by S. M. Reine
She tried to lift a hand to his face, but her arm was too heavy. Her pulse was too fast, too weak.
The door smashed open.
Yatam was suddenly gone, and she was cold. So very cold.
Elise rolled over, trying to collect her senses, but moving only made her heart struggle to beat. Her vision darkened at the edges. An ocean roared within her skull.
Somehow, she threaded her feet through the scraps of her jeans and pulled them over her hips. She found her shirt, but couldn’t get it over her head.
And then there were people there, surrounding the basin. People with guns.
Goddamn Union.
“We’ve got a survivor!”
Someone kneeled beside her. Elise could just barely make out his nametag when it hovered over her face, which said that he was named Bellamy. “God, what a mess—but check this out. She’s got a Union vest.”
“Don’t touch me.” She tried to push him away, but her muscles were liquid, and blood slicked her hands.
A familiar man loomed nearby. His neck was as thick as his jaw, his shoulders were broad, and he looked like an angry gorilla. “She’s not Union,” said Zettel. “Trust me. We don’t want to take her back to the compound.”
Elise reached blindly, hoping that his throat would be close enough for her to grab, even if she couldn’t see him clearly.
A hand caught her swiping arm.
“I’m going to follow regulations. I’ll let Malcolm work it out when we get there,” Bellamy said, restraining her gently. “Allyson. Yates. Bring the gurney.” His face was kind and sympathetic. “What happened to you? Did you get mauled by a fiend?”
She was falling, spinning, struggling to breathe.
“Don’t touch me,” Elise whispered again.
Bellamy lifted her out of Nügua’s basin.
“Don’t worry. The Union’s got you—you’re going to be fine now.”
16
Bellamy informed Elise that the Union had established a temporary hospital northeast of Reno where they processed the injured before evacuating them. The ride felt like it took hours. She drifted on the edge of consciousness the entire way.
Every time she almost passed out, sharp pain would rouse her—hands applying pressure to the injuries on her neck and thigh. They gave her IV fluids. It didn’t seem to improve anything.
Bellamy delivered her to the ward with minimal fanfare. A witch wrote down Elise’s name, and then he wheeled her into a long room full of beds—all occupied.
Lights slid overhead. It made Elise dizzy.
A familiar voice spoke, distant and hazy.
“Elise?”
Footsteps. James’s face swam into her vision. She didn’t realize she had reached out until he caught her hand. “What are you doing here?” she asked.
“I was injured. The Union provided medical care. Forget about that—you’re so pale,” James said, pressing his hand to her forehead. “Jesus, you’re clammy. What’s happened?”
If she’d had any blood left to blush with, her face would have turned red. It was Bellamy who responded. “Significant blood loss. Looks like a pretty bad attack.”
“Is she all right?”
Elise pushed his hand off. “I’m fine.” To betray the lie, she immediately shivered. The room blurred.
How quickly could blood be drawn through the femoral artery, anyway?
James lifted the sheet to inspect her for wounds, and Elise was trembling too hard to stop him. He saw her missing jeans, which had been cut off by a paramedic, and the bandaged leg. His eyebrows lifted toward his hairline. “Battle wound?”
“Sure,” Elise said.
James kept pace as they wheeled her gurney to an empty space in the infirmary, which was next to an unconscious man whose arm terminated at the elbow with a bandaged stump.
“I’ll alert the doctor,” Bellamy said, disappearing.
The corner in which he left them was quiet, if not private; the curtain wouldn’t completely enclose them. “What’s happened in Reno?” James asked, still grasping her gloved hand.
“We lost a casino. And I killed Itra’il.”
Surprise flicked across his face. “Why?”
She struggled to think of an answer. Elise knew there was a good one, but she couldn’t remember it. “No mercy.”
His brow lowered over his eyes. “What of Yatai?”
“Opening the gates,” Elise said. No, wait. That wasn’t right. Her eyes were so heavy. “I don’t know.”
James’s voice faded in and out of her ears, carrying over the quiet bustle of the ward. “Where are the doctors?”
“I’m cold. I want another blanket.”
“You’re sweating.”
Where was Yatam? What would he be doing, now that he was mortal? “He said he wouldn’t kill me.”
James’s hand tightened. “Who said that?”
The curtains opened.
“There you are,” said a woman, and James’s hand disappeared.
“Stephanie! Thank God.”
Elise’s ears rang. They were talking—something about evacuating the emergency room, transferring patients, the collapse of a hospital tower. Yatam’s face loomed in the foggy place between asleep and awake. He was smiling. His lips were dripping blood.
And then cool, dry fingers were probing Elise’s skin, opening her eyelids, pressing a stethoscope to her chest. Stephanie’s clinical briskness was comforting, for once.
She only listened for a moment before pulling the blanket over Elise again.
“Based on your symptoms, I’m going to guess you’ve lost two to three units of blood. Ideally, you should get intravenous fluids and a transfusion. I can’t imagine we’ll have access to donor blood here, but that should be all right. You’re hardy. You probably won’t die. A few days of rest—”
“Days?” Elise tried to sit up, but her vision dimmed at the sudden change in posture, and she almost slipped off the side of the bed. Stephanie pushed her back with an irritated huff.
“We don’t have days.” James took the chair beside her and rolled up his sleeve. “I’ll donate.”
The doctor’s lips drew into a thin line. “Are you compatible?”
“More than you know. We’ve done it before.”
“Far be it from me to attempt to give medical advice to either of you, but blood diseases…?”
“Kopides don’t contract them.”
“Have it your way. I still need equipment. I can’t magic a blood transfusion.”
“Find a man named Malcolm,” James said. “He’s the commander.”
Elise had no idea how long it took Stephanie to find him. She was pretty sure that she fell asleep again. The rasp of the curtain opening stirred her at some point, and Malcolm’s face filled her vision, replacing Yatam’s.
The commander took one look at Elise, pale and limp on the gurney, and laughed. “Have fun in Reno?”
“Come closer so I can hit you again,” she mumbled.
“Don’t make promises you can’t keep, darling. Hey, you!” Malcolm snagged a passing nurse. “See these lovely people here? Get them whatever they want.”
“Donor blood,” Stephanie said promptly. “And access to labs so I can perform analyses.”
“Anything they want, short of that,” Malcolm amended. “One of the blood banks has been destroyed, and we don’t have access to the others yet. Sorry.”
She huffed again. “Then I’ll need a few supplies.”
“This way,” the nurse said, leading her away.
Malcolm peeked under Elise’s blanket. She kicked weakly at him. “You’ve had a fun night. Where was my invitation?”
“Thank you,” James said in the least grateful tone possible, which seemed to be all the cue the commander needed.
Malcolm winked at Elise. “Enjoy the party.” He followed another kopis out of the infirmary.
If nothing else, her annoyance at her ex-boyfriend was enough to briefly clear her head. She looked over at Jame
s. His face was bruised, his glasses were missing, and there were bloody handprints on his shirt. “What happened to you?”
“Anthony. He’s under Yatai’s influence.”
She craned her head around to get a better look at his wounds. “Possessed?”
“That’s my guess. Yatai wanted information from me, but to what purpose, I’m not certain.”
So that was where Yatai had learned to open Alain’s wards.
James’s girlfriend returned, and, with the help of the nurse, quickly prepared Elise for the transfusion. Stephanie had two bags of saline, an IV pole, and some tubing. “Are you sure you’re up for this, James?” she asked as she hung the saline from the pole.
“Always.”
“Well, in order to transfuse a unit of blood, which is all I dare to take, we’ll need seven or eight hours,” Stephanie said, tying a rubber tourniquet around Elise’s upper arm and swabbing the inside of her elbow with alcohol. “There’s no way to speed it up. You two better get comfortable. It would help to sleep through it.”
He adjusted himself so he was leaning against her gurney. Elise watched as Stephanie attached the saline, and then the other tube. James’s eyebrows furrowed as she inserted the needles.
Then it was Elise’s turn. The needle slid into her skin with an instant of pain, which was immediately lost among the mess of other aches and bruises. It was nothing in comparison to having Yatam drink her life out of her thigh.
She relaxed against the bed, the flow of saline cold against her arm.
Sharing James’s blood was enough to bypass the wards on their rings, but she was far too tired to worry about his thoughts, or what he might get from her. Words faded in and out of the back of her mind like trying to tune into a distant radio station.
So tired… city destroyed… Anthony… why her thigh? What’s she not telling me?
She wanted to tell him not to worry about it, but gravity was so heavy.
Exhaustion sucked her under.
Hours passed in the darkness.
Stephanie’s return was heralded by the swift patter of footsteps and the rattling of metal curtain rings.
Elise didn’t open her eyes. She felt much more alert as soon as consciousness hit—her head was clearer, thinking wasn’t so difficult, and she was aware enough to realize that she was mostly naked under the paper-thin blanket. But she remained still as Stephanie addressed James.
“How do you feel?”
“Thirsty,” he said. “Thank you for the water.”
“They’ve offered me a place on the next convoy out of here,” Stephanie whispered over crinkling paper. Plastic snapped. The tubing tugged against Elise’s arm. “They want my assistance providing medical care at the receiving area in Sacramento. Considering the situation here, I thought… maybe I should stay in California.”
James was quiet for a long time. “You mean, stay with your family.”
“Yes. I hoped you would come with me, but…” She sighed. “You won’t, will you?”
Cloth rustled against cloth. “I’m needed elsewhere, Stephanie.”
“Of course.” Elise opened her eyes to slits. Stephanie bent over James, giving him a long kiss. When she righted herself again, she was smiling and holding the bent needle that had been in his arm. “That’s the problem with trying to date a hero, isn’t it?”
He traced the line of her jaw, smiling sadly. “I’m not a hero.”
“Well, if things change, you’ll know where to find me. And I hope you will.”
She taped gauze to his arm. James rose to use the bathroom.
Elise finally opened her eyes when Stephanie’s blue-gloved hands touched her arm. “And how do you feel?” the doctor asked. The usual bite was missing from her tone.
“Like I could wrestle oxen,” Elise said. Her voice croaked from her dry throat.
“Done with angry badgers, hmm?” The needle pinched as Stephanie removed it and pressed gauze over the pinprick. “There. Leave that on for about ten minutes, please.”
She dropped everything in bag marked with a hazard symbol. Elise sat up, hugging the blanket to her bare chest to watch Stephanie tidy up. The doctor wore white sneakers and carried a duffel bag over one shoulder.
“Leaving?” Elise asked.
“Yes. In about an hour.” She glanced at the clock. “Well, half an hour. I should get going.” Stephanie paused with a hand on the curtain. “Malcolm brought your belongings, which they recovered from the scene of attack. He also dropped off fresh clothing for you. It’s all in the bag on the chair.”
“Thanks.”
The doctor gave her a final, appraising look. “Try not to kill James.”
Elise snorted. “It’s not in the plan.”
“Good.”
She departed, leaving the curtains open. Irritation spiked through Elise. She was only wearing underwear and the blanket—some privacy would have been nice.
Then a gurney passed the other side of her curtain, and her irritation quickly dissipated.
A man thrashed on it, strapped down at the shoulders, hips, and feet by rope. The muscles in his neck strained as he fought. His skin shone with sweat.
Anthony.
Elise climbed out of bed, finding her shirt in the black bag. It was bloodstained, but preferable to a Union polo shirt. They hadn’t given her what remained of her jeans, so she had no choice but to wear the cargo pants. They were loose and rode low on her hips.
James returned, holding a fresh glass of water. He seemed surprised to see her standing. “What are you doing? Be careful—you might still be weak.”
“They just dragged Anthony through here.”
His eyes widened, and he didn’t stop Elise when she hurried to follow the gurney in her bare feet.
She stopped when she stepped into the hall.
The door from the infirmary opened into a huge warehouse. She stepped up to the railing and found she was only on the third level—several more floors stretched above and below, and there was a garage at the bottom with more of those hulking black SUVs. The Union bustled around her. She had never seen so many kopides in one place before, even at the semi-centennial summit.
They had a base outside Reno. An actual outpost.
How the hell had the Union built such a thing without her noticing?
The gurney continued down the hall. Elise stepped back from the railing and followed.
Anthony was wheeled into an unmarked room, escorted by two kopides. The door swung shut behind them. She moved to open it.
Malcolm appeared seemingly from nowhere, blocking the door with his body. “Doesn’t anything keep you in bed? I thought you were supposed to be on the verge of death.”
“I got better. Let me in.”
“Why?”
“I know that guy.”
Malcolm laughed. “I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised that you know him. I can’t let you in there, though. For your information, ‘that guy’ blew away three other guys with a shotgun. You’re a tough bitch, but are you that tough?”
A chill washed down her spine. “Anthony killed three men? That has to be a mistake.”
“I’ll let you judge.”
He led her further down the hall, down a flight of stairs, and into a dark room with a bank of monitors. A witch sat in front of them, typing rapidly. Malcolm perched on the desk next to her.
“Cue up the arrest footage we pulled off Jack’s camera, please?”
A low-resolution image appeared on the main monitor. There was no audio, and she could barely make out the eggshell walls. It wasn’t until she saw the darkened chandelier and the barred window at the end of the hall that she recognized the location.
It was her apartment building.
She watched with sick fascination as the swaying image approached her door. Another man moved into view to kick it open.
The camera went wild, and red mist sprayed. The man in front dropped.
Anthony stood in the apartment’s living room. He pumped hi
s shotgun and stepped behind the wall.
The man with the camera entered the apartment, and Anthony faced him. His motions were mechanical as he stepped forward to fire again.
A rifle swung into view, held by the kopis with the head-mounted camera, but he didn’t get a chance to shoot.
The camera fell. It bounced off the floor.
Anthony’s feet took another step. Another body fell to the carpet.
Elise could only see them from below the knees as men swarmed him, slamming him to the ground. A woman delivered a few swift punches, and the sliver of Anthony’s face that was visible in the image didn’t seem to register pain.
“That’s good,” Malcolm said. “Thanks, Carradee.”
Elise watched the monitor for a few long seconds after the screen froze on a single frame—a shot of Anthony’s impassive face, and a bloody limb on the carpet. She wasn’t sure if it was an arm or a leg.
When James told her that Anthony had attacked him, she hadn’t imagined anything quite so… fatal.
“He’s been possessed,” she said. “There’s no other reason he would do that.”
“Psychotic break?”
“Anthony isn’t crazy.”
“He is definitely showing signs of possession,” Malcolm admitted. “We’re not equipped with an exorcist right now, though, so the best we can do is keep him from hurting anyone else. In case you’re worried, we have regulations for this. He won’t be punished for what he’s done under the influence.”
Elise traced a finger over Anthony’s face on the monitor. He must have been taken in the Warrens—and she thought he had been running away.
Another one of her friends’ lives destroyed by her decisions.
She sighed. “Don’t send him to a priest. Just get someone to bring my belongings to me.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m going to exorcise him.”
Elise met James in a darkened observation room. She studied Anthony through a one-way mirror into Anthony’s cell. The Union had strapped him to a heavy wooden chair, and the only things holding him up were his bindings. He was slumped over with his head hanging from his shoulders. The ropes at his wrists had rubbed him raw and bloody.