Page 62 of Scars Beneath a Serpent’s Scales

His eyes entirely glazed over, operating on sheer instinct rather than any sort of conscious effort. He was almost done with the puzzle when a bolt of pain twisted behind his ribs, and he inhaled sharply.

“You okay?” Nico asked from where he was tossing crumpled paper balls into a wooden bucket, keeping track against no one.

“Fine,” Roremar breathed, taking a long sip of water as another bounced to the floor. “You suck at that by the way.”

“Like you’d be better.”

Trying to steady himself, Roremar took Nico up on the challenge, but more jabs came in quick succession, bad enough that if he didn’t know better, he’d have thought he was getting stabbed. But it wasn’t quite a physical ache.

It was more of an emotional one—the kind that ripped at your spirit so desperately, it became physical. Like when his sisters cried and he thought his soul was being torn in two. Or when he saw his mother’s lifeless eyes on lonely nights. Or when he had to wake up every damn morning after a dream about his father, feeling like someone had actually reached into his chest cavity and squeezed his heart.

“What in the Fates…” he grumbled, rubbing the heel of his hand against his sternum.

“Rore?” Concern laced Nico’s voice.

Roremar’s breath caught in his throat, and he stumbled, catching himself against the table. The wooden puzzle clattered to the floor, pieces exploding in all directions. His knees buckled, the tiles looming closer.

A hand gripped his shoulder as he tried to pull in breaths. He hadn’t even heard Desmond enter, but his friend was holding him up now, his brother on his other side.

“Rore!” Desmond insisted, snapping until he met his stare. “Rore, what’s happening?”

Roremar tried to focus on Desmond, but a pair of hazel eyes flashed behind his stare, wide and pleading and terror-struck, twisting his chest until he thought he’d keel over.

“Emmeline,” Roremar gasped out, panting over every syllable. “She’s in trouble.”

Getting to the Academy was a blur. He didn’t realize how hard he ran, how badly his legs burned, and his lungs pinched as he sprinted up the hills, the stone facade looming in the distance like a haunted, moonlit nightmare that he couldn’t get close enough to.

All he knew was the panic in his every breath, twin to the terror in the hazel eyes that kept flashing through his memory, and the desperate need to strangle whoever put that look there.

Desmond and Nico were on his heels, yelling to the guards to stand down as Roremar tore past the gates. His heart beat in his ears, blood as cold as the thrashing sea in the heart of winter.

Horror shredded his bones as he ran through the corridors and saw the door to her dormitory thrown wide—as he rounded the threshold and found Emmeline huddled on the floor, her entire body shaking, and on the wall⁠—

“Fucking Fates,” Desmond swore beneath his breath.

TO TEMPT THE FATES, AND REALMS WILL WREST,

The words dripped crimson down the plaster, and based on the smell, Roremar knew it was written in blood. Red trailed over the precious paintings and letters that, if he knew anything about Emmeline, she’d meticulously chosen and arranged on her wall.

Everything was in disarray, books and glass and water splashed across the floor and bed. Scents mingled on the air from where vials had shattered. The space was an image of her, an imprint of everything she loved and found solace in.

And it was all broken.

“Emmeline,” Roremar whispered, dropping to his knees. Glass crunched beneath his leathers, but he didn’t care.

She shook and shook, her body a leaf in the breeze from the balcony doors. And with each wracking tremble, rage curdled in his chest. He couldn’t explain it—this instinct that he knew she was in trouble and the resulting call to defend her. For some reason, she felt like she was his to protect, though.

And Spirits, would she have a lot to say about that. Desperation crawled through him to hear that argument, to hear any words from her lips.

“Emmeline,” he repeated, shuffling closer.

A thunder of boots told him the guards had arrived on Desmond’s and Nico’s heels, but he didn’t dare take his eyes off the trembling huntress before him. Roremar inched forward until he was just in front of her.

She flinched as he crouched down, pressing his cheek to the floor to mirror her position, but she exhaled as her vision focused on him, relief cooling her terror and doing something to his chest that he didn’t quite understand. A balm wrapped around the lump of hatred for whoever had done this to her.

“Hey, Huntress,” he whispered.

“R-reckless,” she stuttered.