by Joey W. Hill
Well, that theory was shot to shit, wasn’t it? How long before they’d try again? Suddenly JP was in an active operation again, and his instincts kicked in accordingly, gauging what damage control he needed to do and how to prevent the next fuck up.
He braced himself on the wall above the finger of rock that held her, not trusting the ledge with their combined weights. He felt for a pulse. She’d implied she had exceptional healing powers, so he had to hope that she was right and she was just banged up some.
If he needed to do so, fuck the rules, he’d take her through a damn portal to modern medical care. No matter how many cans of worms that would open, and he was sure it was enough to supply a fishing trip for the entire membership of Boy Scouts of America.
Her eyes fluttered open. “John. John.” She was suddenly, drunkenly trying to get away from him, slashing at him with her sharp claws, not realizing where they were or how dangerous her disorientation was to them both. The snakes, fuck it all, jumped right on board, rearing up to hiss at him, preparing to strike.
It shot an arrow in his heart, knowing she thought he’d somehow been responsible for this. But hadn’t he reminded himself her trust was fragile and new? What would he have thought in her place?
“Hey, stop it. Stop. Medusa, it wasn’t me. It wasn’t me.”
He gave her a little shake when it was clear from her movements she didn’t have a spine injury. She focused on him, her talons curling onto his shoulders. The snakes wavered in their resolve, giving him hope some of his words were getting through to her.
“There are a hundred ways I could have taken you through the portals against your will,” he said evenly. “Why wouldn’t I have done it before now? Somebody else found a way in. Let’s get you taken care of and then we’ll see what happened.”
If he’d brought additional danger to her, he might let her cut his throat with one of those vicious claws. But he’d deal with that guilt later. A cursory examination showed she had a nasty gash on the back of her shoulder and on her head, though a probe of the area reasonably assured him the skull hadn’t been compromised.
“Thank God you’re hard-headed, sweetheart,” he muttered.
He took a cursory look at the broken rope, but it was just rope, no clues to be had there. What worried him the most was her right wing. She’d landed on it, and it drooped at an odd angle from her body. Blissfully, she seemed to have lost consciousness again, because getting her back up this cliff wasn’t going to feel good. He wasn’t sure how much pain even adrenaline would mask.
Securing her to his back with the other rope he’d brought down, he began a much less pleasurable ascent than they’d experienced together earlier. Taking her down wasn’t an option, because he’d brought his pack with the first aid kit up here.
When he reached the patio, he was drenched in sweat, but they’d made it. He lowered her onto her side on the tiles, hefted himself up onto them, and divested them of the rope. He carried her to the large grass mat she’d woven and placed in the area she used somewhat like a living room. After he placed her carefully there, he dipped a bucket into the creek running through her home and brought it, a cloth and his first aid kit back to her side.
He cleaned the wound in her head first, to verify it wasn’t critical. Ratqueen and Tunneltrap were still wound up, weaving in and out of her hair around him, but they let him do what needed to be done. The wound could use a few stitches, but he would attend to that after he looked at the wing. He wanted to examine it while she was still out of it.
As he eased her to her stomach, he drew in a hissing breath. She’d fallen on the wing for sure, and a probing examination showed she’d broken it. It was like a leg bone, he realized, the way the two long bones connected. The lower one had snapped like a twig when she landed on it. He’d never wished for a Wi-Fi connection and Internet so much in his life, but he decided the right course for now was to set the bone best as possible and bind the wing close to her body with torn strips of cloth to restrict movement.
He’d had to set bones before, and he hoped to God it was the same for a bird. Or a woman with wings.
The snakes had grouped around her in a defensive circle. They kept weaving, refusing to settle, so tangled he could barely tell one from the other. Ratqueen kept circling back to bump his hand.
He supposed Medusa had been able to communicate to them that they should let him help her. Or maybe she hadn’t, and they were learning to trust him on their own account.
He was relieved when she didn’t wake as he bound the wing. The only painkiller he had was the ibuprofen, and he didn’t think he could bear to hear her cries of pain, especially at his hands. Wryly, he thought if she knew that, she’d never again worry that he harbored some diabolical plan to hurt her.
He had to keep pushing Ratqueen aside as he stitched Medusa’s head, but when he was done and tucking her into bed, the reason for the snake’s distress finally penetrated. Fucking hell.
Bastard that he was, he hadn’t given them a thought beyond what threat they might pose to him helping their mistress, and they’d been such a tangled mess, he hadn’t taken a head count. Ratqueen was obviously okay, as were Earthson, Waterlight, Tunneltrap…but Treebark was missing.
He found him coiled under her hair, against her nape. The crusty, half dried mass of blood gave him a jolt, and if Medusa was awake, she would take no comfort in his relief that it wasn’t hers. The bush viper had a deep cut close to where his head met the rest of his body, and he seemed disoriented, almost limp.
Christ, he hadn’t the foggiest idea how to treat an injured snake, but he’d proceed just as he had on the wound to her wing. He cleaned out the gash, and slathered antibiotic on it. He wasn’t sure if it was deep enough to have cut some nerve function, and the rhythmic twitch Treebark was doing was a discomfiting tic. But when he was done, JP laid the snake out on the pillow next to her and hoped for the best. He’d done all he could do for the moment.
He moved out onto the patio, getting a breath of needed fresh air and stretching cramped muscles. He’d tended to himself and others in far more dangerous surroundings, but his hands had never shook afterward, not like this. Her pain tore something loose inside of him. He hadn’t felt such a strong urge to kill in a very long time, long enough he thought he might have forgotten what it felt like.
He hadn’t.
The piercing cry of a bird of prey pulled him out of murderous thoughts and gave him a surge of relief. He knew that voice. Lifting his arm, he caught the attention of the pretty merlin winging through the sky. Wart was the way Maddock sent communications that couldn’t wait for pack supply transfers. She was fearless, passing through the portal process as matter-of-factly as she winged through the forest around Maddock’s compound. They called her Merlin’s familiar, and she was so attached to the scientist, it probably wasn’t far off the mark.
When Wart landed on his arm, JP gave her a quick stroke and unrolled the message from her leg. He cursed as he read it, though the note confirmed his suspicions. Fortunately, it also told him things were under control.
Portal system hacked. MyTech. Got it locked back down, so they can’t get thru that way again. But stay on guard. She’s on their radar. Send you more soon.
MyTech. A consortium of assholes fascinated by the magical-science combo stuff that Maddock did, only their interests were how to use what they found for weapons and profit, not to make the world a better place. Though the founder likely claimed it would make the world a better place. Meredith Molen, CEO, reminded JP of the Gary Oldman character in The Fifth Element. Destruction justified by production.
He offered Wart some fish Medusa had left over from last night and penned a return note. Attack repelled, but need instructions on care for broken wing (hers) and deep cut neck injury to snake (one of hers). STAT.
Once the bird took flight and disappeared into the sky, headed for God-knows-what portal Maddock used for her transmissions, John stared out at the beauty and peace of Medusa’s
island. It was so far away from the industrial chaos nearly a couple millennia in the future. He didn’t want to take her there. He’d rather stay here with her, forever. Hadn’t he had that thought just a short time earlier, that he’d be happy to remain in this peace and tranquility—relatively speaking—forever?
But the same niggling thought hit him now that had hit him then. Was that fair to her? She’d come here out of necessity and was living in isolation. She’d obviously enjoyed her friends and her life, before it had been disrupted. Yes, this was wonderful. But wouldn’t it be more wonderful if it was a choice, rather than a necessary refuge she had to defend, over and over?
The merlin had returned. Fast, but time worked differently through the portal, which was why Maddock had sent a message less than a half hour after the attack happened. It had likely been several hours or even a full day there.
JP opened up the thicker wad of paper. He was relieved to find he’d done pretty much everything that was supposed to be done. The message contained some important follow up care, though, as well as a vital tube of pain killers and oral antibiotics that would dissolve and be absorbed through the soft tissue of the mouth. The note suggested once he gave them to Medusa, they would help Treebark, too.
He performed that task, and shortly thereafter, maybe because the pill had a bitter taste, he heard Medusa shift, then let out a moan. Getting her a cup of water, he shifted to her other side, dissuading Ratqueen from sticking her head into the water cup as Medusa’s eyes fluttered open. In her dazed state, the bright red irises were paler somehow, like diluted blood.
“John.” Her gaze slid around her, digesting the familiar surroundings. He saw the fleeting waves of panic as she likely did a checklist. Where am I? What happened? Is he responsible? Do I need to be on guard? Why am I bound?
“You’re not bound,” he reassured her as he saw her start to fight the restraint. “It’s a bandage. You broke your wing. I bound it to your side and arm to keep you from moving it.”
She settled back, though now there was a different reason for the alarm in her face. “The good news is that it’s a clean break,” he added quickly. “I set it and, if those healing powers of yours work, you should be okay.” He hoped. He didn’t know how long it would take her to be able to fly again. But he was going to think of that as when, not if.
He saw her pallor whiten as she moved the wrong way. “I gave you a painkiller,” he said, gesturing with the pills, trying not to let the way her pain affected him make him sound brusque. “It should kick in soon and ease the discomfort. It will also make you sleepy, but that’s not a bad thing. For the next little bit, you probably don’t want to feel much.”
“My snakes…” Her focus seemed to turn inward, and he knew she was doing that internal communication thing she did with them. Her head turned immediately toward the other side of the pillow. She couldn’t reach across herself toward Treebark, though she tried, and winced again.
“Stop,” he ordered. “I’ll help you reach him.” Easing her back down and then supporting Treebark under his injured area, he brought the snake over to the other side of her body so she could touch his head, give it a stroke. The snake’s tongue flickered.
“Does he say anything?” JP asked.
“They never really speak to me, not that way. I can just feel him. He knows he’s hurt but he’s not afraid. He thinks I’m heavy and he doesn’t want me to fall on him like that again, not when sharp rocks are beneath us.” A tight smile touched her lips. “You tended him well. Does he seem…does your knowledge of healing tell you if he’ll be okay?”
“I don’t know. I hope so, though.”
“Good. Ratqueen plans to eat him if he dies, so hopefully that will inspire him to heal quickly.”
“Huh. Women.” JP curled his hand around the one on her unbound arm. She studied him.
“I thought it was you.”
“Still do, a little bit. I can see the questions in your eyes.” He stroked a hand down the side of her face. “I don’t blame you for having a hard time trusting. We haven’t known each other for long. For all I know, I may very well be to blame, opening a portal and drawing attention to your island.”
Briefly, he explained MyTech in terms he hoped she could understand. She seemed to follow it, but then, corporate competition had probably been around ever since two bakers had set up carts next to one another.
“What would they want with me?” When he hesitated, her tone sharpened. “It is harder to protect myself if I do not have all information, John Pierce.”
Yeah, she had him there. “They’d want to use you as a weapon, is my guess. They probably have some crazy idea that they can study the properties of your gaze and learn how to turn things into stone themselves. Or put some kind of directed goggles on you and make you do it for them. Turn you into their assassin.”
“How would they make me do this?”
“People come up with all sorts of twisted terrible ways to bend others to their will. I’d rather not find out.”
She swallowed, shadows passing through her gaze. “You are right, of course.”
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I know you came here to be safe.”
“I have never been safe,” she said bluntly. “The longest time that has passed between people coming to my island to cause me harm has been the space before you arrived. The grandmother and her grandson were my last visitors. Since then, I have seen two full moons.” A softer emotion passed through her gaze, easing some of the hard feeling in his gut. “Perhaps that is why I didn’t turn you to stone right away. I had become complacent with the unprecedented peace, and tired of the quiet. I determined I could at least enjoy your conversation before you did something that would require me to kill you.”
“Well, thank the stars I wasn’t a boring conversationalist.”
“Being boring isn’t a killing offense. Not usually. When you haven’t held an actual conversation with another human for a long time, it would be hard to find you boring.”
“I see.” He pursed his lips. “So I could be boring; you just haven’t filled up your need for human contact enough to know.”
“Exactly.” The weak humor died out of her face and she closed her eyes, which made her look weary and young. “It is helping, your medicine.”
“Good. Just rest. I’ll keep an eye on Treebark.”
Her fingers curled around his again, the tip of one claw hooking the sheet. He freed it before it could poke a hole in the fabric. He thought of how he’d helped Olivia trim her cat’s claws with fingernail clippers so the barbed tips wouldn’t catch on the upholstery. He’d hold that helpful suggestion for later.
“Why do humans insist on harming one another?” Her words were slurred. “Some do more than others, some don't realize they're doing harm, but we all do it. We all do harm. Why? Why must it be that way?”
The pain in her voice wrenched him, touching the same question he carried in his own soul.
“Don't know, my lady. A lot of people come up with ideas about that, tests of faith, purgatory, whatever you want to call it, but maybe it's nothing so complicated. We're just flawed. And we each have to figure out how to overcome that flawed nature in whatever way we can throughout our lives, if we think that's important. Most people we consider good do.”
Her eyes opened, the slit pupils considering him. “I hope you are good, John Pierce. You seem to be. I’m so afraid of being hurt by you. I’m afraid, not only of having to kill you as I have the others, but of my heart breaking past repair. I’m so tired of all of it. I might not survive having to do that.”
“My lady.” He touched her face and came closer so she was gazing straight into his eyes. “What did I write on the sand when I arrived?”
Her muddled mind searched through memory and found it. “I am here to serve you.”
“Right. That’s the beginning and end of it.”
“It is the beginning. Some things never end. It would be nice if, for once, it was something
I didn’t want to end.”
She slipped off, leaving him holding her hand and with a hollowness in his lower belly. He wished he had Meredith Molen of MyTech in front of him right now. If she was forced to see Medusa’s pain, her sadness, would it change her? John would like to think it would. Maybe that’s how people stayed sane, thinking only choices could be irreparably evil, not the people who made them. That there was always a chance the person could change, even if they couldn’t change their past choices.
He’d stopped debating questions like that a long time ago. He expected Medusa had as well, except in vulnerable moments like these, when the hope that people could be better than they ever seemed to be managed to raise its weary head once more.
The next couple days were nerve-wracking. John stayed on guard, his senses honed razor-sharp for any evidence of a portal opening that might herald another invasion by MyTech, no matter Maddock’s reassurance that he’d closed down the access. JP also kept his eyes on the shoreline. If two full moons was the longest time that had ever passed since she’d had someone coming to her island looking to cause trouble, they were long overdue.
His beach, the view from her home, was the most likely landing spot for approaching boats, because the visible, populated land masses were on that side, but it was always possible they’d try a different beach. Or MyTech would open another uncharted portal and arrive unseen, launching a land attack. Maddock did send a follow up communication indicating, first, that he didn’t believe the hackers had the actual knowledge to open a portal, and second, that he’d done some spell craft that shut down all the known or suspected portals, except a one-way exit on the beach. The information relaxed John a certain amount, but he had other things to fray his calm.