Eden ran, wide-eyed, to help form a circle around us.
I looked up at the sweet healing teacher to see tears in her eyes. She peered at me with fear. “I…I don’t know, Fallon. This is beyond me. Her life force is weak, but I can’t tell why.”
I took in a cleansing breath, trying not to let the panic overtake me because it sure was trying to.
My father is fine.
Mable is fine.
Ayden is fine.
Ariyon is fine.
Everything is going to be fine.
My hands were so hot, they felt like they were on fire, and I wanted to dip them in cool water. It was as if my healing gift knew it was needed and was charging up, getting ready.
You know what to do,I told the magic within me. We had a trusting relationship. I was a total newbie, and the magic knew that, so it was going to have to take the lead.
“Master Hart is here!” someone cried out.
Relief rushed through me as the master healer stumbled into our circle, but the relief was short-lived when I saw the state he was in. He looked like he’d been mauled by an animal. Bloody gashes were carved all over his body. His color was pale, and his hands shook.
“I…I… The queen,” he muttered.
“Help me save her!” I snapped.
He looked shell-shocked, staring at me, then at Queen Solana, and then at me again.
“I’m not my mother!” I yelled at him. “You have to help me!”
He scanned her body with his gaze. “In…ternal bleeding. The Grim…” he mumbled, and then he teetered backward and passed out cold into a waiting fourth year’s arms.
Internal bleeding. The Grim!
Crap.
Screw this. I wasn’t waiting for step-by-step instructions.
What would Ariyon do? What did he do with my father?
“You can’t have her,” I growled, imagining the Grim hovering over her body in the Realm of Eternity.
Then I grabbed her exposed upper arms with my bare hands.
Screw my curse, I needed to touch her. I instinctively knew that, and so I had peeled off my gloves. This was bad, and my magic needed to physically enter her body through touch.
The second my skin connected with hers, I cried out in pain but held on.
“D-d-don’t take her body down…like you did Ariyon,” Master Hart’s weak voice came to my right.
Good. He was awake.
Golden light flooded from my palms, and I felt a tug.
“I feel a tug! Something is pulling me,” I screamed.
“Go with it, but detach your energy f-f-from her body without letting g-g-go,” he stuttered.
