“Kallie!” I shouted. Charlie let me down, and my arms ached as I forced my wheelchair through the grass to get to her. She was on her knees, clutching her face as blood ran down her cheeks.
I reached out my hands to heal her. My Anichi magic worked quickly as I mended the cut on her face, then stitched the cuts on her hand. As I worked, Marcus stared at Kallie with a vacant look, like he was horrified at what he’d done…
And yet, not surprised, like he’d been expecting this.
“It’s okay,” I said in a rush, and Charlie and Oberi landed behind me. “I mended everything. You’re no longer bleeding.”
“Alette!” Kallie whimpered. She held up the little moth in both hands. Alette limply fluttered in Kallie’s bloody fingers, one of her wings hanging on by a thread. The glass from the crystal ball had nearly severed it off.
“I can fix it,” I offered quickly. “Give her to me.”
Kallie cried as she placed Alette into my outstretched fingers. I felt the moth begin to die as my healing magic connected to her body. I wasn’t going to let that happen, so I forced Anichi magic into her. Her wing started to mend, and life flooded back into the little moth as she lifted her antennae to feel the air. In a few moments, Alette was as good as new, hopping around my hands like nothing had happened at all.
“She’s okay,” I said, and I gave her back to Kallie. “No harm done.”
Kallie didn’t respond, but I knew she was thankful. She clutched Alette to her chest as she ran off sobbing, blood drying across her tear-stained cheeks. Rishi yowled at her to stay, but Kallie didn’t even look back.
Marcus stared after her and cringed as the door to the Arboretum slammed shut. “I cut her face— I could’veblindedher— and I almost killed her faekin.”
“It was an accident,” Charlie insisted.
“People end up dead when I start havingaccidents,” Marcus shot back. “I lost my temper for two seconds, and she got hurt. If I hadreallylost control, she might’ve died!”
“Marcus, the one thing I know about Charlie and me is that we can take anything we throw at each other. We’re strong enough to survive each other’s storms. You and Kallie are the same way,” I pleaded. “She’s a demigod just like you. She can take it.”
“She shouldn’t have to!” Marcus bellowed. “I never should’ve let you guys push me into this. It was a mistake.”
Marcus turned his back to us. I was going to ask if he needed help cleaning up this giant mess, but clearly, he wanted to be left alone.
Charlie pushed me back to the sidewalk. I was exhausted from healing both Kallie and Alette, and I couldn’t maneuver myself around. I sagged in my chair, feeling a new bout of soreness rising from my middle.
Well, that escalated rather drastically,Oberi stated, shaking his fur.And it was all going so well.
“They have more problems than I thought,” I said softly.
The guilt resonating from Charlie was palpable. “I shouldn’t have pushed Marcus to do this. But I really thought they were ready, whether they knew it or not.”
“They can’t be ready until they decide they are. We had to figure that out ourselves, too,” I said, and I reached back to touch his hand. “Don’t blame yourself. Maybe they need to fight to get through it.”
Charlie went silent, but I was there to meet his regret with hope. Sometimes, when you loved someone, you had to go through the worst of shit in order to come out on the other side and be happy. Perhaps it was going to take something big to bring these two together.
The thing was, I worried just how terrible things would have to get before they accepted that they loved each other. And if, by that time, it would be too late.
* * *
The next day was my first physical therapy appointment since being out of the hospital. I felt nauseous the moment I woke up. My stomach churned just thinking about going back to that infirmary again.
If I never returned to that place, it’d be too soon. But I had to. The impending dread I felt the further I got into the infirmary was a crushing weight, overwhelming all my senses and making it hard to think about anything but how much I wanted to get out of there.
We were able to refill my prescription just fine, but the moment I was pushed into a room by Charlie to wait for the physical therapist on staff, I got a sensation like I was about to be drowned. My heartbeat swelled in my chest, blood rushing through my ears so I couldn’t hear anything but my own panicked breathing. The walls of the hospital closed in around me. It was hard to breathe. I felt suffocated by the white paint and the smells of antiseptic.
The sight of the medical machines stored in the corner caused my lungs to cease up. I recalled how pinned down those machines made me feel when I was hooked up to them, and although I’d been out for it, I vaguely recalled the discomfort I’d felt when they’d removed my breathing tube.
Though I hadn’t been conscious for so many of these things, my body remembered, and it was rebelling at the idea of being here at all.
Charlie, she’s not doing okay, Oberi said. He placed a paw on my knee, giving a low whine.
“Pidge, what’s wrong?” Charlie knelt by my side, but he was speaking to me through a fog. I opened my mouth to try and talk, but no sound came out. I ran my tongue over the roof of my mouth to try and comfort myself, a habit I’d acquired whenever I felt uneasy, but the absence of cool metal made me even worse. They’d taken my tongue ring out when they’d put the tube down my throat, and I didn’t know where it had gone, because nobody had ever told me.
