It’s hard to reconcile with the man who flinched away from me when we were riding in the trap.
That’s too complicated to examine right now. “What happened?”
“Xovaar came after him,” she says. “He has weapons of Iishellasan steel. Nakiis cannot heal the wounds.”
I touch a hand to my pendant, which is also of Iishellasan steel.
Igaa watches the motion and nods. “Yes, magesmith. Like yours.”
I swallow and turn back to the injured scraver lying curled in the dirt. He hasn’t stopped growling, but it’s as if the effort to scare me off has worn him out, because the sound is no longer loud and threatening. Instead, it’s a bit pitiful, like when that fox’s threatening snarls turned to painful keening.
I stop beside him and drop to one knee, just out of reach. His claws scrape against the ground, and I freeze.
Alek must be able to see the motion, because his voice is just as low and threatening when he says, “If you hurt her, scraver, I’ll rip you apart in a way that can’t be healed.”
My traitorous heart skips a little, and this time it has nothing to do with fear.
No, I tell my heart.
But then I remember him spinning with Nora in the arena, the way his voice was almost encouraging. I think about the joy on her face.
No. No, no, no.
My heart doesn’t care. It skips again anyway.
Nakiis has given up the growling, and now he’s all but panting against the ground. There isn’t much light, but I’m close enough to seethe wounds, and the infection seems profound. He looks like he’s been stabbed in the shoulder, or maybe shot with an arrow. There’s another puncture wound through his arm, and I can’t entirely tell, but it looks like there’s a tear in his wing.
As my eyes scan his form, I find other wounds. Claws have slashed across his abdomen, and those ridges are crusted with pus and dirt. Something impaled his thigh, too. He’s wearing trousers, but the bloodstains are thick, the injury still seeping.
“Clouds above,” I breathe.
“I do not want your help,” he says, and these words are spoken in a plaintive whisper. “Please.”
Instead of threatening, he’s turned to begging.
“I know,” I say. “But you definitely need it.” I hesitate, my gaze skipping over the wounds again. I might have saved Alek’s life, but that was nothing like this. “You should know,” I begin, “I’m not very practiced in healing—”
“Keep your magic,” he says. “I don’t want it.” But his head falls back against the ground, his eyes slipping closed.
I reach out, but my hand stops before touching him. I caught a glimpse of his fangs when he was growling, and they looked razor sharp.
— Please,Igaa says, the words carrying to my thoughts silently. Her begging is completely at odds with his.—Please save him.
I take a long, slow breath, then steel my nerves and reach for his arm. When my fingers brush his skin above the injury, he flinches a little, but his eyes don’t open.
“If you’re going to force me,” he says breathlessly, “just let the man kill me.”
That makes me go still. I don’t want to force him.
Igaa says something from behind me, and I don’t understand the word, but it sounds like profanity. “You should have allowed Tycho totether his magic to yours,” she snarls. “Then he would still be here, and you would not be in this condition. Now you have lefthimat risk.” She swears again. “He could be dead. He could be fighting Xovaar this very moment. And you will do nothing because you refuse to move past old harms.”
Nakiis says nothing. He doesn’t even move.
I don’t know what a lot of that means—tether his magic?— but something in the scraver’s silence makes me think he agrees.
Especially when he lets out a heavy breath and says, “Fine. Do it.”
I slide my hand down his arm until I find the first swell of infection. The cave is so cold, but his dark skin is unnaturally warm, especially around the wounds. I try to summon the magic, but nothing happens.
