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“I don’t know if we can count on her help,” Crew had said after hearing our story.
“She seemed pretty fired up to get Simon off the island,” Kira had countered.
Crew shrugged. “In my time on Bloodstone, I’ve found it easier to rely on myself and my people than outside help. She could easily turn her back on us. These immortal beings are fickle, you guys know that. Oh, I’m also not really happy about you both traipsing out into the jungle without authorization. I’d ream your asses, but Eli says she already did a good job of that.”
“Okay, I get it,” Kira said, “but maybe we can look at her like a secret weapon? We train and prepare as best we can, and hopefully, she jumps in if we get in trouble?”
Crew nodded and stood to leave. “I can get on board with that. Don’t spread this around, though. I want my people focused and ready. If they start thinking some magical creature is going to swoop in and save them when it gets tough, they might not train as hard. That, and they may not be as focused going into battle.”
He’d left then, leaving Kira and me to discuss training for the next day. In all honesty, I agreed with Crew. And now, seeing the way he eyed his people while they learned to fight, I saw exactly what he was worried about. These people relied on him, and hedidn’t want to let them down. Wedidneed everyone as prepared as possible, because regardless of what Lucina had told us, there was a chance she could back out and leave us out to dry. Gods didn’t have the same moral compass mortals did.
Zoe swatted my shoulder to get my attention. “I’m going to go check on Leif, is that cool?”
“Sure. How’s he doing?”
“Not sure. I’ve been working with one of the fae healers on a spell that might work. They were gonna test it on him today, so I want to see how it was going.”
“Okay. Let us know if you need anything.”
Zoe left, and I walked around, correcting stances and helping out with some of the more difficult moves. She was only gone five minutes before she came sprinting back into the room, beaming at me.
“Leif’s had a breakthrough. Come on, hurry!” Zoe turned and dashed back down the hall.
J.D. nearly tripped over his feet to follow her. Watching his excitement as he rushed after Zoe, I couldn’t keep the smile off my face. Kira and Mika followed him.
I turned to Crew. “Can you watch over the others?”
He nodded. “Sure. Okay, everyone, let’s go over what Wyatt and Kira showed you earlier,” he said to the group, stepping farther into the room.
Knowing the trainees were in good hands, I ran to catch up to the others. They were all huddled around Leif’s cell. The other alpha looked better than he had since we’d found him. His face was pale and strained, but he wasn’t rocking on the floor anymore. And he looked relieved see us, especially J.D.
“How are you?” J.D. asked. “How do you feel?”
Leif put a hand to his forehead. “Weird, but better.” He eyed us warily. “Uh, this, um, it’s not a hallucination, right? You guys are really here?”
“We are,” J.D. insisted, taking hold of the bars and leaning close.
“Yeah, this is real,” I confirmed.
Leif nodded, then winced and clutched his head.
“Do you have a headache?” J.D. asked, a worried tone to his voice. He turned to look at Zoe. “Do we have anything for headaches?”
“I’m all right,” Leif said. “It’s not that it hurts so much as it feels like…” He trailed off, his face crinkling in concentration. “Well, I guess I don’t know how to explain it. All my memories are out of joint. In the wrong order, if that makes sense. I also have this weird, overwhelmingpullto go somewhere on the island. Almost like I’m being called to return somewhere I don’t want to go.”
Kira and I shared a look, and she asked the question on both our minds. “Does it have something to do with Simon? The guy who did this to you?”
Leif shivered at the mention of Simon’s name. “I can’t go back there. Not to him. I can’t.”
The fear in his voice sent chills down my arms. He started to rock back and forth, slowly lowering himself to the floor, slipping back into his strange hypnotic state.
J.D., seeing him reverting, turned to Zoe and the other healer. “Can you do more? Whatever you did to bring him around? Please?”
Zoe and the other fae gave each other a helpless look before Zoe turned back to J.D. “We’re a little out of our depth here. I think all the magic users here are. This is a bit beyond what we’re capable of doing. All we’ve been doing is tweaking other spells to get them to work on Leif.”
J.D.’s shoulders slumped. “So there’s no hope?”
“I didn’t say that,” Zoe said quickly. “If we really can stop Simon and get back to the mainland, I think Leif has a chance.Whatever is going on with him in his head can get better, too. I think he needs a combination of things: standard medicine, magical intervention, as well as psychic healing. Back home, we can find a good psychic doctor who can get in there and fix whatever Simon scrambled up.” She squeezed J.D’s shoulder. “The fact that we can help him at all with what we have here means he’s curable. I know it.”
