“Only the fact that there are many of them and only two of us.”
“Fine. If you need to tell me you told me so before we die, then you said it.” Sam spun her ends of the staff around, bringing one high and the other low. With her augmentations in place, she moved quickly, and the man she was facing wasn’t able to compensate. She managed to strike him, catching him on one side of his head as well as one leg at the same time. He crumpled, falling in a heap, and blood pooled around the open wound on his head.
Sam backed into Bastan, getting close so that she could help. He whipped his sword around in a blaze, spinning quickly, and as she often was when fighting alongside Bastan, she was impressed by the level of skill he possessed. She didn’t know if that was a djohn thing or if that was a Bastan thing, but either way, he managed to push back the Kaver who was attacking him.
There were two others in the hall with them.
Sam jumped over Bastan, kicking his attacker as she did, and the other two surrounded her. She whipped the ends of her staff, moving them in a quick circle. She was able to block one blow then another, but somehow, one of the attackers slipped through and struck her on the back of her leg. She staggered forward but didn’t fall. She was thankful she had made her skin impervious. The blow didn’t split the skin, and nothing broke; all she had to endure was the pain.
It did make her angry.
Sam swung one staff piece and threw it at the Kaver who was attacking her. It connected with the woman’s stomach and threw her back.
It left only one attacker and Sam with just one half of her canal staff. “I might let you live if you lay down your staff,” she said.
The other Kaver clenched his jaw. He was a little older than Sam, and he had close-cropped hair and sun-darkened skin. “You can’t win. Your attack on the city and your intent to destroy everything that we are will not win.”
“My attack? I’m only preventing Helen from making her attack. I’ve seen what she’s doing and what she’s willing to do.”
“You don’t understand. You have never been outside of the city. You don’t know what’s out there.”
“My brother is out there,” Sam said.
The man lunged, and she twisted out of the way, bringing her staff up at the same time.
Hers caused his staff to connect with his skull, and he fell backward.
She kicked, adding strength to the momentum that carried him backward, and he crashed through a doorway, landing on the floor on the other side.
Sam spun around, looking to see whether Bastan was in trouble, but he was sheathing his sword.
“How many of these do you want us to restrain?” he asked.
“I think we need to restrain all of them.”
“And do you think we can?”
“Bastan—”
“It’s a valid question, Samara. We either restrain them and see if we can keep them confined, or we have to realize that holding them creates a liability. Is that what you want?”
“I don’t want to kill them.”
“I didn’t say that we would kill them.”
“That’s what you were implying.”
Bastan looked over at the fallen Kavers. “I was implying that we simply eliminate them as a threat.”
“Confine them. If Alec can sedate them, we might be able to get some answers out of them.”
“And when they wake up? We can’t stay here, Samara. And the two of us can’t take four out. I don’t know what sort of augmentations you have placed on yourself, but I doubt you have the ability to drag four people with you.”
“I wouldn’t have to bring four out,” she said. “You could take two, and I could take two.”
“They were right.”
“They were right about what?”
“They were right about the idea that this is war. And if it is war, Samara, we must be prepared to do everything necessary for us to be victorious.”
“Help me tie them up. We can drag them down into the cellar and come back for them.”
“What if someone else returns before then?”
“One of us will stay and keep an eye on them.”
“I will stay,” he said.
“I need to be the one to stay here.”
“With what you have been doing in the city, you are more valuable than I am.”
“I’m not more valuable than you. You’re the one who is helping to ensure that the outer sections are unified.”
Bastan gritted his teeth and then nodded. “Fine. You remain. And if there is any danger, you depart. Do not stay here and risk yourself unnecessarily.”
“I never do.”
“I know that is not true.”
They made quick work of tying up the Kavers, and dragged them down into the cellar, securing the door behind them. Sam hoped there wasn’t another way out down there, but there didn’t seem to be. It seemed to be nothing more than brick and dirt.
“Go get Marin,” she suggested to Bastan.
“I will find all the help I can,” he said softly.
“We don’t need an army.”
“Are you sure?” He looked around the room before turning his attention back to Sam. “We don’t know what we need. I saw a few people come in here, but none of them were the four that attacked us.”
“None of them?”
Bastan shook his head.
Sam looked at the stairs and then looked up beyond. “Maybe before you go, we need to see what’s upstairs.”
8
The Bloodletting
They reached the top of the stairs, and Bastan led. With her augmentations fading, she didn’t object. She needed to reestablish them but doing so would take strength. If she tried it too soon, she tired more quickly, and her augmentations were not as effective. Nor did they last as long as when she gave her body a chance to recover.
At the top of the stairs, there was a single door. Bastan pushed it open and peered inside.
“What is it?” she asked when he didn’t move out of the way.
“Samara—”
“No, Bastan. What is it?”
She pushed past and wished she hadn’t.
Inside, she saw a woman in a corner, her still body suspended from the ceiling. Her head hung limp, her feet dangling above the floor, and her arms were outstretched to the sides, supported by additional rope. Her wrists had been slashed, and blood drained out, dripping into buckets below.
That wasn’t even the worst part of it.
“That’s Camellia,” Sam said.
She looked over to Bastan, and he nodded.
“What’s she doing here? We left her at the university, guarded by your men.”
“It seems as if they managed to spring her free.”
“And what is this? What are they doing with her?”
“She’s a Kaver, right?”
She was a Kaver, and her blood was being drained out of her.
Was this how Helen was using the Kavers? If so, why would other Kavers fight on her behalf? If she was assaulting them in such a way, what would make them willing to fight for her?
“I’m going to see if there’s anything around here that could help us,” Bastan said.
Sam stood there numbly, unable to react. She needed to say something, but all she could do was stare at Camellia as she remained suspended from the ceiling. After a few moments, Sam dragged a chair over to her, standing on it so she could cut the woman’s arms free. No one deserved this sort of torment. Not even a Kaver who had betrayed other Kavers.
She lowered the woman to the ground and gasped when she realized Camellia still had a pulse. “Bastan?”
He was facing a bookshelf and glanced over his shoulder. “What is it?”
“She’s still alive.”
“What? How can she still be alive?”
Sam shook her head. “Alec taught me how to assess for heartbeat and breathing and… All I can say is that she still lives.”
Bastan turned back to her. “You need to get her
to the university. If she knows anything, and if we can help her, she might be willing to share.”
“She can’t share with us if she’s dead.”
“That’s even more reason for you to hurry.”
“Bastan—”
He shook his head. “You can move more quickly than I can. Don’t dispute that, as we both know it to be true. Get moving, see if you can help her, and then get Marin and return.”
Sam bit back an angry comment. It seemed Bastan was going to get his way. As much as it annoyed her, he was right. She could move faster than he could, and with an augmentation, she could carry Camellia more easily than Bastan. And once she reached the university, she would have an easier time of getting the woman the necessary care.
“Don’t think this changes anything.”
Bastan chuckled. “What would it change?”
“Don’t think it changes the fact that I know you’re trying to stay here.”
“Samara, I can assure you I couldn’t care less whether I am here or not.”
“No, you’re trying to protect me in some way.”
“Why stop what I have always done?”
“Would you stop saying that?”
Bastan grinned. “Does it bother you that someone else cares about you? It shouldn’t.”
“It bothers me that you keep trying to throw it at me that you’re looking after me.”
“I’m not throwing anything at you. I’m trying to remind you that you aren’t nearly as alone in the city as you like to tell yourself you are. Ever since your brother headed off with Ralun, you have gone on as if you are isolated here, but that’s not the case. You and I both know that’s not the case.”
“Is this your way of trying to make me stay?”
Bastan stared at her. “Go. Get this woman whatever help you can. And then bring that help back here. I will go back down to the cellar and guard our Kavers.”
Sam didn’t like the idea of leaving Bastan here to keep an eye on the Kavers, even restrained as they were. It took a moment to understand why. If something happened to him, she would be angry.
“Don’t do anything stupid.”
“Usually, I’m the one who says that.”
Sam ran down the stairs and considered going out the front door before deciding to use the window. She carefully lowered Camellia out the window to the ground, and then jumped out, scooping her back up and running. As she carried her through the streets, she focused on her augmentations, needing to add strength and speed. This time, she needed to do it before she lost all of the augmentations that she already had, needing to ensure that she was able to reach the university in time.
Power surged through her in a cold wash.
Sam raced over bridges, ignoring the guards who tried to stop her, going much faster than they could keep up. She thought about using her canal staff and jumping the canals, but that would be too jarring for Camellia, and she thought she could manage more speed this way.
When she reached the university, Sam slowed. The line of people waiting for healing was much longer than it had ever been before, now trailing over the bridge and into one of the neighboring sections. The good news was that more healers were waiting than there had been before. But even with more healers, it would be impossible for them to keep up.
With so many people waiting, she wouldn’t be able to cross the bridge, not easily, and not without trying to muscle through the crowd.
Sam had no choice but to jump the canal. She shifted Camellia in her arms and screwed the two ends of her staff together with her free hand. Running to the edge of the canal, she jumped, pressing off on her staff in the middle of the jump, using that to propel her over the water.
She landed on the other side as softly as she could and raced through the main doors of the university, not bothering to look back to see if anyone had seen what she had done. Inside, a few physickers moved along the halls, but Sam didn’t go to them. She wanted to find Alec, but it was possible he wasn’t back yet. He might still be with his father, which meant she would have to find someone else at the university who could help her.
Who could she find? Could she find Beckah? Sam had never really cared for the woman, but she trusted that she would do the right thing and would try to help Camellia.
She reached the hospital ward and pushed the door open and paused. It was so much busier than it had ever been before. There were hundreds of people in here now, and dozens of physickers making their way along the beds. Had Alec realized exactly how busy he would make the university by opening the doors in the way that he had? It made the physickers work that much harder, though knowing Alec, he probably didn’t care. He probably enjoyed the extra work, and wouldn’t have complained at all, except for the fact that he was not able to offer his own help because he was so busy with everything else he was working on.
Surprisingly, she saw someone she recognized and raced toward Jalen.
“Jalen. I need your help.”
Jalen looked over. “Samara? Where is… Who is that?”
“I don’t know where Alec is. This is a Kaver Bastan, and I caught. We had brought her to Alec, but she must’ve escaped, and now she’s injured, and I don’t know…”
Jalen took the woman from her and hurried to look for an open cot. There weren’t any, so he was forced to set her against the wall near the back of the ward. Sam crouched down next to him. “It’s unfortunate that we have not been able to keep up with the demand for our services,” Jalen said. “As much as Alec wants us to help as many people as we can, there are limits to how many people we can support.”
“Is there anything you can do for her?”
“Do you know what’s wrong with her?”
“Look at her wrists,” Sam said.
Jalen had started an examination, listening to her heart and her lungs the same way Alec would, but stopped to look at her wrists at Sam’s suggestion. His eyes widened slightly, and he gasped. “Who did this to her?”
“I can only guess that it was Helen. As she did with your father, I believe she’s stealing the blood of Kavers for whatever it is she has planned.”
Jalen paused and looked up. His eyes scanned the ward until he settled on somebody in the middle of the room. “Beckah!”
Beckah hurried over, and when she saw Sam, she frowned slightly. Sam ignored the slight and pointed to the woman. Beckah crouched down next to Jalen, and the two of them began to perform a rapid assessment. Beckah checked Camellia’s wrist and then her neck, leaning her head down to the woman’s chest. “She still has a heartbeat,” she said.
“I could see that. There is still blood spurting from these wounds. It’s amazing she managed to make it this far.”
“What do you think we can do?”
“I don’t think there’s anything that can be done for this much blood loss.”
“We need to save her,” Sam said. “We need to be able to question her to see what she knows and if there’s anything we can learn about what Helen plans.”
“Samara, I don’t know that there’s anything we can do. She’s lost so much blood, and there’s only so much support that we can give her.”
“Do you have easar paper?”
“Sam…”
“You know how to treat her, right?” Sam stared at him, waiting for Jalen to argue, but he didn’t.
“I know how to treat her, but there isn’t enough time. Even if we managed to get easar paper, we wouldn’t be able to buy her enough time to get her through this. I’m sorry, Samara, but she’s gone.”
Sam wasn’t willing to accept that.
“There has to be something that can be done. We have to find some easar paper.”
“Even if you did,” Jalen started, “you would have to find both Kaver and Scribe. It won’t work otherwise.”
Kyza! Helen would win again.
“See what you can do for her. Just… Just try something. I have to get back to Bastan.”
“I’ll do what I can. I’m sorry, Samara.
There are limits to how much healing we can offer.”
Sam knew there were and had experienced the limitations before, especially when there had been nothing they could do for Elaine. She hated the limitations and hated feeling helpless and hated that Helen could take away the one person who might be able to offer some answers. Was that the reason that Helen had come for Camellia? Had she been in Alec’s room?
As much as she wanted to go and check on Alec, helping Bastan took precedent, at least right now. She trusted Alec was well, but she couldn’t shake her concern that this woman had been in his room. “Beckah, could you check on Alec? This woman was taken from Alec’s room, and if anything happened to him…”
“I will.”
Sam sighed and turned away, heading out of the building. She needed to get Marin and take her to where she’d left Bastan. She raced away from the university and jumped over the canal, now unencumbered by Camellia, landing on the palace section. When she ran inside, she stopped and asked the first set of guards, “Where is Marin?”
“I’m not certain.”
“Is she still here?”
“I haven’t seen her leave.”
That didn’t mean anything, and Sam knew it. Marin could have snuck out the same way that Sam was able to sneak out and could’ve crossed the canal without being seen.
“If you see her, send word to her that I need her help.”
She ran back and jumped canal after canal, racing through the sections, heading back to Caster for help. She’d promised Bastan she’d return with Marin. When she reached Caster, she started keeping track of how long it had been since she’d left Bastan, realizing that had been far longer than what she thought was safe. If anything happened to Bastan, she would be angry. Hurt. Devastated. All of those thoughts raced through her mind.
When she reached Bastan’s tavern, she hurried inside. She waved Kevin down. “I need your help. Bastan—”
“Say nothing else.”
Kevin hurried away and spoke to a few of the men in the tavern. They immediately got up and went with Sam. It happened so quickly that she was almost taken aback by the speed with which they reacted.
“Is this all?” she asked as they lined up outside the tavern.
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