Chapter 45 #2
Amaris’s hand braced her shoulder, but she didn’t stir. She studied Ms. Borstad’s work, taking note of the missing tourniquet. No blood seeped through the bandages.
“Cornelius required hands now and then,” Ms. Borstad whispered. “He no like flower child. Need strong hands and no singsong voice.”
Amaris wanted to speak, to ask her everything she knew about what a mystique did in Magoria, but that would have to wait.
She only smiled at her description of Pricilla.
She eyed the belt still wrapped around her own leg.
She released the buckle and held the edge of the table as the blood refilled her system.
Pins and needles started in her toes and worked its way up her leg, but blood didn’t seep from the wrap Theodoric had placed around her thigh.
“Three down, way too many to go,” she whispered to herself.
She swallowed the lump in her throat as several soldiers carried over a large fellow.
They set him on the ground at her feet. He was pale as a ghost, but she had to confirm what she knew to be true.
She lowered herself, but there was no burst of breath on her cheek or a bounding of a heartbeat beneath her fingers.
“He’s gone,” she said quietly.
The men bowed their heads. One kneeled next to the cold and dead man. He placed his hand over his eyes and whispered something that sounded like a prayer. They picked up his lifeless body and carried him into the hall, where Amaris guessed they had a spot for the dead.
She closed her eyes, pushing the morbid thought from her mind.
When she used to have rough calls, they’d sit around the kitchen table, allowing their dark senses of humor to get them through the night, but she didn’t have Charlie beside her to look at a pile of intestines and ask if they were having sausage for dinner.
She moved down the line, assessing and treating. It pained her when she’d reached the ones where there was nothing she could do for them besides offer a drink to calm their nerves. Several had already passed, probably before she’d stepped off the ship. A twinge of guilt sprouted within her.
How many more would still be alive if I hadn’t left?
It was more horrible than she could’ve ever imagined.
Everyone in the fire service wanted to see a mass casualty incident once in their lives, whether they admitted it or not, but it was more than she could handle.
She cleared the kitchen and began moving into the hall.
She felt as though, the further down the line she went, the more grave the injuries.
All while she stopped bleeding, bandaged wounds, and wrapped injured joints, she looked for Esaias, Adelaide, and Gris.
She kept her hands moving; it was all she could do to steady them.
She assessed Theodoric when she found him down the line again.
He’d passed out, but his breaths were even, and his heart beat a steady rhythm.
Her fingers lingered on his neck, her chest tightening.
She forced herself to pull away and continued moving through her patients.
Why did she sense she was missing something?
His eagerness to see her safely out before the Conjugation had been replaced by something else, but she didn’t know what to call it. Did she want there to be more?
She pushed through, fighting the urge to let her leg collapse. Finally, she was forced to cease her efforts when she stood up and swayed as the room twisted and warped around her. A hand caught her arm and pulled her into the kitchen.
Gris sat Amaris in a chair and forced a glass of water and a piece of bread into her hands. “Eat,” she demanded. Her eyes were swollen and red. A bandage wrapped her arm, another around her leg.
“I’ll be alright,” Amaris said, scathing off the dizziness. “How are you?” She tried to stand but Gris pressed against her shoulders.
“You need to rest.” Her chin quivered, and her hands clenched at her sides.
“Where are Esaias and Adelaide?”
“They’re safe,” she assured her. “Ms. Borstad and Onika tended to them both immediately. They’re resting in the back corner of the hall.”
“I hadn’t gotten that far yet,” Amaris muttered.
“And you won’t if you don’t take care of yourself.” Gris eyed the bread and water.
Amaris took a bite, her eyes rolling back in her head at its glorious sweetness. “Why were you on the boat?”
The first week, Gris had visited Sephardi while she oversaw Amaris’s guard duty, but the ship had been the first sight of her in weeks.
“Why were you?”
“Adelaide needed help.” Amaris didn’t have the energy to elaborate further.
“I didn’t know about Sephardi,” Gris whispered.
“She’s your wife.”
“Everyone has their secrets.” Gris’s bow had found its home slung over her back. It shifted as she leaned against a table and folded her arms.
“Even you?”
Gris bowed her head and gripped the edge of the table.
Amaris remained silent as the adrenaline began to wear off. She lifted her hands, and they started to tremble before her eyes. She bit into the bread and lowered them to her lap, fending off the shaking.
“Eat, drink, and rest. This isn’t only your burden to shoulder.” Gris left, heading into the hall.
Amaris finished the morsels and leaned her head back. It was her burden to shoulder. She knew what to do, how to assess and treat, but she was so tired. Her limbs ached and grew heavier the longer she sat. She closed her eyes and promised herself only a few moments of rest.
§
A loud crash echoing through the kitchen startled Amaris awake.
How long did I sleep? Glancing through the window, it still appeared dark out. She drew her gaze around the kitchen, searching for the cause of the commotion.
Bennet strode through the open doors. “Deavopan has fled!” he cheered.
He sheathed his sword and grabbed a large glass of kusu from a barrel.
He led a parade of men and women. All of them were stained in blood and covered in dirt, but each one grabbed a glass and joined in the celebration.
Amaris couldn’t judge them. She needed a shot herself.
They dispersed throughout the rooms, finding their fallen comrades or tending to the other injured.
Bennet stiffened when he eyed Amaris. She watched as his eyes moved to each person lying in pain. He faced her, taking several steps, until he glared down at her.
“What are you doing here?” he growled.
She swallowed but didn’t shrink into the chair. She stood, forcing him back. “My job.”
“How many dead?”
“I don’t know.”
Bennet scoffed, taking a sip from his drink. “How bad are his injuries?”
“Who—”
“Theo,” he spat.
She crossed her arms. “I didn’t think you cared, since you tried to kill him with that whip.”
“The boy is strong,” he barked. “It was meant to teach him a lesson.”
“He’s passed out in the hall, but he’ll live,” she muttered. She wasn’t in the mood to debate with him.
Bennet’s hand wrapped around his sword, and her shoulders tensed as she waited for him to draw it. Instead, he pushed past her and disappeared into the hall.
“I don’t understand how you can do all this and still remain calm,” Alan said, his thumb brushing along the edge of a bowl of broth.
She stared at him, still processing the interaction with Bennet. Alan turned his gaze to Peter, who was awake and upright, fidgeting with a wood carving.
Amaris sighed. “Is it that I can remain calm, or are you asking if I have any fear?” She ambled closer, eyeing over Alan’s shoulder at the color peeking through Peter’s cheeks.
“Both.” Alan let out a huff, mixed with disbelief and laughter as he dragged his hand through his disheveled hair.
“I understand how to wield a sword and remain calm in the heat of a fight, but taking a man’s life is different than saving it.
How do you do it without bearing the responsibility of the realm? ”
“It’s all still there, the fear and panic, but I’ve learned to control it.
I’ve tended to dying people before,” she confessed.
“I can’t do anything for them if I’m in my own head about their uncertainty.
I’m not the one who’s injured—it’s them.
” She gestured to Peter. “I have to remind myself of that.”
She excused herself from the room. More hands were scattered about now, and she avoided Bennet as he kneeled beside Theodoric’s cot. She walked to the back corner, wondering what she’d say first, but Adelaide was nowhere to be seen, as usual, and Esaias was passed out.
She wished she could rest, but there was still too much to do. She found where she’d left off with her patients and began again—assess, treat, and repeat. It was only when she finally reached her last patient beside Esaias that she curled up on the floor and closed her eyes.