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“How is she?” I honestly couldn’t tell if my mother looked better or worse, the lantern hanging from the center pole illuminating her skull-like head, only a dusting of white hair floating like a halo.
The circles beneath her eyes were nearly black, her paperlike skin crepey and dry, and her ruined fingers…one hand might be useable, but the other…
I looked away. Blew out a long breath.
“That she survived is a miracle in itself.” The healer’s quiet voice was calming, taking the edge off my anger and fear as perhaps she intended. “She ate and drank a small amount, not too much or she would not have been able to hold it down.” The woman swallowed hard.
“She is High Fae, which is the only reason she is still alive. Perhaps, with time, she might regain her health.” She was so very cautious with her words I realized Adele’s survival was a long shot. That even with her bloodline, she’d suffered too much, for too long, and I might have been too late.
The unfairness of that made me so angry.
That after everything, I was too late to save her.
“Her hands…What about her hands? Can you fix them?”
“Not here, my lady. But in Blackcastle, there are healers who are far more skilled than me. I can give you their names, and perhaps they can help your friend.”
“My mother,” I said quietly. “And yes, I would very much like their names.”
The healer’s eyes widened, but she kept quiet, her gaze drifting back over to the sleeping female. “You must have made her feel safe for her to be sleeping,” I murmured, wondering how long it had been since Adele had truly slept soundly. “Thank you for taking care of her. She is precious to me.”
The healer dipped her head. “It was my honor, my lady.”
“Just Anaria will do,” I murmured, sagging against Raziel. He was healing, but his body was still so ravaged, his face nearly as pale as Adele’s. Powerful…and vulnerable at the same time.
Oh so vulnerable, as we all were.
“She nearly burned herself out; can you check her over?” Raz asked quietly. “A lecture on how to be more careful with her magic might be in order as well,” he added with not one shred of guilt.
“I hardly need a lecture.”
“I think a lecture is exactly what you need.” Tavion ducked into the tent, which suddenly became all sorts of too small. “I saw what you did to that army, how much magic you used.” Then,like I wasn’t even here, the bastard told Raz, “She should rest, twelve hours at the very least. And put those bands back on.”
I bristled at his arrogance; every word sent outrage shivering down my spine. The arrogant git never stopped overstepping his bounds, and beside me, Raziel’s low, mean growl vibrated with the same repressed fury.
“I’ll take that under advisement.” My wide grin was a bigfuck off and die. “Thank you for voicing your opinion, Lord Montgomery.”
“Anaria, that was not a suggestion.”
My grin grew wide enough my lips hurt. “Suggestion, opinion, whatever you want to call it, you can stuff it up your pompous arse.” Since I wasn’t about to wake my mother from the first decent sleep she’d probably had in twenty years, I kept my furious hiss as quiet as I could.
“You don’t tell me what to do. Not now. Not ever.”
“You are about to collapse,” Tavion hissed right back, the healer wringing her hands as she looked between us. “For once in your fucking life stop being a stubborn idiot and listen.”
“To you?” I chuffed out a low laugh. “Never.”
“Enough.” Raz stepped between us, fire lighting his eyes. “Tavion, get out.” His voice was even and calm but thrumming with violence, and I glanced to where Adele lay pale as a ghost. “Now, Tavion, before I take you out like the garbage.”
Tavion jerked so violently at the words, I wondered if cutting remarks hit him deeper and harder than others. If that was why he was so vicious with his own words because he knew they could be so much sharper than any other weapon he might choose.
Then I cursed myself for caring one iota about Tavion Montgomery.
“Rest. Eat. Put those godsdamned bands back on.” The second Tavion got the last word in, he was gone, a swirl of cold air left in his place.
“When you have a moment, can you check Anaria over? She’s on the verge of burnout and she has a gash on her nose that’s still bleeding.” Raz’s voice softened when he looked back at me, his brow wrinkled. “He’s not completely wrong, you know, even if he’s being an arse. Whereareyour bands?”
“In my pocket.” Truthfully, I was too damned tired to care about anything right now, much less locking down my magic given there wasn’t a drop left. Tomorrow, maybe, my power would refill, but right now, my head was blissfully quiet, my body limp with exhaustion.
