Chapter 32 #3
Brunn went with them until the end of the hallway, her gait stealthy like that of a cat.
Only when Lory grabbed the banister of the next set of stairs did she stop, placing a light hand on Lory’s shoulder.
“You might have proven your loyalty to Ashthorn, but the Master of Whispers still sees you as a threat, Elory. Make sure this wound heals fast. It will be harder to make it look like an accident when he needs to slice your skin himself.”
The haze in her head threatened to return. “Slice it for what?”
For a moment, the question hung in the air, heavy like the rain clouds in the sky, but Brunn didn’t answer. All she did was nod at Tabi before she turned on her heel and walked away.
“Slice it for what?” Lory repeated as Tabi dragged her down the stairs, step after slow step.
“Later,” was all her friend whispered. Her friend, who seemed to have secrets with the Master of Veils. “What are you doing out in the hallways at this time?” That was perhaps the more important question. “And with Brunn?”
Tabi didn’t seem to notice that the last words had been spoken only into her mind. All she did was gesticulate with a shake of her head that she wasn’t going to answer now.
And Lory didn’t have the strength to push it. Not when the world was already blurring again and the wound on her thigh seemed to be spilling her blood in rivers.
They barely made it to Nahrit’s door before her knees sagged. The Medica Hand shuffled around his desk to help Tabi carry Lory inside and lift her onto his desk, which had been cleared for the night except for a scroll of parchment, which he shoved to the floor without hesitation.
“Her wound won’t stop bleeding,” Tabi explained, reaching behind her to shut the door.
The air rippled as Tabi placed her hand back on Lory’s thigh, pouring her magic into her tissues.
“I’ve tried everything. I’ve tried minor healing for the blood vessels.
I’ve tried the brutal force-mending you’ve taught me for the battlefield.
I’ve even stooped to simply putting pressure on it like a non-magical fool. ”
Nahrit appeared above Lory’s face, his black eyes assessing.
“The wound on her leg is only one of the problems,” he noted, opening a drawer beneath Lory’s shoulder and pulling out a bottle and a piece of cloth.
“Here, clean out the wound with this.” He handed Tabi the two items without looking at her, and she grabbed them almost blindly, as if they’d been working together for a long time.
Tabi flipped open the lid of the bottle, pouring the contents over Lory’s wound before even cutting the fabric of her pants.
“It should staunch the bleeding for a few moments—long enough for us to come up with a plan.”
“A plan that he won’t notice?” Tabi prompted, and Lory felt like she was missing something.
“His attention is elsewhere for now. There have been problems in the dungeons.”
The dungeons. The dungeons… The three Flames. Had Khayrivven’s plan worked? Had they escaped?
And if they did… Why had Anees still been there? The Triad would have known who was on guard duty when the Flames disappeared.
“What’s wrong with me?” she ground out, barely feeling her leg.
Tabi’s warm hand grabbed her cold, shaking one. “Nothing Hand Nahrit can’t fix.” She said it with such conviction, Lory didn’t even bother considering the alternatives.
Nahrit shuffled closer to her knees to work on her leg. “You can’t tell anyone about the kind of magic I possess, Miss Vednis,” he warned. “It’s classified the same way as Thornling Ngala’s. The same way the Master of Whispers’ power over blood is classified.”
Lory wasn’t sure she’d heard right. “Blood?”
Even Tabi raised both eyebrows, pausing the dabbing on Lory’s wound while Nahrit held his hands over the cut that should never cause such problems.
“I’m saying this only because I know Lenya is busy elsewhere, and I explicitly trust both of you not to go advertising that sort of knowledge.
” The warning was clear. “The same way as Thornling Ngala can make tissue grow and vanish, the same way I can drive out infections with my magic and clean the blood of illness, the Master of Whispers has a unique kind of matter manipulation as one of his gifts.” He paused, pressing a hand into Lory’s wound, and she bit back a scream as Tabi added her hand on top of it.
“He can manipulate the flow of the blood in your veins. He can make it slow or speed it up or keep it from clotting.”
Her thigh grew warmer as their magic worked on her wound, until a singeing sensation ran through her, a jolt of power that wasn’t entirely of this world.
Her body seized, head hitting the surface of the desk as her limbs contorted.
Then Nahrit straightened, the concentration on his features replaced by exhaustion.
He sank into his chair, wiping his forehead, and Tabi leaned against the edge of the desk, black braids shifting over her shoulder like a string curtain.
When Lory’s body finally relaxed, the wounds had stopped bleeding.