When I came to, I was bouncing up and down. Trying to get my bearings, I looked around and realized I was hanging over Liam’s shoulder, and we were just exiting the park.
“I’m okay,” I croaked, and he slid me down, his eyes honey amber with threads of blue. There was blood on his cheek.
“Cam’s hurt,” he said. “Bad. Can we take him to Faerie?”
I didn’t hesitate. “Yes.”
Two concussions in twenty-four hours might be messing with my brain, but I didn’t give two fucks about the Elders anymore. Liam, his brothers, Cam—they were fae, and all fae had a right to a healer when sick.
Elle caught up with us, holding a bleeding black wolf in her arms. My mouth popped open to ask why the fuck she was carrying a wild animal when I saw two horns on the wolf’s forehead.
“Cam’s a shifter,” I breathed.
Liam nodded. “Not for long if we don’t help him.”
Elle grunted under the weight of his giant body. “Come on, I can’t hold this illusion forever.”
Oh, yeah. Carrying a bleeding wolf shifter with black horns through New York City wasn’t normal. Elle must have a pretty big illusion up to make it all seem natural.
By the time we got to the apartment, Elle was pale white.
“I’ll take him,” Liam said, crossing the threshold into the living room.
Elle must have dropped the illusion then, because her color looked better, and she handed the limp wolf off to Liam.
I shut the apartment door and realized I’d told Mara to give us an hour. We still had twelve minutes before the other side of this door would transform into her apartment.
Fuck.
“Let’s go!” Liam yelled. “He’s bleeding out.”
My heart plummeted. “Twelve more minutes,” I mumbled.
“What?” Liam’s voice was hoarse. He’d laid Cam down right there in the hallway and was pressing his hands to his wounds. Crimson blood pooled on the wood floors around Cam’s body.
“I told Mara one hour.” I checked my watch again just to be safe. “We still have eleven minutes until she comes.”
“No!” Liam cried out, his face twisted with grief.
“I’m sorry. We just have to wait.”
“All right, call an emergency veterinary clinic.” Liam looked around for a phone. “We need to get him into surgery.”
Cam’s wolf form started to tremble then, and at the same time, my hands pulsed with white light.
“What the fuck was that?” Elle asked, looking at my hands like they were aliens.
I gave a nervous giggle. “Nothing.”
Why was my sunlight magic coming out now? I wasn’t in danger.
They pulsed again, and my hands warmed, sending a tingle up my arms. I had the strangest urge to kneel and place them on Cam’s quivering body.
I realized then that Mara had done something similar. She’d pulsed some kind of light into Liam to stop the bleeding. Maybe I could, too…maybe whatever the mermaids had done to me had caused me to be a healer.
My hands were glowing like lightbulbs now.
Elle backed against the wall. “That’s some freaky Elder power.”
“Liam.” I knelt and faced him, my warm, glowing hands hovering over where his held Cam’s bleeding wounds tightly. “Move aside.”
He looked up at me, unshed emotion in his eyes and torment on his face. “No. He’ll bleed out.”
I shook my head. “You have to trust me. After all this, can’t you trust me?”
Something changed in his face, and he removed his hands. The second they came off Cam’s body, I slammed mine down firmly. Light pulsed, sharp and hot, causing Cam to jerk and wake up.
I held on as the light seared into him and a howl ripped from his throat, echoing off the apartment walls. Chills broke out on my arms, and it felt like a wave of magic crashed into me and then flooded into Cam. Whatever that healing pool had done, it had given me some seriously awesome ability, and I was pretty sure that power was healing Cam.
Finally, the light died down, and Cam stopped howling. Laying his head to the side, he panted softly instead.
Removing my hands, I looked down and gasped. Where the deep bloody gash had been, there was now a closed and puckered scar.
Had the High Priestess of the healing pools given me healing powers?
I looked up at Liam, who just watched me with a furrowed brow and curious eyes.
“What the actual fuck was that, Lily?” Elle breathed next to me. Cam whimpered, and she instinctively reached out and stroked behind his ears, as one would to calm a dog. “You’re okay.”
We sat there for a few moments in silence, me staring intermittently at my hands, Liam staring at me, and Elle treating Cam like a prized pooch.
The door opened behind me, and suddenly, Mara was looking down at all of us. “I thought I heard a wolf. What happened?”
Liam picked Cam up, and we all moved into Mara’s house.
“We were ambushed,” I said. “I need you to take us to Faerie. Kira needs to see him.”
Mara’s eyes ran over Cam’s wolf form, and something sad crossed her face. “You’re dancing with the devil, Lily. If you bring another one into Faerie, then Indra will—”
“I don’t care anymore! Let her cuff me. Let her kill me. I will not live my life imprisoned by rules that I don’t agree with. It’s worse because you think you’re free, but you’re not. It’s an illusion of the grandest design.”
Mara began to tear up. “Damn. Your mother would be proud.”
She gave me a quick hug, and then we all ran down the hallway to her office. As we strapped in, I couldn’t stop looking at my hands.
Was I a healer Fae?
No. Kira’s light was blue. Mine was yellow, and you couldn’t be a Seeker and a healer. Right?
I wrestled with my thoughts until we stood at the blue door that led from Mara’s office and into Faerie. “Thank you,” I whispered, and we sneaked out into the night.
“I’ll get Kira,” Elle said, and I nodded in gratitude.
Weaving in and out of side yards and shadowy bushes, we
