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We heard at least six sets of footsteps running away from us.
“Come on, Ayla. Let’s get you to safety and then I’ll take care of you. I’ll make sure to fix it. You don’t have to worry at all.”
At that, Kai stood up, taking me with him. I tried to straighten up, knowing I had to get myself to the cottage to be treated, but I started swaying. I was just so damned cold. When did the islands get cold? I didn’t remember them being cold.
“Here,” Kai said, removing his shirt and wrapping it around my middle, using the sleeves to tie a knot tight enough that I cried out. “I’m sorry. I know it hurts, but we need to slow the bleeding. Silver wounds don’t clot.”
I managed a nod, which just made me notice I was still crying. My giant sobs had faded, leaving small hiccups with plenty of big fat tears burning their way down my cheeks. For being so cold, my tears felt like they were molten, surely leaving cinder tracks down my face.
“I’m going to pick you up now.”
That was all the warning I got before Kai did just that, but knowing ahead of time stopped me from losing the grip on my spell. Although the guards were running after Darla and Oren, it wasn’t like they were far enough away that they wouldn’t be able to smell my blood. Especially the amount I had left behind.
At least that bleeding was momentarily stopped, and I reached into myself to find that green, shimmering enchantment that had helped me save Mad Dog. I focused on that as Kai ran along, his strong arms cradling me oh so carefully.
I had no concept of time as we raced along. All I knew was that the pain still radiated through me and that I needed to stay conscious as long as possible. But as the moments passed, I did notice one positive. Slowly, bit by bit, the insane level of agony was slowly lowering. My thoughts were clearing, and it felt less like my body was trying to rip itself apart.
As the pain faded, I became more aware of how exhausted I was: cold, shivering, barely held together by magic. But I was being held together, and that was what mattered.
It wasn’t until Kai pulled me into the cottage kitchen that I finally let my shield drop, instead pouring my magic into healing myself. I knew better than to try to directly deal with the silver wound as it would just make my magic fizzle out entirely. There was a reason silver wounds were so pernicious with shifters. They needed physical treatment first, with only a thorough cleaning allowing other magics to help.
“What do I need to do?” Kai asked, his voice incredibly calm as he pressed a kiss to my forehead. “I’ve dealt with these things in the field before but sloppily. Tell me what’s best.”
“Boil…water,” I wheezed, blinking as I looked around. He had me on the island in the middle of the kitchen, an entire drawer of dishtowels upended beside me. When did he have time to do that? I had no idea. “Stick half of these cloths in. Need…need to…sterilized.”
“I got you. I’ll get some bowls.”
Kai stepped away from me, but I swayed and nearly toppled backward. Ever vigilant, he caught me and helped lay me down on my uninjured side.
“It’s going to be all right,” he said, pressing another kiss to my cheek. He was so tender, his eyes full of more emotions than I could process in my injured state. “I’m going to take care of you.”
“I know,” I said, and then he was gone, racing to do everything I’d asked. I faded in and out of reality for a few moments, and whenever my vision cleared, Kai was in a new spot preparing something. Despite his calm tone and the kind smiles he would shoot my way, I could feel his fear, his worry, and his panic coursing through him. I couldn’t really blame him for feeling that way. I’d largely been the same when there’d been an attempted assassination on Kai.
“All right, I have everything,” Kai said, drawing me back to reality. I realized that I was just staring at the stove. “What next?”
“Cut my shirt down its side to expose the front and the back.”
He did just as I asked, using a sharp knife. My side was immediately that much colder for it, which wasn’t the best sign. Even with my magic, I had lost too much blood. Oh, well. Either I would get better or I wouldn’t. It was easier to see things as a simple dichotomy like that when I was on the verge of passing out.
“All right, next?”
“You’re going to need to clean the wound thoroughly. Take the boiling water and pour a generous amount on both the front and back.”
“Shouldn’t I let it cool a little first?”
I shook my head, which turned out to be a mistake with how dizzy it made me. But I managed not to yak out everything I’d eaten at Aodin’s. “Silver debridement means you need to destroy all the cells affected by silver. Burning them or cutting them out are the best ways, and I’m guessing you don’t exactly have a scalpel to do that, do you?”
I wasn’t so out of it that I couldn’t see how gray Kai turned.
I really did feel bad for him, in a strange way, and I weakly reached over to rest my hand over his wrist. “It’s okay, Kai. It’s going to hurt, but it’ll be what’s best for me. We must get any silver contamination out as fast as possible, so my healer abilities take me away from the edge.”
Because even when we completely debrided my wound and destroyed all the affected tissue, my shifter abilities wouldn’t be able to seal it up like they usually would. Nope, normally I would have a long, long, human-paced recovery window ahead of me.
Luckily, I just so happened to be half witch, so once I got some rest after initial treatment, my magic would be recovered enough for me to do some complicated healing on myself. It would take some heavy manipulation and reworked spell structures to circumvent my shifter half, but once more, there were some advantages to being of mixed blood.
“I don’t want to hurt you,” Kai said, bringing my once again wandering mind back to the moment.
“I know. Trust me, I know. But right now, you need to.”
