Limbs locked; paralysis intensified.
“I need to take you back to the academy. He’ll know what to do.” Kharon’s words were raspier than usual, and his eyes crinkled with distress. “Can I—” He reached for me slowly “Can I touch you? Just so we can leap.”
I gave another jerky nod.
Gently, like I was made of glass, he grabbed my biceps.
“Come here, guys,” he said.To who?
The world exploded.
I barely noticed.
A muse yelped as we knocked into her, fireplaces crackled, and candles glowed in the hazy darkness.
Smoke billowed around us.
We’d leaped into the library.
Initiates and a few familiar Spartans with weapons drawn stood in a huddle. They must have come back before us.
Thank goodness everyone else is safe.
My stomach rolled.
But you couldn’t save Leo.
Kharon bellowed something as he laid me gently down on a chaise lounge, but all I could hear was a sharp ringing in my ears.
There was a commotion.
Patro and Achilles were leaning over me with panicked expressions.Patro yelled something in my face. Someone ripped him away and leaned toward me, but everything blurred.
“How the fuck did a Titan get all the way out here? It doesn’t make sense,” a masculine voice growled.
I drifted in and out of consciousness.
My eyes opened a tiny crack—a doctor knelt over me, wearing medical gloves.
Aren’t doctors not allowed in the crucible?
I tried to speak, but I was locked in some sort of sleep paralysis.
“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” a voice whipped cruelly from somewhere beside me.
The doctor froze. “I’m p-putting our newest healing cream on her wounds? You asked me to treat her. This should close the skin in hours.”
“Lay a finger on her,” the voice said calmly, “and I’ll cut off both your hands, then I’ll shove them down your throat. Then, while you’re busy choking, I’ll skin you alive.”
The doctor recoiled and dropped the tub of cream.
“Calm down. There’s no need to worry,” said a second, more reasonable voice. “If he touches her, I’ll stab him. You put the cream on her.”
Never mind, not reasonable.
The doctor left.
Who named two psychopaths as my medical proxies?
