Chapter Seven #2
“Nope. I am good at my job. I am getting the work done, and our survival rate is the highest in the fleet. If you want someone half-assed taking care of your community, feel free to request them.”
Dem-rah blinked. “You are that highly rated?”
“I am good with a multitude of species, and Skip is good with diagnostics.”
“Ah, the brownie. Right. You are a good team?”
“Yup. So, why are you talking to me and these two are positively vibrating with hostility?”
“Because your face is striped, and my people did it. We need to take better care of those without claws and teeth, especially if we want them to care for us in return.”
She smiled. “I can put on claws and teeth, but I am too tired for it now.”
He patted her shoulder, and she didn’t wince as it was on open wounds. “I will take care of my people. They won’t stand by again.”
“Um, okay. Cool.”
“You are owed a boon.”
“I will wait until the child arrives to collect.”
He nodded. “You are a fierce little thing.”
“Not that little, but everybody thinks I am tiny.”
She stuck out her hand, and he gripped it in two out of four hands. “Take care, little mother.”
“Not yet. Currently just incubator.”
Nylora smiled. “Have a good sleep, Your Majesty.”
He chuckled. “I will, after I have a chat with the community at large. If I am awake, they are all going to be awake. Get some food and get some rest. Solor, thank you for bringing this to my attention. The administration doesn’t tell us when this sort of thing happens.”
“Oh. Well, that explains the turnover in ambulance crews. I think aside from me and Skip, the oldest team is fourteen months.”
Dem-rah was shocked. “They quit so frequently?”
“Not everyone heals as fast as I do.” She shrugged. “I am exceedingly hungry right now, so no offense, I need to get going.”
He patted her hair and nodded. “Rest well.”
“That’s how I do it. Good evening and hope to return to your truck in three months.”
He chuckled and backed away, closing her door. She sighed and sat back. “I believe I was promised food. If you have changed your mind, I need to get out to scare the locals.”
Solor turned and looked over his shoulder.
“We have not changed our minds. We just put you there so that Demuel would not be compelled to heal you before we went for breakfast. Dem-rah needed to see what his citizen had done to someone trying to help, and the others are supposed to help and hold them so that that does not occur.”
“Oh. That’s the thing. Okay. Sure. You should see what the giants do.” She made a face.
Solor exhaled and started the car. They drove to the diner where a lot of XIA vehicles were parked out front.
Demuel came to her door and opened it. She sighed and unbuckled, taking his hand to hop down.
“I will heal you while we wait for our meal.” He kept hold of her hand as they walked into the diner.
The chatter and ribbing went silent as they stood and waited to be seated. The server looked at her with wide eyes. “Are you all right?”
“Yup. Not bleeding anymore. Apologies for the appearance.”
“Um, no problem. The agents occasionally come in covered in goo.”
Three menus were grabbed, and they walked past some shocked and appalled agents to a booth where she was urged to go in first, and Demuel was next to her. She yawned and looked around. She lifted her menu, ordered decaf coffee, juice, her eggs, and some extra fruit salad.
The guys ordered, and Demuel turned her head with two fingers touching her chin and kissed her. Healing warmth went through her, and she felt the slices heal and firm up. The diner was still silent.
When he lifted his head, he stroked her cheek. “There. All better.”
“Thank you.” She smiled brightly.
She looked around and blinked at the focus of the other agents. Some were even standing. She saw Neekil’s mate, and the woman smiled and waved. She hadn’t seen a dark elf war companion before.
The woman got up, climbed over Neekil, and walked over. “What the hell happened to you?”
“Angry patient. They get scrappy, and I am not allowed to shoot them.” She smiled and extended her hand. “I am Nylora.”
“The dark fae. I’m Hannah.”
“Yes.”
“Do you know Jennel?”
“Oh yeah. She’s the one who outed me to these two. It was a one-night stand that went all kinds of strange.”
Solor snorted. “Perhaps this venue was not the right one for this conversation.”
“Oh, no, you picked it. Now you deal with it.”
Demuel chuckled. “It is a strange thing. We don’t know you, but you are carrying his baby.”
Hannah blinked. “Right, on that note, I am out of here.”
She returned to her table, and when Neekil wouldn’t move, she crawled over him to settle against the wall. She whispered to him, and his eyes glowed scarlet for a moment before Solor got a buzz on his phone.
Solor looked and snorted. “You are invited to Neekil and Hannah’s housewarming. We can’t come if we don’t bring you.”
Demuel gave Neekil a thumbs-up. The dark elf grinned, and Hannah laughed and punched her mate in the shoulder.
Demuel looked at her. “Do you hit?”
“Nope. They train self-defense out of us. We just try to heal and then try not to die.” She glanced at him. “Do you mind if I take off the corset? The slicing makes the tension all weird.”
“Go ahead. Do you need a hand?”
She shook her head, reached behind her, opened the lacing at the back, loosened the busk, and then popped it off. She exhaled slowly and took the structure out from under her uniform. She hummed and rolled the corset into a column.
Solor reached over and took it as the beverages showed up. He unrolled it and saw the slashes that went all the way through the layers. “This could have been horrible.”
“It wasn’t great at the time.”
“How often does a patient attack you?”
She shrugged. “Every three to four shifts. Mostly, it is getting punched. It isn’t like today when I had to launch over Demuel to avoid getting mauled.”
Solor stared at Demuel, “What?”
“I didn’t actually tell him.”
Solor blinked. “What did I miss?”
“Oh, we got a call to meet an ambulance at the hospital for a violent patient. A delayed first shift through a ton of drugs used to keep them from dying of an allergy.” He sipped his coffee.
“The door opened, Nylora shot out and flew over our heads, landing on the gravel and pavement behind me. The wolf was about eighty percent shifted and flailing around in there. We got him calmed, and the hospital took care of the new werewolf. I walked over and tried to heal Nylora, and it worked.”
She sipped at her juice. “You didn’t think it would work?”
Solor sighed. “He’s a situational healer. Apparently, this is the right situation for him. How long have you been a medic?”
She counted on her fingers. “Four and a half years in Redbird.”
Demuel asked softly, “Where else?”
“Corudet City for five years. Arutrus for five. I was a teacher for five years before that. I still do the occasional appearance. I was near the old home of the gods for a while, teaching a first aid course, when I was asked to go to a party at the governor’s mansion.
Zerul throws a mean party, but that is where I stood in the shadows and left as soon as the folk familiar with each other drew in against the men invited.
You two know the rest. Why were you guys there? ”
They looked at each other, and Solor said, “Zerul invited us and mentioned that there would be powerful extranatural women there. We portaled there, got changed at the mansion, and then went to the party.”
“Oh. I know what happened next.” Her fruit salad arrived, and she stabbed a melon chunk with her fork.
Demuel murmured, “You are chewing on that like it owes you money.”
She snorted. “Bump likes greens and fruit.”
They both grinned. She winced. “Yes, I know both of your beasts are herbivores, but it isn’t my favourite thing. Usually, the only thing green on my plate is the garnish.”
They both chuckled.
She pushed the empty bowl aside as their food showed up. She loved diners. If you were hungry, the food could keep coming, and all they wanted was money.
Solor asked, “Why did you choose Redbird City to settle down?”
“Uh, I didn’t. My foster sister lives here, and my fraternal twin, but we just connected before my shift.”
They both froze. “Twin?”
“Yeah, my mother was incredibly sneaky, and she ended up with two children. According to her father, there was one to sacrifice and one to keep. My mom thought differently and used temporal magic on me, so I got big enough to grab Isocar and run through a dimensional portal on stubby legs.”
Demuel paused. “Where did you come from?”
“Demon zone. But not demonblood. It was a fun trick. I am dark fae and something else, and my sister is dark fae and something else. Both of us have different fathers but the same maternal donor. Mom was in love.”
Solor asked, “What was your birth mother?”
“Succubus. Instead of using her own eggs, which would have bound us to her father, she got two from the woman she loved as much as a succubus can love and used two different donors as fathers.”
“So, you are not demonborn.”
She salted her eggs benedict and said in a singsong, “Demonborn but not demonblood. Consider my mother a surrogate who was always planning on keeping the babies.”
Nylora started eating and was relieved that both of them were eating steak and eggs. “Well, at least somebody can eat what they like.”
Demuel chuckled. “Our other forms are herbivores. We are not.”
“Oh, good. I have vegan nightmares now and then.”
Demuel grinned. “You don’t say.”
“Don’t be weird. Until you have been chased by twelve-foot kale, you have nothing to snicker about.” She kept eating. “And you aren’t a mare. I am pretty sure I would have noticed.”
He wrapped an arm around her and pulled her against him, kissing the top of her head.
“I swear, if you left steak juice in my hair... I am not a repository for things to finish later.” She glanced at her belly. “Well, mostly.”
Solor choked and coughed slightly. “Sorry.”