Lambert forces a tiny smile. “Great. I think I’m having one.”
I gape at him uselessly until he sways slightly, jolting me into action.
“Sit down. Breathe. Feck’s sake, how long have you been feeling like this? No. Don’t answer that. Just breathe in and count to five.”
He obeys, taking up most of the step and forcing me to cram myself into what little space is left beside him.
Does he get panic attacks often? What brought this on? Feck. What am I saying? It’s bleeding obvious who caused it, and she’s lying upstairs having a nap while he suffers.
“Are you counting?” I demand, crouching beside him. “Have you tried naming things you can see, hear, smell, and touch?”
The space is too small. Being boxed in probably isn’t helping.
“What’s that supposed to do?” he asks, confused. “Feels like I can’t breathe anyway.”
“That’s because you stopped counting! In for five, hold it for two, out for seven. Come on.”
I count with him, not because I don’t trust him, butbecause I wish someone had done the same for me when I was a kid trapped alone in that gloomy old mansion.
Helplessness plagues me for long minutes of counting and breathing. At first, it feels just as useless as it was back when I was wrestling with the knowledge that what killed my parents was coming for me, too. I scramble for other ideas, other techniques I found in my books, but the trembling in his shoulders gradually starts to even out.
That’s something.
“She just broke,” Lambert eventually says, destroying the steady, even rhythm as he opens his bloodied hands. “Her face… She was in pain. Ihurther.”
Of course, to Lambert, who treasures women and goes out of his way to help them in ways no one even knows about, that’s the biggest sin of them all.
“You didn’t hurt her,” I reply, indignant. “She hurt herself. Sheusedyou. She had no right to?—”
I cut off as I realise that my words aren’t helping. Instead of revitalising him, the glumness returns, and I notice he’s forced his breathing back into the same pattern I just taught him.
My anger might be the only thing keeping me from breaking down right now, but it’s having the opposite effect on Lambert.
“When she wakes up,” I try again, gentler this time, “you can talk to her. She’ll explain herself.”
No response.
Keeping vigil on this staircase isn’t helping. “Come on,” I say. “Let’s head out and grab something to eat. You’re going to need your energy back after the game.”
And while we’re gone, I can work on healing his hands. Some of those cuts look deep.
“Can’t.” He shakes his head. “The doors don’t work.”
What? “Some of them must.”
Every so often, a door happens to be a dud. You just have to move on and try the next. It’s one of the quirks of the Arcanaeum. He knows that.
Lambert rolls his eyes. “No, they’re all locked. Jasper wanted to get another restorationist to come and look at her. He tried six or seven in a row.”
So we’re trapped here?
“Besides, I don’t want to leave her. What if Jasper missed something? What if she wakes up?”
What if shedoesn’twake up?
That question hovers between us, sucking the air from the space.
“Food,” I insist. “Eddy is still living here, so there’s got to be food somewhere. And you need to rest after the game. You look knackered.” When he keeps hesitating, I add, “She’s taking care of Kyrith, and we can be up here in seconds if she calls.”
