His fingers tightened, then he pulled the knife away. The blade slid out of my leather jacket, coated in shining red blood. Droplets spilled off the steel, falling in slow motion, sparkling as they floated down toward the pavement.
He drew the dagger back—and time snapped back to normal as he swung it toward me a second time.
Bang!
The sound exploded in my ears, and the cultist keeled over, shock splashed over his face and a bloody hole in his forehead.
People were screaming. Shouting.
“Tori!”
People were running. Fleeing.
“Call an ambulance!”
The ground was hard against my back. Was I lying down? When had I lain down?
“Prop up her feet! You, put pressure on the wound—hurry up! Tori, stay with me.”
My vision was blurring. A face above me wavered in and out of focus, white as a ghost, hazel eyes just like mine shining with tears.
“Where’s the goddamn ambulance?”
Hands were touching me, prodding me, pushing on my chest. A sound, growing louder. Sirens. Wailing, crying. I’d never realized how sad the sound of sirens was.
“Tori, stay with me.”
“Tori.”
“Tori!”
Chapter Seven
Beep … beep … beep.
What an annoying sound.
Beep … beep … beep.
It wasn’t an alarm. Not a cell phone. What else beeped like that? And why hadn’t anyone shut it off already? So damn annoying. I was trying to sleep here. So tired. So exhausted.
Beep … beep … beep.
Just … shut … up!
“Relax, Tori.” The cool female voice was accompanied by the scuff of shoes against a tile floor, drawing nearer. “I’m on it.”
With a huge amount of effort, I cracked my eyes open. Light blasted my pupils, and my eyes were so dry they felt like sandpaper. Everything was so blurry that it took me a moment to make out the woman nearby.
She was in her late forties or early fifties with blond hair pulled up in a casual but elegant twist. She tapped on a monitor displaying a bunch of colorful numbers and lines, and the beeping went silent.
“Your blood pressure dropped again,” she remarked, turning toward me. “How are you feeling?”
I blinked slowly. My face felt strange, and when I tried to wrinkle my nose, all sorts of weird sensations assaulted me. There was something stuck to my face?
The woman caught my hand as I reached for my nose. “Please don’t pull out the nasal cannula.”
“The what?” I croaked.
“The oxygen line in your nose.” She pushed my arm down to my side, then produced a plastic cup of water with a bendy straw sticking out of it. She set the straw against my lips, and I greedily sucked down several mouthfuls of cool liquid.
Setting the cup aside, she perched on the edge of my bed. “Do you remember what happened?”
No images came to mind, but a horrendous rush of noise filled my ears—screaming and shouting and sirens and Justin calling my name over and over and over. Shuddering, I pushed the memory away and focused properly on the familiar face watching me: Elisabetta, the Crow and Hammer’s best healer.
I blinked against the scratchy dryness in my eyes. “I was stabbed?”
“Yes. Would you like the short list of your injuries, or are you one of those patients who wants to hear every gory detail?”
“Gory details. How else am I gonna brag about it?”
“Just like your friends.” She shook her head. “You were stabbed in the left side of the chest. The puncture caused a pneumothorax—a collapsed lung. The blade also nicked your heart, resulting in a condition called cardiac tamponade, which is where the sack around your heart fills with blood, squeezing your heart muscles. That caused you to go into cardiac arrest.”
My abused heart lurched sickeningly.
“Fortunately, the paramedics had just arrived and were able to save you by performing a pericardiocentesis—they inserted a needle into your chest to drain the blood—”
“Actually, I changed my mind. I don’t want the gory details.”
Elisabetta smiled with faint humor that quickly faded. “It was close, Tori. Your friends sleeping in the waiting room right now don’t even realize how close we came to losing you.”
Waiting room? I glanced around and realized I wasn’t in one of the converted rooms in Elisabetta’s spacious home. This was an actual hospital room—beige walls full of weird sockets and panels and equipment, a sink and cupboard, and an ugly padded chair in the corner. Tubes ran from an IV stand with two bags on it, disappearing under my blanket in the vicinity of my left wrist.
“Am I gonna be okay?” I asked.
“You’ll be absolutely fine—in a few days. We already removed your chest tube and healed the wound sites. Your X-rays look good, but damage to the heart is nothing to shrug off, even with healing Arcana to help.” She stood. “Now, let’s see how you’re doing.”
I submitted to a physical, too tired to do anything but answer her questions as she poked and prodded me. When she finished, she passed me the water cup for another drink.
“All right.” She set the cup on the overbed table beside me. “I’ll tell your friends you’re awake.”
“Can I see them?”
“Yes—if you can stay awake that long.”
“Of course I can.”
With a knowing smile, she headed for the door. It clacked shut, and I stared at it, determinedly ignoring the bone-deep fatigue weighing me down. I wanted to see them. The guys. My mages and my brother. They were here. I knew it. They were waiting for me, like we always waited when one of us got hurt.
They were here, and I’d stay awake so I could see them.
I kept repeating that to myself as the room faded and I slipped back into an exhausted sleep.
I spent two nights in the hospital, but no sooner was I discharged than Elisabetta shipped me straight to her house. She set me up in a healing room—significantly cozier than the hospital version, but the bed was the same—and only permitted brief visits from my friends. Probably smart since I was having trouble staying awake.
Still, I got to see Aaron and Kai, who fussed over me and tried not to show how
