by SA Magnusson
“For now,” Aron said.
“Fine. For now. There’s no reason for the two sides to fight.”
“We have confronted the Dark Council for a long time. There is more reason than you know for the two sides to be at odds.”
“Even after everything that happened?”
“This was one conflict in the greater scheme of things. It changes little.”
Maybe for them, but for me? I had no interest in getting involved in the politics between the two councils, but I wasn’t sure that I could continue to avoid my magic.
“What will you do?” Aron asked.
“Return to work. Save lives. You know, the same things I was doing a week ago.”
“You could—”
“Could what? There’s no way that I could go and be a part of the mage society. My magic is different. I felt it in the neutral ground. I pulled magic across the Veil, Aron.”
“I know. And I don’t know what it means. Your grandparents—”
“Don’t know either. And they’ve warned me to be careful, so this is me being careful. I have no intention of getting too close to the mage council.”
He took a deep breath. “And I’ve been summoned away.”
“Another demon?”
He smiled tightly but didn’t answer. I guess I shouldn’t expect him to.
When he left, I found myself sitting on the couch again, a bottle of wine in front of me and an old TV show flashing on the screen. When my next shift came up, I dreaded going into work.
The day passed slowly, thankfully not very busy, though the warmer-than-normal day might have something to do with it. I saw mostly earaches and the occasional stomach pain, workups that didn’t take much mental gymnastics. For that, I was thankful. I wasn’t sure that I was ready for a difficult or complicated case.
When a trauma came in, the surge along my spine warning me that someone was seriously injured, I was waved off by Dr. Roberts. He shot me an annoyed look and, rather than arguing, I simply turned away, heading back down the hallway toward the nurses station.
I don’t know why I should be surprised, but Dr. Allen greeted me.
“Dr. Michaels. I trust you’re feeling better?”
“As well as I can. I’m not sure what I got exposed to, but it was awful.”
He opened his mouth as if he wanted to say something, but then clamped it shut. He crossed his arms in front of his chest, studying me. “You’ve been distracted lately.”
“I haven’t—”
“You have potential. You’re incredibly bright, but intelligence isn’t all that matters when it comes to the practice of medicine. You have to have a dedication to the people you care for. That we serve. If you don’t have that dedication, you can’t provide for them the way that you need to.”
It was strange getting lectured to by someone as young as Dr. Allen, and stranger still that his lecture was appropriate. I had been distracted, and he had seen it. It came out in my lack of empathy with patients, and through my incomplete evaluations, nearly missing a malignancy that would have killed a man. Using magic when it was possible a non-magical approach might have bought us more time.
“You have to decide what you want to do, Dr. Michaels. Whatever’s been distracting you needs to be pushed away.”
“It is,” I said.
He studied me a little longer. “Good. I’d hate for you to lose your place here.”
A bead of sweat worked its way down the center of my back. Could I really have gotten so far along that I was in danger of losing my position? I hadn’t thought so, but then, I had lost a patient in CT, regardless of whether or not there was anything I could have done for her. And then there was the sinus tumor patient.
Both of those had been with Dr. Allen.
“Would that be your recommendation?” I asked carefully.
“I don’t want it to be. The question is whether or not you want it to be.”
He watched me for another moment before turning away and disappearing back into the trauma bay with Roberts. I stared for a moment, feeling the surge of cold along my spine. It flared for a moment before fading. I couldn’t tell if that meant the patient had died or whether they had succeeded in reviving them.
Maybe it didn’t matter.
“Kate?”
I jerked around. Jen watched me with an amused expression. “I didn’t realize you were working today. With as slow as it’s been, I would’ve figured I could have seen you in the lounge.”
I forced a smile. I had been careful not to spend too much time in the lounge, not wanting to appear as if I were abandoning my responsibility. “I’ve had a few patients who took a little bit longer than they should have.”
“Oh. One of those days.”
I glanced back over my shoulder, looking toward Dr. Allen. “Seems like it,” I said.
“Has Derek found you?”
I shook my head. “I haven’t seen Derek in a few days.” Not since leaving the basilica. He had been quiet, and I recognized the troubled expression on his face. Something was going through his head, but I figured that we had time to work through it.
“He put in his notice.”
“He did what?”
“Quit. I guess he’s heading out west somewhere to take another job.”
“How long?”
“I don’t know. You’ll have to ask him. We’ll have to have a drink in his honor, and maybe you can give him a little goodbye gift, if you know what I mean.”
I shook my head. “I always know what you mean, Jen.”
She laughed and sauntered off down the hall.
I returned to work, my mind even more distracted than it had been before, and near the end of my shift, I ran into Derek. He was dressed in scrubs, coming on for the evening shift. He nodded at me and started down the hall toward one of the lower acuity rooms before I caught up to him.
“You’re not going to tell me?”
“Tell you what?”
“That you quit.”
Derek looked around. A flash of scrubs in the distance warned me that someone had overheard, and I decided I didn’t care. “Dr. Michaels—”
“Don’t you go Dr. Michaels with me. Why did you quit?”
He took a step close to me and lowered his voice. “Kate, I can’t stay here. After everything that’s happened…”
“What happened that has changed for you? The fact that I know that you have a different kind of magic? Hell, I have the same thing.”
“It’s not that.”
“Then what?”
A flush started at his neck and worked up toward his chin. “I told you that I have been watching you for a while. I guess I always thought that the two of us would…” He shook his head, glancing down at the floor. “It doesn’t matter. Not now. I’ve seen you with that archer.”
“Derek, don’t talk like that. You’re needed here. My grandparents put you here to—”
“To watch over you. And I don’t need to do that, not anymore, not when there’s someone else who seems to be doing it better, and certainly more welcome than I was.”
I stood facing him, not certain what more I could say. I didn’t want Derek to leave, but if what he said was true and he had feelings for me that he hadn’t revealed, I wasn’t ready for that, either.
He smiled, though it was a sad smile. “See? I can tell what you’re thinking. I know you, Kate. This is better, for both of us. And besides, your grandparents set me up with another assignment.”
“When are you leaving?”
“A couple of weeks.”
“Where are you going?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“It does. How will I know if—”
“You won’t.”
I started to reach for him and hesitated. The sound of a siren coming into the ambulance bay caught my attention, and with it came another surge of cold along my spine. This one was stronger than the last, and I turned toward the trauma room.
“Go,” Derek said
.
“You’re not coming?”
“I’m not on yet.”
I watched him for a moment, but the sense of cold intensified, pulling me away. I turned away from Derek and headed toward the trauma room, determined not to allow my distractions to get the best of me. The patient coming in deserved that much from me.
And maybe I could use my magic to help. It certainly allowed me to know how severe the injury was, so could it really be all that bad?
When I stepped into the bay, I took a deep breath, steadying myself. “Okay. What do we have?” I asked.
And then I got to work.
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An ancient and deadly magic comes calling in my ER.
I’ve managed to stay under the radar as I continue my ER residency. All I need is to finish it out and I can get away from Minneapolis and the magic all around me. For so long, that was what I wanted. And still do… even if I can’t help it as magic begins to creep into my work.
When an injured shifter shows up in my ER with my name on him, I have no choice but to try and understand why, but doing so risks exposing my magical side to the one place I wanted to conceal it from.
Partnering with Aron leads to a discovery in the north woods that I alone think will impact magic in the city. When the mage council refuses to get involved with shifter business, I lean on a different sort of ally, but even that might not be enough to save us.
The magic attacking is like nothing I’ve faced before. This time, the Veil can’t protect us. A search for answers yields only more questions. And as the attacks progress, I need to figure out what sort of magic I have to stop the threat—or I’ll be the next victim.
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Author’s Note
Thank you so much for reading Postmortem. It was a blast to write and hopefully just as much fun to read.
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SA Magnusson
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Also by SA Magnusson
Medicine and Magic
Flatline
Postmortem
Malignant Magic