“I don’t know. I can feel the magick running through her veins, but I can’t feel any effects from it.” She tapped a finger against her lips. “She’s more human than you or Deimos. It might take longer.”
“Does she need more potion?”
“More would kill her. Her signs are already faint.”
Jordan nodded. They both sat back and waited and watched Andronika sleep. And waited. And watched. As the sun slid across the sky and behind the trees, Jordan grew concerned. If Andronika didn’t return home soon, Cassandra might come looking for her. She couldn’t find him here, but they couldn’t abandon the unconscious girl, either. Cassandra could mix a concoction to try to revive her daughter and possibly ruin the potion’s effects. He opened his mouth to tell Eris they needed to move her, but then the girl’s body stirred. Jordan flashed, appearing a hundred paces away, and watched.
Andronika’s eyes fluttered open. She looked at Eris at first with confusion and then with recognition. Eris helped her sit up.
“How do you feel?” Eris asked.
The girl seemed to consider the question. “Well, I guess. Not much different, though. Wait … I suppose the sadness has lifted. I don’t feel so heavy.”
“Is that all?”
Andronika rolled her shoulders and stretched her neck. “I feel like I slept for days. How long did I?”
“Just the afternoon.”
Andronika looked around. Eris and Jordan both studied her carefully, watching for any indication the girl gave of improved hearing or sight.
“The sky is darkening. I better return to Mother,” she said, rising to her feet. “Thank you for sharing your drink. I think it’s working.”
The girl skipped off and Jordan and Eris just watched, their mouths open. By the time Jordan thought to react, she was already disappearing inside the shelter. An angry roar started building in his core, pushing its way upward. He let it out when Eris appeared by his side. She jumped back several feet.
“Calm down,” she snapped.
“Calm down?” Jordan echoed, his voice like ice. He flashed right in front of her and grabbed her by the throat. “Calm down? What did you do, woman? You ruined the potion!”
Pain pulsed through Jordan’s hand and Eris’s spell forced him to release her. She held a hand up, threatening him.
“Yes, calm down. I could still feel the magick within her. Just give it time.”
Jordan snarled at her. “What did you do to the potion? How did you change it?”
“Nothing, except add the lavender and vanilla for flavor. That wouldn’t change the effects.”
Jordan crossed his arms and narrowed his eyes. “You think it will work?”
“If it doesn’t, it’s not because of the potion. It’s because of the girl. She might be too human.”
Jordan rubbed his chin with his thumb and forefinger for a long, silent moment. “Then we wait and we watch. When she starts showing signs, we must get to her before her mother does.”
Jordan couldn’t wait long. His army needed attention. The new recruits lacked control over their bloodlust and would betray them all if he didn’t act. The Daemoni wouldn’t have the numbers to overtake humanity for a few human generations, and if they exposed themselves too early, the humans would fight back. He would lose all the progress he’d made. So he left Eris to keep an eye on the girl.
After several weeks, Eris returned, appearing at his side as he watched a pack of werewolves train.
“It’s not working,” she said, avoiding any preliminaries.
Jordan snarled, the sound muffled by the growling and snapping of teeth from the fight pit. The revelation wasn’t a surprise to him—after all this time he’d come to accept the girl’s human weakness—but it still angered him to hear it pronounced. He had another plan, though.
“How much potion is left?” he asked.
“Enough for two.”
“Take it all and go to Cassandra.”
Eris sucked in a breath. “We agreed she might be too old. It could—”
“She’s the last chance we have. If it doesn’t work, give both her and the girl the rest. Even if it kills them.”
At this, a wicked glint shone in Eris’s eyes as her lips turned up in a smile. “If that’s what you want.”
“Yes. That’s exactly what I want.” Jordan looked back at the fight pit where two wolves tore at each other with long fangs and claws. One of the wolves grabbed the other with its mouth, clamping its teeth on its throat, drawing blood. Excitement surged through Jordan’s body. “And I want to watch. Fetch me when you’re ready.”
Two days later, Jordan crouched in the woods again as Eris greeted Andronika in the field of flowers.
“Hello, again,” Andronika said with a smile on her face.
“Hello, sweet one. I see you feel much better.”
“I do. Your juice worked!” The girl studied the older woman’s face, biting her lower lip, as if wanting to ask something but not having the courage to do it. Then she finally blurt it out. “Do you have any more? I’d like Mother to try it. She really needs it. She’s so sad, sadder than even I was, and I’ve failed to make her better.”
Eris smiled and so did Jordan. The girl couldn’t have made it any easier.
Andronika ran for the shelter and reappeared a few minutes later, tugging on her mother’s hand. Cassandra stumbled after her daughter, blinking against the brightness of the morning sun. She looked even worse than she had before, her face vacant, her eyes distant, as if she didn’t see anything in this place or time. As if she was lost in the past. He recognized the look—their Father had carried it for some time after Mother had died.
“Here, Mother,” Andronika said, placing Eris’s water skin in her mother’s hand. “This is what made me better. It will make you better, too.”
Although the change in Jordan allowed his mind to run several thoughts at once, he focused every bit of himself on his sister. He watched her eyes travel to the water skin in her hand and back to her daughter, as if not comprehending. His pulse raced as Andronika forced her mother’s hand up, lifting the skin to her lips. His breath caught as she drank without question. And his heart leapt.
He’d finally done it. His twin sister would have to see his side now. She would have to believe him now. She would have to admit he’d been right all along. She would have to join the Daemoni, where she belonged.
Chapter 13
A voice in the back of Cassandra’s mind told her not to drink from the water skin, that something was amiss about this grandmotherly woman and the drink she offered. The back of her neck tingled with the feeling of being watched and not just by Andronika and this woman. Her daughter’s eyes looked so hopeful, however, and she’d witnessed a definitive change in Andronika. Her mood had brightened and she just seemed more alive than either of them had since learning of Niko’s death.
Andronika had attempted to reproduce the concoction on her own, saying the woman had told her the herbal ingredients, but she’d never been able to replicate it—nothing she made had the same effects. Cassandra could smell the same ingredients Andronika used in the water skin now, but she also smelled a bitter tang underneath the lavender, vanilla and other herbs. Perhaps that was the missing ingredient she needed. Or perhaps she was making a big mistake. But she didn’t want to disappoint her daughter and, by now, she was willing to do anything to move beyond her grief for Niko. So when Andronika lifted the skin to her mouth, she drank.
The liquid felt neither warm nor cool in her mouth, but as soon as it hit the pit of her belly, it seemed to freeze. A bitter cold spread among her insides and her stomach tightened painfully, making her cry out. Icy shards entered her bloodstream and traveled throughout her body. Her heart sped, as if trying to outrun the cold, and uncontrollable shivers wracked her shoulders and arms. Her teeth slammed against each other and she tried to wrap her arms around herself, but she couldn’t make them move. She’d never been so cold in her life, even when she’d bathed in the streams up north during the winter.
