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The First Years who had crowded around Rodriguez like chicks to a hen scuttled away, piling onto couches and sinking down onto the floor. When only the wounded remained with us—four trembling First Years, three girls and a boy, Rodriguez with Dani in his arms, and Kage carrying Regan—we hurried up to the second floor and into the Avari infirmary. The fact that each house had their own infirmary was a blessing from the Bloodmaiden. Even though the First Year one had been overrun—a description that didn’t bear thinking about in too much detail—at least every house had their own facilities and healers.

As we entered, Healer Elycia, her silver hair coiled in prim braids around her head, looked up from where she stood mixing a draft and paled as she saw our procession. “What’s happened? Here, put them here—quickly.” She pointed to empty cots along one wall. A lone patient already occupied one of them, a curlyhaired highblood girl with a bandage on her arm. Elycia had clearly been tending to her before we barged in. Now she sat up, swinging her legs over the side of her cot and peering with interest at the First Years, who began to sit down on chairs in the waiting area.

Kage laid Regan down gently on a mattress. Rodriguez put Dani on another, then immediately went over to one of the supply cupboards and began rifling through it.

I moved to his side. “Iron-wort tonic?”

“It’s the easiest thing to give her, yes. We need to boost her blood production over the next hour as much as possible. Healer Elycia should help the other students. I know she’s skilled in coagulation charms.”

“Regan’s lost a lot of blood, too,” I murmured. “Will she heal on her own?”

Rodriguez glanced at the headmistress. “I’ll talk to Elycia and take a look. She’s highblood, but some iron-wort might not hurt.”

I nodded. “Let me mix the draft for Dani. I know what to do.” I wasn’t a healer, but I’d recognized the ingredients and knew the right ratio to use. It was a simple-enough mixture. “You help the healer and see to the other students.”

I was still holding Neville. He’d been dozing in my arms, no doubt recovering from his earlier ordeal. Now he jerked awake, his fur bristling. As I went to put him down, his muscles tightened, and he wriggled from my grasp. Jumping down to the floor, he trotted over to where the injured highblood girl now stood beside her cot.

Elycia hurried over. “Jacklyn, get back in bed. I’m not finished examining you.”

“I feel fine,” Jacklyn protested, sounding slow and sleepy.

“Neville, what’s gotten into you?” I walked over as the fluffin kept growling.

Before I could even begin to process the way the highblood girl’s eyes were hazing over to a milky gray, she lurched forward, not at Neville but at Elycia. In a split second, her fangs were out and her jaw was open.

Things happened in the blink of an eye. One moment Elycia was opening her mouth to scream. The next Jacklyn was crumpling to the floor, with Kage behind her. He’d crossed the room and leaped the cot to get in behind her. Now he held a dripping dagger in one hand. The blood on the dagger, I saw, was a dark red, nearly black.

For a heartbeat, no one breathed.

“She’d been bitten,” Elycia whispered, staring at Jacklyn’s body. “I thought it was a random attack, someone playing some sort of horrible prank after drinking too much bloodwine. She’d been walking back from the library. She managed to ward her attacker off and get back here. The injury was on her upper shoulder. She would have been fine. Should have been fine …” The healer trailed off, her eyes still on Jacklyn’s body.

Then Kage looked over at Rodriguez. “You understand what this means? Anyone bitten is infected. We cull them or the tower falls.”

I looked over at the First Years, still waiting to be triaged. Their eyes were wide. One girl began to cry.

Rodriguez was between them and Kage in an instant. “We don’t know that. There may be a cure, an antidote—something to slow this down. We have no idea what we’re even dealing with yet.”

The Avari didn’t look convinced.

“Kage, please,” I pleaded. “Look at them.”

His eyes blazed. “I am looking. You think I want to do this? Did anyone even notice what was happening to Jacklyn? She changed in an instant. I won’t risk the tower. Another hour and they’ll all be just like her.”

“You can’t kill everyone who’s injured. We don’t even know for certain that they were bitten,” I said desperately.“What about Regan?”

Kage’s eyes flew to the headmistress’s bed, his expression instantly one of horror.

“She wasn’t bitten,” I said immediately. “I was there. She was injured but not bitten.”

His shoulders seemed to sag in relief. “Fine. Only the bitten.”

One of the First Year boys began to cry. “Please, my lord, don’t do this.”

Neville had begun padding between the First Years, pressing his nose to their ankles and sniffing.

“Get out of my way, Rodriguez,” Kage said roughly. “I’ll do what I have to in order to protect my house.”

My eyes widened. “Wait—look!”