Mere breaths later, Emillie was on Ariadne’s other side, grabbing her hand and squeezing hard. “Gods, Ari, I…I was so scared.”
Wincing through the forced, light laughter, Ariadne squeezed back and reached across herself to touch her sister’s face. “I am fine, Em.”
“I prayed harder than I have ever prayed before,” Emillie said. “When you would not drink from Azriel, I thought…I remembered Madan and…”
Ariadne nodded, hand dropping back onto the cot, grateful for the sudden shift in topic and distraction. “Madan survived, too, remember?”
“He lost an arm!” Emillie looked up at Phulan, silently begging the mage to help her.
“There was a moment there,” Phulan admitted, “that I was concerned.”
She looked between them, mouth agape. “Truly?”
“You bled a lot,” Emillie said.
“And she is correct,” Phulan said a little quieter as though tiptoeing around the news she had just delivered. “You wouldn’t drink from him. I thought we’d lose you both.” At her visible confusion, the mage added, “If youactuallydied…I fear the Azriel we know and love would also be dead.”
A silence fell between them all for a long moment. Ariadne did not know what else to ask—what else tosay. Phulan had obviously taken excellent care of her and brought her back from what could have been a rather horrible end to her reign as Dhemon Queen. Even if it was at a cost for which she did not care. Likewise, Emillie had not gone far, though she understood just how helpless her sister had been during that time.
“No matter.” Phulan patted Ariadne’s hand. “You’re alive. Azriel will be thrilled when he returns. I must see to the others.”
At that, the mage stood and walked away, stopping only when she reached another patient who needed her magic. It washed through the air, vibrant as Ariadne knew it to be in those moments of healing, and seeped into the itchy scab on her belly.
“Did I drink fromanyone?” Ariadne asked her sister, remembering the strange ache she felt upon waking.
Emillie shook her head. “Azriel just sort of…bled into your mouth, but you never responded.”
“I am surprised he left at all.”
“He was not going to,” Emillie said and sighed. “Phulan had to force him out, and I think Razer took him from there.”
Ariadne tried to reach out to the great blue dragon, but was met with a solid wall. At the far end of her vinculum, Almandine bristled. “He does that a lot.”
“Well, I understand your frustration now.” Ariadne pursed her lips, then refocused on Emillie. Anything to keep her mind from wandering back to Phulan’s news. “How has it been for you…working here, I mean.”
Over the course of a few heartbeats, Emillie’s expression went through every emotional range possible. The initial excitement shifted into confusion, then worry, hope, devastation, eagerness, and exhaustion. She settled on a resigned smile when she said, “It is a lot of work. Losing them is the worst of it.”
After a moment of hesitation, Ariadne asked, “Have you lost many?”
“More than I care to admit.” Emillie looked at her hands. “Dahlia is dead. I tried to save her, but…I just was not fast enough.”
The pink-eyed lycan flashed through Ariadne’s memory, and her heart ached for Emillie. She did not know Dahlia well, but her sister had traveled with her long enough to have built a friendship. With Luce as her partner, her sister likely put a level of responsibility on herself to keep the lycans alive.
All too quickly, though, Dahlia’s sweet face faded and was replaced by Kall’s. Ariadne had not been fast enough to save him, either.
Before Emillie could pull back, Ariadne squeezed her hand again. “Dahlia would not blame you for doing your best.”
A silent tear slipped down Emillie’s cheek, but she nodded. “I know.”
“So do not blame yourself.”
Throat bobbing, Emillie looked up at Ariadne again. “That is easier to say than to follow.”
Ariadne grimaced. “I know that feeling all too well.”
Silence descended between them again. They sat together, hand in hand, for some time before Emillie looked around, sighed, and claimed she needed to return to her duties. Ariadne let her go, chest tight at the way her sister moved with slow purpose to the nearest patient. Though there was nothing to be done for Dahlia or Emillie’s feelings on the matter, she was grateful for one thing: that she had not passed on to the next life, leaving her family and husband behind in what would otherwise become a perpetual war.
Chapter 27
