feeling in my limbs lightening. I even felt my heart relax, relieved of the effort of pumping infected blood through my body.

In the next moment, a cooling sensation enveloped my charred, lightning-tainted skin on my left side. That side of my face and neck felt as if it were encased in soothing balm, the web of pain not gonebut placated, no longer angry and alive. My vision, however, did not return.

The banshee removed its hand from my forehead and turned to walk—float—away. This left me feeling better than I had since Aemilia’s attack.

I had one hour. So which to find first—the flower or the animal? The thought of killing something for no other reason than because I was asked to retrieve its organs made me shudder. I had never hunted, and unless I found something to make a weapon with, I would have to kill with my bare hands—if I could even catch something to kill. I was so far out of my league.

Flower first, then.

Nella pulled me from my thoughts. “Naci, where did it go?”

“Nella, your ears. Are you okay?” I grasped her head between my hands, inspecting both ears, searching for blood.

“I’m okay now, just lightheaded. Areyouokay? What was it doing to you? Was it talking to you?” she asked, the never-ceasing concern for me still present.

I took a steadying breath, still trying to comprehend it all myself. “Yeah, it was. And I think the infection is gone, and the pain is, too, for now. But it said it couldn’t heal the wound, only block the pain. And I still can’t see from my left eye.”

“What?! Naci, that’s terrible!” Nella was panicking, and it wasn’t helping my own fears. I realized then I hadn’t told her I was half-blind.

“It’s okay, Nella. I’m sure it will come back in time if we can get Aemilia’s magic out of the wound. I plan on asking how to do that when we accomplish the banshee’s task.”

“That thing is an actual banshee?! And it will tell you that if you complete some…task? What is this task? Are you sure you’re okay?”

I realized then she couldn’t understand the banshee like I could, and she must have only heard my words to it, plus its wailing, and had to be confused. The banshee had mentioned mortals shouldn’tbe able to understand banshees, yet I could… I’d have to ponder that later, for now the clock was ticking.

“I’ll tell you everything, but we need to move to find a certain flower. And fast.”

I filled her in on all the banshee had said and asked of me as we walked. A look of abject horror crossed her face when I got to the part about killing an animal for its eyes and heart and spilling my blood for the banshee’s elixir.

“So that flower could be anywhere in this forest,” Nella huffed as she voiced that unfortunate truth. “What if we encounter another creature like the banshee out here? Naci, what do we do?”

I contemplated her question and looked around us as if the answer might be written somewhere on a tree. A flutter of wings caught my attention.

A bird. Thesamebird? Had it been trying to help or lure us into the banshee’s grasp?

“You’ve been following us,” I bellowed up toward that black, beady-eyed bird I was now certain was the same bird from before our encounter with the banshee. It didn’t flinch or fly away at my yell. “What do you want? To lead us to our death?” But there was a tug at my soul that told me that wasn’t true and that the black bird could understand me.

It flew up and headed to our right, looking over at us as it went. I was unsure, but something told me to follow it. I looked at Nella, her eyes questioning but not disbelieving. “Is it crazy if I say I think we should follow the pesky bird?”

Nella considered for a moment, and the slightest semblance of a smile ticked one side of her lips upward. “I think that bird has a thing for you.”

It crowed from afar, so I made my decision and took Nella’s hand and headed right. It flew straight ahead, not landing or slowing. Nella and I had to jog below it to keep up. We went on as a crew of three for a few minutes before the bird banked to our left and stopped ona branch several feet above us. Nella and I stopped, and I looked around, wondering if the bird had led us anywhere significant or if we’d been on a wild goose chase.

Then I saw it. Just ahead, at the center of a beam of moonlight was a lone flower growing next to a fallen tree’s stump.Theflower, with electric blue petals nearly glowing.

Still hand in hand, we crept toward it. Pausing a few feet from the flower, I glanced back at the bird to find it was still watching us.

Just as I was reaching to pluck the flower, I saw a shadow moving toward us from the corner of my eye to the right. I pulled Nella closer to me and watched as my heart raced.

The first thing that came into view was a pair of white eyes glowing in the swirling shadows. Slowly, a four-legged body formed, attached to a head supporting…antlers—a stag.

We backed up as what could only be described as a demon deer took a first step toward us. It was massive, its shoulders level with my head. While the pitch-black body seemed to solidify, its wide antlers remained as shadowy wisps dancing around, fading out and reforming, like a shadow made of dancing flame.

This would have made me run if it hadn’t been sauntering lazily toward the flower between us like it held no interest at all in Nella and me. We backed up a few more paces. The creature stopped and just stood by the flower, staring at us with its glowing eyes. It was…guarding the object of my task.Great.

“Naci, I don’t think that deer is going to let us take the flower. What do we do?”