Alarmed, Daya reached out.Ereven!Get Neka!
What happened?Ereven asked.
Magic.Ember hissed.It glitters over him.
Ember sent her a visual flash of sparkling gold with streaks of white and blue light that was quickly dissipating from Raiden’s body.It had completely covered him, the colors concentrated around his head, particularly the blue magic.
Pushing down her rage at the careless actions, she focused on calming him.Cradling his head, she ran her fingers through his hair and laid her other hand on his back.“Just breathe with me.Slow and steady.”
She stroked his arms in a soothing rhythm as she assessed him for injuries.Nothing seemed wrong.In fact, the damaged skin on his shoulder felt smooth to her touch, and the scar on his cheek had disappeared.
Healing magic.They tried to heal him.
Daya vaguely recalled hearing his sister say something about boosting his body’s ability to heal when she’d been hiding in the hall.She should have been with him.Not that it would have changed the outcome if she had.
They should have been more careful,Ember said.
The intensity of color around his head concerned her most.They’d obviously tried to heal more than just his physical wounds.Why in the world would they do that?Nature had been running its own course just fine.
Soothing him helped calm her in turn.Nothing was as terrifying as having her fearsome sky hunter collapse in her arms, except for possibly the last time he’d collapsed, when the poison had nearly killed him.Ironically, his mind was being eviscerated by loving, healing magic this time.
His heart raced at a dangerous pace as he shook and sucked in air.Ignoring her audience, she dipped her head close to his and hummed to him like she’d done when he woke up in hyperventilating panic from fevered nightmares he couldn’t remember.
Eventually, his breathing stopped its seizing and regulated to the steady sound of her voice.That’s it.Come on, Raiden.
Neka is here, hidden in trees,Ereven reported.
I’ll send him out to her.Once he felt stable, she rose, pulling him up with her.Ember, keep them here.
“Come on, come with me.”Leaving Ember to guard their backs, she led him out of the room, not stopping until they were around the corner out of sight.
“Daya.”His voice was broken as he touched his head to hers.
“I know.”
“My mind feels broken.Shattered into a million pieces.”
She stroked a gentle hand down the back of his neck.“You’re going to be okay.Just keep breathing for me.Go with Neka.I’ll come find you in a moment.”
He gave the smallest nod before moving away from her to the back door.
The breath she’d been holding left her in a rush as he disappeared from sight.Her next inhalation brought fury with it, filling her core.
Spinning around, she raged back into the living area, stopping a few feet from the visitors to dim the temptation to physically lash out at them.
“What happened?”
His sister stepped away from her protector to face Daya.“I don’t know.All I did was try to heal him.Nothing like that has ever happened before.”
“He’s in pain, and he says his mind feels shattered.”Daya barely kept the accusation out of her voice.
“He must not be handling the return of his memories well.I’m so sorry.”
“Healing his mind is not the same as helping his body heal.You were supposed to boost his natural ability, not bring all his memory back at once.”
“You’re right, that was what should have happened, but magic can be unpredictable,” Celina defended.
That was true, but Daya wasn’t feeling too charitable with Raiden’s pain echoing through her.She tried to keep her voice calm.“His mind was keeping his memories shadowed for a reason.It was protecting him.We have no idea the kinds of things he’s done and seen that just got unleashed before his mind was ready to remember them.”
