And my nose. I shake my head, pulling her up into my arms. My head buzzes. “I stay with her.”
“Use our cabin.” Sol follows, supporting me as I stumble toward the door. “Rio is already there. Easier to watch them both.”
I practically tumble down the stairs, shoving the door to their cabin open with my boot and turning to get through with Selene. Esme startles, and I vaguely notice Rio sleeping on one bed.
After crossing the small space in a few stumbling steps, I place Selene down in the other. Sol shoulders in next to me, lifts her head gently and adjusts the pillow as I scrub my hands over my face. “I found her half dead on the side of the ship, but she wasstillholding onto Leo.”
The blood on her shirt—my shirt—stares up at me. We’re not done yet.
Kneeling beside her, I grab the top of my shirt and tear it. The cut is long, and deep, an almost perfect line that stretches from shoulder to shoulder above the binding that covers her breasts. “This will need stitching. Matthias would be best.”
“She’s lost a lot of blood. Too much to wait for him. He’d be the first to say it.” Sol presses his fingers below her neck. “I’ll do it.”
I wait impatiently as he counts, his lips moving. His lips shift into a thin line. “Her heartbeat is too slow. We need to stop the bleeding.”
Esme tosses a healing pack at Sol from her place beside Rio, worrying at her lip as her eyes flicker between him and Selene. He rips it open, scattering the contents beside Selene’s unconscious form as he grabs a linen bandage and unwraps it before pressing it to her skin. “I’ll mix up a bark poultice to try and ward off infection. Es, can you get me some honey from the stores?”
I can’t take my eyes off her face. “What do you want me to do?”
“Sit,” Sol says curtly. “Before you fall. I’ll take care of your faeyte.”
The words are sharp, but his hands are gentle as he continues working. “She didn’t even hesitate.”
I shake my head. It’s all too easy to allow my legs to give out as I drop down to the floor beside the bed, pulling up my kneesand lifting her hand, winding our fingers together. Her hand is a block of ice, and I rub at them gently, trying to work some warmth into them.
A cloth lands in my lap. “To clean up.”
It comes away stained with crimson. Knowledge settles like a rock, heavy in my chest. “We can’t do the drop. We have to get back as soon as possible.”
Sol’s eyes don’t move as he leans over Selene. “Then that’s what we have to do. Take a minute, Cal. And then take us home.”
The bleeding doesn’t stop this time. It slows, but it does not stop. “Tell her—”
“Tell her yourself,” he snaps. “In Asteria.”
My breathing sounds wet, I realize. A bubbling noise ripples in my lungs with every inhale. “I have to go.”
He pauses. My best friend’s hands waver.
But he doesn’t move to follow, as he always has before.
He looks away, digging through the pack for a thin wooden needle. His voice is rough. “Don’t die before Matthias can get to you. It’ll be irritating if you ruin our homecoming plans.”
One more push, to get them back. To get Selene home.
But I’m not going to be there.
My cheek burns, twisting to the side. “Come on, Cal. You have to stay awake.”
I search out the maegis. There is so little left. The thousands of threads are dark and curled now, almost used up. The pretium hovers, stealing my breath and replacing it with fluid that fills my lungs.
I find a handful of final threads hidden beneath the rest. Unused. Once these are gone, I will be burned out, and the pretium will sweep in and take the rest.
Regret is bitter on my tongue. Perhaps this was my role in her fate. To get her back to Asteria, to the home that we stole from underneath her feet.
Maybe she’ll be able to save them, when I could not.
Chapter twenty-seven
