Spell It Out for Me

by Sarina Dorie

  “No!” he said. “You’ll get in trouble.”

  “I don’t care about getting in trouble. I don’t want you to die.”

  “This isn’t going to kill me.” He made a noise that might have been a bitter laugh. “It’s just going to make my penis shrivel up and fall off.”

  I didn’t know if he was joking or being serious.

  “We should wash off the toxins. That will help, right?”

  He grunted. I grabbed a black silk robe flung over the dressing screen that belonged to Vega and threw it on. It was too long and I tripped over the hem as I ran to the bathroom down the hall, realizing too late I had nothing to scoop up the water. Frantically I ran back and looked around my room. It wasn’t like I just kept a bucket lying around. My water bottle was plastic. I didn’t want to fill that. I grabbed my nightgown since it was a hundred percent cotton. I soaked that and ran back.

  Elric flinched as I placed the cold wet fabric on him.

  “Is that bad?” I asked.

  “No. Not bad,” he said through clenched teeth. “Just not enough to wash away the poison.”

  “We need to get you to the shower. Can you walk?”

  “Maybe.”

  Elric managed to fall out of bed. That didn’t help much. I rolled him onto a blanket and dragged him to the women’s bathroom that I shared with other teachers. The showers were in the far back. To get to the stalls, I had to drag him past the toilet stalls, sinks, and mirrors.

  I pulled Elric around the corner. He moaned at every bump along the way. Once he finally lay inside a shower stall, I ran cold water over him. He cried out when the water hit him. I didn’t know if this would make everything better or worse. I didn’t want the force of the water to tear his skin off. I used my nightgown to catch the water and wring it out over him.

  “What should I do?” I asked. “Is there some kind of healing magic? A potion that will work on Fae? I can go to the nurse’s wing.”

  He leaned his head against the tile wall and closed his eyes. I shook him. “What do I do?”

  “I don’t know.”

  There were only three other people in the school right now: Jeb, Imani, and Thatch. Maybe Vega was around somewhere. I wasn’t certain. I sure as hell wasn’t going to get my student involved. Jeb could help, but I didn’t know if he would. The same with Thatch, but for different reasons. I didn’t know where Elric’s guards were or how to retrieve them.

  If only I could transport myself like Thatch did. I could get the healer in Lachlan Falls. Or my fairy godmother.

  Or Khaba. He would have helped me if he were here. Then again, if he still worked at the school, I was certain he would have talked some sense into Jeb.

  But there was no one to help me. I had no magic. All I could do was block small amounts of pain like I had just done.

  I didn’t feel right about leaving Elric, but I didn’t have many other options. I was in over my head, and I needed help. I left Elric to sit under a cold stream of water. Everyone always locked their doors, so I headed into a secret passage that contained the hallway of mirrors. If Vega was around, I would be able to spot her from there.

  Perhaps it was the running to the hallway that made me break my concentration on my affinity. My hands began to throb. All things considered, I was lucky that was all that had blistered and caught fire.

  In the hallway of mirrors, the portals glowed, the view of each room silvery-blue. I paused before Jeb’s room. It was so dark, I couldn’t even make out whether he was in his bed. The idea of telling him filled me with dread. Vega wasn’t in any of the rooms. I hurried on to Thatch’s quarters next.

  Imani had said Thatch would do anything for me. He had said he would do anything for me. I just couldn’t imagine that would still be the case after I had invited Elric to spy on him. He probably hated me right now.

  Yet Felix Thatch was my best chance at helping Elric.

  When I came to the mirror that reflected his room, I found him asleep in his bed. He’d gone to bed early. His arms were bare, the white lace of his tattoos faint against his skin. He’d thrown aside his blankets other than his sheet. His face leaned against a book he’d apparently been reading as he’d fallen asleep.

  I tried to push down the stinging in my hands so I could think clearly. I needed a plan for talking to Thatch. I wouldn’t tell him about the condom. I needed to convince Thatch to make me some kind of potion or brew so I could give it to Elric. Not that I knew if he would be able to tolerate an elixir better than he had with Vega’s hair of the dog potion.

  I was just going to have to wing it and feel Thatch out. If he was in a crabby and vindictive mood—more than the average person who was woken at night by someone who had insulted his professionalism recently—perhaps it wasn’t a wise idea to mention Elric.

  I pushed myself through the portal. The surface was cold and resisted me at first, then it sucked me through. I stumbled over the lower edge of the mirror, banging my foot on the way out.

  So much for my smooth entrance.

  Thatch sat up with a start, his book toppling to the ground. The ceiling glowed as orange as a sunrise.

  “Merlin’s balls, Clarissa. What time is it?” Thatch pushed his blanket aside. “And what have you done this time?”

  He wore a snug white T-shirt and boxers. His hair was messy in a rakish sort of way.

  I paused, forgetting myself for a moment. I wasn’t used to seeing him undressed like this. The throbbing in my hands started up again, reminding me why I was there. I turned my hands over, staring down at my blistered fingers.

  His gaze fell upon my burns. He rose, taking my arms in his hands and inspecting them. My skin was red and blistered—not anywhere near as bad as Elric’s injuries—but in the light, I could fully see the inflammation.

  “Bloody hell, what have you done to yourself?” He raised one of my hands closer to his face.

  “Do you have any salves for this? Like the one you gave me before, when I had problems with my affinity?”

  He eyed the wounds skeptically. “This isn’t from your affinity. How did you do this?” He steered me over to his bed and sat me down.

  I tried to think of something that wouldn’t raise his suspicions further. “It was probably something synthetic.” The condom package had said it was natural—lambskin. Of course, I didn’t know about the lubricant that it was covered with. I didn’t know if the wrapper had been safe. Elric avoided eating fruit from plastic packaging.

  “It might have been from a lotion or something.” I swallowed. “From the Morty Realm.”

  His lips pressed into a line. Skepticism tugged the corners of his mouth downward. His gaze flickered from my hands to my chest. He reached up to my collar and tugged the V of the neckline of the bathrobe more securely closed. I hadn’t realized it had gaped open.

  The gesture was familiar, too intimate for a coworker. I found I had trouble formulating words, and it wasn’t just the pain.

  “I—um—Will you help me?” I asked.

  “Yes.” He sighed. “Wait here.”

  He opened the door to his room and left. I remained sitting on his bed for a moment before I considered how forward that was. I stood. It seemed like he was taking forever. I picked up the book from the floor.

  It was the Fellowship of the Rings. I thought he hated fantasy. Why was he reading one of my favorite books after he’d insulted it before? I set the book on his pillow.

  Thatch returned a moment later.

  I sprang over to him. “Thank you. That means a lot to me. I’ll just take that and be on my way.” I tried to grab the ceramic canister from him.

  He held on to it firmly. “No. You’re going to sit down and let me apply it.”

  “That’s okay. I can do it myself.”

  He nudged me over to the bed. “You don’t know how to do healing magic on your own. I’ll apply the first batch. You can reapply in a few hours without me.” He sat on the bed an
d popped the lid open.

  “Does this salve rely on healing magic? Or is the magic in the salve itself? I was hoping you could loan it to me, and I could do the healing on my own.” Already I suspected my plans were getting derailed. I needed something that I could easily use to heal Elric.

  Like a miracle.

  Thatch plopped a blob of it on my hand and rubbed it across my palms. The cold relief was immediate.

  He hadn’t answered my question. I needed him to hurry.

  “Will this salve work on Morties and Witchkin and . . . Fae?” My voice squeaked on the last word.

  Thatch stopped rubbing. His eyes narrowed. My attempt at gleaning information apparently wasn’t as subtle as I hoped.

  He resumed rubbing. “Where is Elric?”

  “Where? I don’t know. Why would I know where he is?”

  He was gentle with my palms. “Why do you bother lying when you’re so obviously bad at it?”

  “Why do you lie? You said you didn’t like fantasy. That looks like a fantasy book to me.” I nodded to the book behind him. My attempt to evade my situation did me little good.

  “How did you burn yourself?”

  I avoided his gaze, afraid he would see the truth in my eyes.

  “Where is Elric? I assume you burned him too? And the reason he hasn’t healed you or himself is because you burned him with something synthetic.”

  “Maybe.” He didn’t sound angry yet. If I didn’t volunteer any information, he might only guess enough to decide if he was willing to help me, not enough that he might grow angry.

  “And from your dripping hair and bathrobe, my guess is you either just came from the forest with him where you were at the stream or pond, or you were in the shower. If you’re to be believed, and you used some kind of lotion. . . .” His eyes narrowed again. “I have a feeling you’ve done something foolish and short-sighted. Am I right?”

  I swallowed the lump in my throat. “Will you please help him?”

  He groaned. “How badly is he injured?”

  “Really bad. Worse than the mermaid with the fish hook in her lip.”

  “Has his skin necrotized?”

  “I don’t think so, but pieces of his skin came off. He’s in a lot of pain. I didn’t know what to do, so I . . . came to you.”

  “Of course you did.” He grunted. “Nothing says ‘I’m sorry for accusing you of molesting me while I’m meditating’ like a plea to heal your boyfriend.”

  Hopefully his sarcasm didn’t mean he completely hated me.

  “Will you give me something to heal him?” I asked.

  “No. With your ability for blundering any magical situation, you’d probably make him worse.”

  He was probably right. Even so, I had a feeling he would go batshit crazy if he saw Elric and knew what we’d been up to.

  I stood. “Give me a salve for him.”

  “It will be ineffective.”

  “Show me how to use my affinity to heal.”

  He hesitated. “I don’t think you should use magic yet.”

  “I used magic to control my own pain. I used magic the other day when. . . .” When I’d been in his office and lightning had danced across my skin. Not that I wanted to bring up the incident with Elric at the moment. “Nothing bad happened afterward.” Aside from pain, and I had survived that. “Show me how to heal him.”

  He wet his lips. “Do you truly comprehend what you’re asking? Do you understand what is involved to use your affinity for healing?”

  I hesitated. I suspected I did. “It will be like before when I had burns and you showed me how to heal myself.” That had been over a year ago. The thought of putting myself in a situation so vulnerable made my heart quicken.

  I would have to trust him.

  After the lessons in the chair and all the times I suspected he had touched me and kissed me while I’d been induced in meditations, I didn’t look forward to the idea of doing so again.

  “This is why you have a knack for trouble.” He scooped his fingers in the jar and took out another dollop of the ointment.

  “What is why?”

  “You try to fix a mistake by making another mistake.”

  Was asking him to help going to make everything worse? Or was he my favorite mistake? I could hear Sheryl Crow singing that song in my head.

  “Could we hurry this up? I have to get back.” I didn’t want to leave Elric alone in the shower stall, shivering with cold and pain.

  Thatch’s eyes were intent, gloomy with storm clouds. “Close your eyes and focus on your affinity.”

  Immediately I did as he instructed before he could change his mind. Before I could change my mind. He massaged the salve into my hands, but his caress changed from therapeutic to sensual. I found myself leaning in toward him, inhaling his scent of dusty books and oil paint. My limbs grew more languid.

  “Feel the inflammation cooling, the damaged tissue fading. You’re doing more than channeling the pain away. You’re funneling kinetic energy back toward your hands. Transform pain into the essence of the pleasure, of soothing, and healing.” The monotone of his voice was calming and melodic.

  He caressed my arms. With the tingle of the ointment and sensation of his touch, it took a moment to focus. I leaned against his side, finding it difficult to stay upright. My body was so relaxed I would have fallen over if he hadn’t been beside me. I leaned my head on his shoulder. He circled an arm around me, and I snuggled into his chest.

  Part of me knew this was a bad idea. Another part of me reasoned I was doing a bad thing, but for a good reason. So what if it was making a mistake to fix a mistake?

  He murmured against my ear. “How badly do you want to heal him?”

  “Very much.”

  “You’re going to be vexed with me later if I show you. You’ll accuse me of taking advantage of you.”

  “Probably.”

  He laughed, the sound wicked.

  I lifted my head. “Are you going to take advantage of me?”

  His eyes were hungry. His gaze flickered to my lips. “Focus on your affinity.”

  I closed my eyes again. He kissed a line down my neck into the V of the robe. Desire shot through me. A rush of magic flooded through my limbs.

  “Visualize yourself healing,” he said.

  I did my best to concentrate. All the while, I clung to him, trying to squeeze closer to his warmth. He said something, his voice sharp, but I lost the meaning of his words as another wave of molten yearning flooded through me.

  He pinched my forearm. “Focus. Transform the energy.”

  I did so. I shifted the energy inside, but my affinity needed more fuel. I lifted my lips, almost touching mine to his, but he drew back.

  He firmly held me away from himself. “It appears you have healed yourself.”

  Breathless, I blinked at my hands, unable to comprehend through the haze of languid satisfaction pulling at me.

  He pinched my thigh. That brought me to my senses. I jerked back. My hands were pink and some areas still swollen, but there were no longer any blisters. The pain and blisters had evaporated in only a couple of minutes.

  His wicked smile returned. “How was that for healing magic?”

  I jumped to my feet. “Thank you. I’ll try that with Elric.”

  He rose as well. I thought he was seeing me out, but he grabbed a pair of pants he’d flung over the back of a chair next to his dresser.

  I shot across the room toward the door. “You don’t need to come with me.”

  “Yes, I do.”

  I flung the door open.

  “You’re forgetting the ointment,” he said.

  I ran back and snatched it up.

  He stepped into my path, now dressed in a T-shirt and pants. He blocked my exit through the door. “If I don’t come with you, you’ll find a way to fumble the healing spell and shoot lightning at him instead. Healing yourself is one thing, healing someone e
lse is another matter entirely. You have to synchronize with the other person and think of them as an appendage of your own body.”

  “He isn’t going to want to see you.” I charged forward, trying to push past him.

  “What a coincidence. I don’t want to see him either.” He didn’t budge from where he stood or push me. He was a wall.

  “Felix, you don’t understand. This is going to be a really bad idea.”

  He pointed an accusing finger at me. “No. A bad idea was whatever shampoo or soap or lotion you told him it was safe to use in the first place. Not only is Elric Fae, but he is Prince of the Silver Court. Think about what you’ve done. If King Viridios discovers this incident, he might accuse you of regicide and try you as a criminal. Naturally, he shall ensure you’re seen as guilty and thus no one will be able to contest his right to enslave you.”

  I gave up. He won. At least he was willing to help.

  Five minutes later we were in the bathroom of the women’s dorm. I asked Thatch to wait outside for a minute so I could check on Elric alone. The patter of water came from the stall. Elric remained on the floor with my soaked nightgown protecting his crotch. His skin was a translucent blue that resembled a water siren more than his usual healthy glow.

  I turned off the water and crouched inside the shower. His chest was cold, which made sense since I’d run cold water over him. I touched his cheek. He didn’t so much as twitch.

  “I’m back,” I said. “How are you holding up?”

  He didn’t answer.

  I felt for a pulse in his wrist. Feeling none, I palpated his neck. My own heart lurched in fear. I didn’t want him to be dead. I hoped that what I’d done hadn’t permanently poisoned him. Oh God, what if this was the third boyfriend in a row I’d killed? Technically I hadn’t killed Derrick, but I had hurt him.

  Panic welled up inside me. My heart pounded so hard I couldn’t tell what was his pulse and what was my own.

  I lifted the fabric, afraid I would find his penis had fallen off. His leg twitched, and he grunted. The sound in the back of his throat reminded me of a feral animal. He didn’t open his eyes. His genitals were blistered and bleeding. I had managed to peel away all of the condom, but pieces of his skin had blackened. It was the goriest and most horrifying sight I’d ever seen. My stomach flip-flopped, and I just barely managed to keep from puking.