“This isn’t your territory,” he said, spreading his bony arms wide. “And I’m not pledged to you.”
“Get out of here, Cinder.”
“I told you before. I go where I want.”
Perry slid off his bow, nocked an arrow, and aimed at Cinder’s throat. He didn’t know what he planned to do, only that he couldn’t watch this scrawny boy die because of him. “Be gone before it’s too late.”
“No!” Cinder shouted. “You need me!”
“Leave now.” Perry brought the bowstring back to full draw.
Cinder made a low, growling sound. Perry sucked in a breath as the prickling sensation behind his nose sharpened, turned to stabbing.
A blue flame lit in Cinder’s dark eyes. For an instant, Perry thought it was the Aether reflecting in his black eyes, but it grew brighter and brighter. Glowing blue lines crept up from Cinder’s sagging collar, winding up his neck. Snaking over his bony jaw and face. Perry couldn’t believe what he saw. Cinder’s veins lit like they ran with Aether.
Splinters of pain flushed across Perry’s arms and face. “Stop what you’re doing!”
Roar and Aria ran up to them. Roar had his knife in his hand. They froze when they saw Cinder. Perry’s heart drummed wildly. Cinder’s glowing eyes stared through him, vacant and bright.
Perry gritted his teeth as his muscles began to twitch painfully. “Cinder, stop!”
The boy put his palms up, showing hands webbed with Aether. The charge in the air surged, sending another stabbing wave over Perry’s skin.
What was he?
Heat flared across the knuckles of Perry’s forward hand, gripping the bow. The steel arrowhead inches away began to glow orange. Reflex took over. He made a quick adjustment off his mark and loosed the arrow.
An explosion of light blinded Perry, keeping him from seeing what he’d struck. He didn’t feel himself drop onto the dirt or ball up around his arm. He lost time. Knew only that something terrible had happened. The scent of his own cooked flesh brought him back to a world where pain was everything. Terrible animal groans filled his ears. They came from him.
“Stay back!” Cinder yelled. Through squinted eyes, Perry saw Roar and Aria uphill, both motionless and stunned. Scorched smells flooded Perry’s nose. Burnt hair and wool and skin.
Cinder dropped to his knees at his side. “What happened?” he asked. “What did you make me do?” The blue of Cinder’s eyes was fading. His veins melted back into his skin.
Perry couldn’t answer. He didn’t know if he still had a hand. He couldn’t bring himself to look.
Cinder trembled. His entire body was quaking. “What did I do? You fired. . . . You were going to shoot me.”
Perry managed to shake his head. “Just needed you to go.”
Cinder looked stricken. He climbed to his feet, his balance weaving wildly. “I don’t have anywhere to go,” he said, his words choked. Stooping, bent over his stomach like he’d been punched, he staggered into the woods.
Roar and Aria thundered up. Roar took one look at Perry’s hand and went white.
Perry met his eyes. “Help him. Bring him back.”
“Help him? I’m going to slit his throat.”
“Just get him back here, Roar!”
When he was gone, Perry lay back and stared through the trees. The Aether swirled above. He closed his eyes. Concentrated on breathing.
“Perry, can I see?”
Aria knelt at his side. “Let me see,” she said softly, reaching for his hand.
He sat up, a groan tearing through his throat. Then he looked at his left hand for the first time. It had swollen to twice its normal size. The skin over his knuckles looked like blackened meat. Big, red blisters crowded the flat of his hand, making a trail down his wrist. Perry’s stomach twisted. Stars burst before his eyes. He swallowed back the sour rush in his mouth. He was going to vomit or pass out. Maybe both.
“Put your head down and breathe. I’ll be right back.”
She handed him the bottle of Luster when she returned. Perry drank. Didn’t stop until he’d drained what was left. He dropped the bottle to the side. Aria had taken his burnt hand into her lap and pushed his sleeve up. She held a long strip of gauze. Her belt once, he realized. She poured water over it.
“I should wrap it, Perry. So it doesn’t get infected.”
Cold sweat broke out over his back. Perry met her eyes for only a second, afraid she’d see his fear. He nodded and let his head fall forward again.
Her first touch over his knuckles was feather soft, but chills came over him, shaking his shoulders. Aria’s hands went still.
“Keep going,” he said, before he could change his mind and rip his arm off. It might have hurt less. He kept his head down. Watched the dark spots his tears made as they fell on his leather pants. He wanted to ask her to sing. He remembered her voice, how it had carried him away. He couldn’t form the words. But then the Luster kicked in, saving him by dulling some of the pain. Perry pushed the wetness off his cheeks and straightened, swaying unsteadily.
Aria wrapped the long strip of gauze around his wrist, and then wove it up, looping it through each of his fingers. She was calm now. Focused. He watched her as he sank deeper and deeper into the mind-numbing fog of Luster.
She was touching him. He wondered if she realized it too.
“Have you ever seen someone like him before?” she asked.
Cinder. A boy with Aether in his blood. “No. Never seen that,” he slurred. Perry wondered how it was possible, but he couldn’t deny what he’d seen. Not with proof moving through him in agonizing waves. How many times had he looked up and felt connected to the sky himself? Like it wasn’t just some faraway force? Like his own mood ebbed and flowed with the Aether? He should’ve trusted his Sense. Cinder set off the same stinging sensation in his nose. And he’d known the boy was hiding something.