“I don’t think so.” Davis darts forward, pulling his blade as he runs, but he’s nowhere near fast enough. There’s another blur, and then the demon has the older man by the throat with one large hand, while still gripping me with the other. Davis’s sword drops to the stone with a loud clatter.
“No!” Nick yells, pushing against Russ and Fitz both. His elbow flies into Fitz’s nose, knocking the other boy down, but Evan takes Fitz’s place before Nick can break out of the circle. Blood from an injury streams down Evan’s forehead, but he stands firm.
The demon lifts Davis high in the air. Nick’s father scrabbles at the demon’s grip with both hands, wheezing for breath, eyes bulging. The color in his face goes red, redder.
“I will kill both of them while you watch, Pendragon,” the demon snarls, squeezing Davis so much the man turns purple, “and then I will take you.”
“You talk far too much.”
I never thought I’d be happy to hear that voice. Sel drops onto the demon’s back, wrapping his opponent in a headlock. The demon roars, dropping me to the ground and flinging Davis across the clearing. Nick’s father hits a tree with a stomach-turning crunch and falls to the stone surface in a loose pile of limbs.
I scramble backward, just missing the stomp of one enormous foot. The demon grabs at Sel’s back and hair, trying to dislodge him, but Sel hangs on tight, his face tucked away from their claws.
A pair of strong arms loop under my armpits and haul me up and away from the fray.
To my surprise, it’s Sarah, the pixie girl. “Stay back,” she urges once we’re far enough. Then she runs over to where half of the group, Nick included, have gathered at Davis’s side. Nick’s father is not moving. Oh God.
The demon and Sel brawl in a blur of black and green. No one else dares to enter the fight, and why would they? No one else could keep up. When the two opponents lunge for each other, the force of their collision makes the earth shake. They twist and roll on the ground, fists connecting in deep thuds. After a few minutes, Sel’s shirt is torn and darkened with slime and sweat.
The demon kicks at Sel’s chest, and the Merlin goes flying.
Sel hits the ground with both feet in a sliding crouch. A feral grin crosses his face. He launches himself back at the creature like a bullet.
The sight turns my stomach. Nick’s father could be dead, and Sel’s enjoying himself.
“Hold him steady!”
Back at the tree, the boy who had daggers presses his hands over Davis’s chest. A light film of silver liquid covers his fingers. As I watch, the liquid spreads down onto the man’s shirt. A heartbeat later, Davis gasps awake. “Steady,” the boy orders. “Not done…”
William, I think. Their healer.
William continues to work on Davis, but the relief around him is palpable. Nick’s father is alive.
Everyone is so focused on Lord Davis that no one notices Nick until it’s too late.
He bears down on the brawl, his father’s sword in his hands.
Sel has the demon on the ground, one boot on the creature’s chest, an aether blade at their throat.
“You nearly killed my father!” Nick shouts, fury turning his voice to iron.
The demon chitters eagerly. “The boy approaches! Let him come, whelp! I—” A squelching, hissing sound from the press of Sel’s blade, and the creature is silenced.
“I have this, Nicholas.” Sel keeps his eyes on his captive. “Back off. Let me do my job.”
Nick ignores Sel’s warning and swings, his blade arcing toward the demon’s face—
With a sharp twist, the demon breaks Sel’s ankle. Shoves the Merlin aside.
Nick’s sword descends.
The demon meets it with one hand—the blade digging deep—and clenches Nick’s throat with the other.
Nick pulls at the creature’s fingers. Gurgling. Gasping.
The demon stands, snarling in a flash of triumph, lifting Nick high—then slams him into the silver stone. His body goes still.
I’m running.
I barrel into the demon just as Sel swings Nick’s sword.
Together, we send the body in one direction, and the head in another.
14
NICK, HIS FATHER, and Evan aren’t the only injured.
I stand in the corner of the Lodge’s basement infirmary and watch two second-year Pages dash back and forth between five metal tables.
Nick’s on the one closest to me. His father is next to him. Evan’s in the middle, and Victoria lies at the end. I didn’t even know that Tor had been hurt.
Her chest had been sliced open by a hound, and there’s blood splattered across her blue dress and over her pale cheeks.
Still, she’s in better shape than the Davis men. Lord Davis’s spine is broken in two places.
Nick’s skull is cracked.
I should have moved faster. Struggled harder against the uchel. Gotten to Nick before he went after the demon himself.
The infirmary is William’s domain. He strides between the tables, his hands coated in silver aether so thick it looks like mercury. The bright, citrus smell of his aether signature fills the room.
There’s a pattern. He starts with the life-threatening injuries first and spends a few minutes murmuring in a fluid, lyrical language that I don’t understand. He stands over their bodies while aether drips down onto their wounds and disappears into their skin. Then he walks away and closes his eyes, murmuring another incantation that pulls aether from the air again. It coats his fingers, and the cycle starts over.
I look down at my own hands. They haven’t stopped trembling.
When we returned to the Lodge, the group had dispersed. Most of the Pages were sent home. Russ went to check on Felicity. After confirming that she was still asleep—a common recovery from Awakening, I’m told—he came down to wait with me and offered me a sweatshirt. I put it on, because I didn’t know what else to do. He asked me if I’d like to go upstairs to take a shower. I don’t remember what I said, but he left me alone after that.
I look at the infirmary walls and wonder why they aren’t green, like the small room at the hospital. Then, because my defenses are down, I’m at the hospital again. The nurse is there. And the Merlin. And my mother is gone before I could say goodbye.… I squeeze my eyes shut and count to ten until it is three months later. Until I’m back in the infirmary at the Lodge.
“Where is he?” Sel bursts through the door like an unholy angel in a long black coat, his eyes blazing like twin suns. If he notices the two Pages slipping out behind him with fear written all over their faces, he doesn’t say anything.
William’s voice is even but firm. “He’s stable, but he’s not awake. Sel—Sel!”
Sel strides over to Nick—and there’s not even a hitch in his step. Did William heal his ankle already? Sel examines Nick where he lies. Nick’s shirt is cut open, exposing his chest and stomach. His usually handsome, open face is pale and pinched. He hasn’t opened his eyes since we arrived.
“You better not die, Davis,” Sel orders. “Not now.”
“Sel.” William steps toward Sel, his silver-coated hands raised up like a doctor’s. “Nick is stable,” he repeats. “He will recover. Lord Davis, on the other hand, is not stable yet. I need to keep treating them both, and everyone here, and you’re not helping with that.”