A Burning in the Bones (Waxways #3)

Chapter 36 Mercy Whitaker

36 MERCY WHITAKER

Around the room, the tides began to turn.

Some of the paladins fled with the viceroy, but most were abandoned in impossible positions. The remaining wizards surrounded them, advancing in small packs, until every enemy soldier in the room was subdued. Gemma Graylantian shouted to keep the soldiers alive—and Mercy suspected it was not for the sake of kindness. More likely she wanted to interrogate them.

Mercy fell to triage as soon as the fighting stopped. Cleaning out wounds. Binding the larger cuts. Staunching blood flow. There were a few broken bones that would require more attention—and one younger boy who’d knocked his shoulder out of the socket in an effort to dodge one paladin’s attack. It was all comfortable work. The sort of triage she’d performed during her residency. That feeling faded, though, as she began to assess the mortally wounded.

Several wizards were dead. One was Marc Winters—the current heir of their house. Her eyes searched and searched, but thankfully none of the children had died. A short-lived relief as Mercy stumbled across the man and woman she’d spoken to earlier. Bond-mates. The woman had survived, but her husband had not. Mercy could not bear to hear the sounds coming from the surviving wife. She could not watch that sort of heartbreak. Not again.

“Move. Back away. He might not be gone yet… let me tend to him!”

The room was still mostly chaos. Others were helping the wounded. The wife moved, but kept muttering. “Dead. Oh gods! He’s dead!”

“Someone! Help her! Give me some space to work over here!”

She had the commanding voice of a triage doctor. A few people hustled over, doing their best to pull the woman away. Using their bodies to shield her from the sight of something so terrible that she’d remember it for the rest of her life. Mercy carefully assessed each wound. Took the man’s pulse. It wasn’t there, but that wasn’t the end. It didn’t have to be the end.

Quietly, she began casting her magic. Bright flashes that removed infections or sealed some of the internal wounds. Mercy glanced back over one shoulder at the wife. She was screaming at the people who’d dared to get in her way. Everyone was distracted. Mercy hesitated briefly, and then cast the only desperate spell left in her arsenal. She set one hand over his unbeating heart and magic pulsed out from her. Mercy braced herself as the man’s entire body began convulsing.

She felt a sharpness in her right foot. A pain so intense and sudden that she bit down on the tip of her tongue. The husband came gasping back. It had worked. The bereft woman sagged to her knees. The two helpers turned to stare as the man rolled over, hacking up blood and mucus and worse. His chest heaved. His eyes rolled wildly around the room. He looked pale as a ghost, but he was here. He was alive. Mercy winced at her own pain before barking out orders again.

“Get him water! Keep an eye on him, please. He lost a lot of blood. He’s damn lucky to be alive.” The poor woman crawled across the floor to her bond-mate. They collapsed into each other. Both of them were weeping, but Mercy didn’t have time to watch their reunion. There was too much to do. She made second rounds. A necessary part of any triage effort. Magic had a nasty habit of unwinding itself. Refreshing spells was just as important as the initial castings. Mercy worked her way down the lines, checking and rechecking her work, until the remaining survivors had all gathered around the area. Mercy realized that when the viceroy had fled, several wizards had pursued him. Glancing around, she suspected they were the very wizards who might have taken charge if they were here.

The logistics of what to do next fell to her, a woman named Gemma Graylantian, and a pioneer that Mercy had met earlier. A man called Hurst. Their first task was a body count.

Seven wizards were dead. Over thirty paladins had been killed. That left thirty-one survivors trying to rally themselves, and the first question was where they should go. It didn’t take long to arrive at Balmerick as the safest option. The rest of the populace—magicless as they were—could not access the Heights at all. It would be safe and Balmerick’s campus was certainly large enough to host a group as large as theirs.

The next question was how the hell to actually get there. Not everyone had spare way candles. More importantly, there were two groups that could not travel with them. First, the magicless parents of some of the children in the room. A quick discussion took place. Most agreed to send their children ahead to safety. Anywhere but down here where they might be targeted by yet another attack. One mother declined. Mercy could only watch as she put an arm around her little boy and quietly guided him back out into the night.

Be safe. Please be safe.

The second group that could not travel with them—but also couldn’t be left behind—were the prisoners. Almost every one of them was magicless, and thus could not be ferried up to the Heights. Mercy saw that one of them was Nance Forester. He wasn’t offering her any dark glares or gloating smiles. No, he was huddled and bound with the rest of them, looking like a lost sheep. When no one else offered any alternatives, Mercy volunteered.

“We can take them to Safe Harbor. There are warded rooms there. Designed for when we have to provide medical care to criminals.” Or when you want to falsely imprison one of your own doctors, she thought, remembering her own stay in one of those rooms. “I’ll need a small escort group if…”

She trailed off. There was a low buzzing noise. Everyone in the room heard it and all of them went quiet at the same time. Near the front of the room, one of the windows had been broken by a stray blast of magic. Mercy moved toward that spot until the noise resolved into a voice. Words were booming out in the street.

It was Viceroy Gray.

Speaking to all of Kathor.