Stealing a glance at Tulya, who was still out, I stepped inside the room and checked that her breathing was still steady. I didn’t know what to call this other than a deep slumber. It wasn’t a coma or anything natural for the body to do—it was a Rubian reaction to way too much pressure. The latter I was sure of, and I needed the damn medic to tell me what to do.
Snatching my phone out of my pocket, I went back on the balcony and texted Magnum.
Be there in an hour. Taking you, Blake, and Cinder to jet. Be ready.
I didn’t have the time or focus to write more. In fact, I stuck him on Do Not Disturb and set about calling the medic myself. We didn’t have doctors in Rubia because we couldn’t attend medical school, but we had a large supply of medics who’d studied as much as an MD. They ran our small hospital and were responsible for all of the Rubian population.
I assumed Ezza meant the chief medic; she wouldn’t associate with anyone else. I just happened to have Abraham’s number from when he cared for my father.
Pushing the call button, I waited for him to pick up.
He greeted me as if he’d been briefed on the scenario. “Donovan, how are you? I was expecting to hear from you.”
“Cut the formalities, Abraham. Ezza was supposed to put you on a call. I have Tulya here, completely out of it…in some sort of deep slumber. If I’m being blunt, I’m not happy or comfortable with this.” It was as honest as I could be in this very moment.
“Her system shut down,” he said bluntly.
“So, this happens? You’ve seen it? Knew it? What the fuck?” The questions bubbled out of me.
Of course Ezza had to know this was a risk too.
“Yes, it’s a chance we take when powers are overly tasked, especially when it comes to interacting with humans.”
“What the hell?” I paced the patio and peered in the window, and there Tulya still lay, her hair fanned out around her, eyes closed. My heart ached a bit more with every glimpse. “Why would they ask her to do this, then?”
I asked the question without thinking.
“Some answers are above our pay grade,” Abraham simply responded. “Also, if I’m not mistaken, she did this for your mother?”
I shook my head. My goddamn mother. I wanted to throttle her—I knew better—but what did she care who Magnum married?
“In short, Tulya’s abilities require her body to absorb all the negative emotions of a Rubian. Something inside her acts like a siphon with a sort of vent to push it out of her body. It’s why she gets so hot when the feelings start to infiltrate her body. That’s my rudimentary explanation.”
“But what went wrong?” Not that I didn’t care about the process. In fact, I made a note to ask at a later date about my own capabilities. But I needed to know what to do.
“Well, you see, the heat is her body starting to work, pushing the emotions out. I don’t know how much she has disclosed but she becomes extremely warm when inheriting the pain. Typically, her system disposes of the emotions, and that acts as a cooling agent. In this case, my guess is she held on to the pain until she could target the human and started to send her the suffering in short bursts, causing her body to overheat. She never cooled off, and she is in some sort of hypersleep.”
“This has happened before? You’re not even looking at her and know all this.”
“Yes.”
His one word was curt and final. He’d seen it, Ezza knew it, and he wasn’t giving any more. “You need to come and help her. You should be on your way, for God’s sake.” It was all I had left in me.
“When your brother and his bride-to-be, along with his child, land in Rubia, I will come.”
“What? You should be on the jet coming to pick them up.” I was feeling twitchy from all of this.
“Minister’s orders, especially since your mom had a spell. He is requiring lawfulness be restored.”
“And what about his niece? Is he not worried about her?”
“Put a cool compress on her forehead. Apply some ice behind her neck and try to drip some water in her mouth. I’ll see you soon. You’d better get your brother packed up.” He had the nerve to disconnect.
It had been a day of people leaving me hanging on their orders.
Donovan
“I’m not helping you talk your way out of this, brother. You’re on your own” was all I said to Magnum as I unloaded the trunk of the car. We were standing side by side on the airstrip, and I couldn’t even look at him.
