Chapter 47: Heal Thyself

Jo helped Thomas lay Zach out on the concrete. He was shockingly pale under the parking lot lights, and Thomas’s healing mana unhelpfully screamed FixThisDoSomethingHelpHim!!!

Jo wasn’t helping. “Thomas, who were those guys? Can they follow us? Is Zach—is he going to be okay?”

“They’re witches, I guess. I don’t know, and I don’t know.” He growled the last bit as he searched for a pulse on Zach’s neck. His own hands were shaking so hard he could barely do it, and for a second, he thought there were actual bugs under his skin causing it.

Get a grip, he told himself firmly. I can freak out later.

There! He found Zach’s pulse, but it felt super faint and a lot slower than it should be considering what they had just escaped. Shit, was he breathing? It looked like he was, but the breaths were shallow.

“I think he needs mana. Do you have any fire crystals on you?” Thomas asked. “Level one, I don’t care.”

“No, why would I have fire mana?”

“Search Zach’s bag, then!”

Thomas grabbed for his own and then pulled out a Healing crystal. He took just a metaphorical sip off the top himself, which was enough to steady his hands and push whatever horror that wizard did to him to the corner of his mind. He put the remaining crystal in Zach’s hand.

Nothing happened. Jo came back with a shake of her head, then started searching through Thomas’s pack while Thomas checked Zach’s pulse again: still weak, and his skin was growing cold. A fire mage should not be cold.

“Come on, Zach, you gotta absorb this. Zach, wake up.” He tapped his cheek, then when that didn’t work, rubbed his sternum with his knuckles as he’d once seen paramedics do to a junkie who was checking out. “Wake up!”

There was no response, and he didn’t know if the healing mana would work at all. He briefly tried his Living Architecture skill, but there was nothing to rebuild. Zach’s body was technically healthy, but through his health sight, he looked like a dimming, flickering candle.

“Here, I just found this in your pack.” Jo shoved a tiny, level one fire mana crystal at him.

Thomas took it and put it in Zach’s lax hand as well. Fuck. How to get him to absorb this? Even a thirsty man would die of dehydration while unconscious.

Come on… come on. Think.

“He looks bad,” Jo said, echoing his thoughts. “Should we call 911?”

“If they’re like the hospital up in Tahoe, they won’t work with magic. We should call Applebaum, maybe?” he asked, looking for some sort of lifeline. Thomas hated to be in the National Guard’s debt, but maybe they owed him one. He took out his phone. His hands were shaking again, he was choking up, and that reminded him of the feeling of centipedes crawling down his throat.

That spiral was averted as his healing sight alerted him to something very important.

Thomas looked up to see three figures enter the parking lot. He recognized the heavier one’s features. This was the hit squad again. All of them wore light beige cardigans and slacks and generally looked like they’d come from a polo tournament. What the fuck.

“Move along, cardigan crew,” Thomas snarled. “You don’t want this fight.”

That was all bluster. He was on his last nerve and wasn’t sure he could even hold his mace, Zach was obviously out, and Jo… Well, this would have to be up to her. But that was fine. She was level three, and she had poison mana on her side.

Sure enough, Jo stood in a fluid motion, hand on her sword, and put herself between the new threat and her teammates.

The hit squad crew paused at Thomas’s words, then continued walking. He couldn’t quite read their body language, which was… strange. They were so neutral that it struck him as wildly off.

They stopped just within the border of the parking lot light. There were three of them: two men, one woman.

“Is there a problem here?” the big man called.

“Don’t know,” Jo said. “Are you looking to make a problem?”

The second man poked the other. “They are level 3.”

That caused the cardigan crew to gather and whisper together.

Meanwhile, Zach’s breathing faltered, breath catching with a choke, but he recovered a few seconds later. Thomas snatched up the Healing crystal from his limp hand but sat there, unsure what to do with it. Could he push the energy into Zach, somehow? No, he needed Fire mana. Thomas could try to absorb a low level fire, then… what? If he could figure out how to push it back out again without a skill, it would come out as flames. That wasn’t helpful.

“Who are those people?” Jo hissed in an undertone.

“I don’t know,” Thomas replied tensely. “They followed us around the Convention Center, but we lost them. Zach thought that they were a hit squad, but…”

“They’re weird,” Jo said. “I don’t like them. How’s Zach?”

In answer, Thomas shook his head. “Maybe we should load him up in the car and get to a hospital. I don’t… I don’t know what I’m doing,” he admitted, as frustration and helplessness threatened to crash over him. He’d fixed himself of grievous injuries, fixed his teammates and his brother no problem. He even knew the solution to this, but he just didn’t know how to get there.

Perhaps he’d spoken too loud, because the cardigan crew separated and the big one said, “Your friend appears to be dying.” Before Thomas could snap something at him he added, “Fortunately, we have a high healer in our presence tonight.”

Thomas’s head snapped up. “What?”

“What’s the cost?” Jo demanded.

“The cost is a meeting between our elders, Thomas Alexander Coldstrike, and your associate, Preston Trent de’Montvallon.” His eyes flicked over to Jo, and when he blinked, it made Thomas want to recoil. “Joanna Marie Fitzsimmons may accompany you, of course.”

Jo lifted her sword. “How do you know my name?”

Thomas was having a hard time finding Zach’s pulse. The flicker of life in his healing sight was barely there. He was a healer and could do nothing.

They didn’t have time for back and forth. “Yes,” he growled. “Heal him, and your elders will have my undivided attention.”

The big guy blinked, somehow, like a reptile. “And you will offer us no violence?”

Offer them no violence?

FixThisDoSomethingHelpHim!!!

“Yes!” Thomas snapped. “You have my word, just get the healer. Hurry!”

The two men looked at each other, then split off at a run back toward the convention center, leaving the woman behind. She approached, holding up her hands, with a slight smile on her face. She was mid-twenties with dirty blonde hair pulled back into a bun, and a round face with a button nose. She should have been cute, but there was something wrong with her smile, and every time she blinked was wrong, and…

Thomas had to look away from her and instead to the equally horrific sight of Zach who was now taking in shallow, choked gasps. He was like an engine running out of fuel.

“It is okay,” the freaky woman said, walking closer with hands open and empty. “I offer you no harm. What is wrong with your teammate? Has he been cursed?”

“Do you know how to get him to absorb mana?” Thomas demanded, tripping over his words. “He needs mana.”

She blinked weirdly at him. “Excuse me, but are you not a healer?”

Manfully, he resisted the urge to leap up and shake the answers out of her. “Can I get him to absorb mana?”

She just looked politely puzzled. “Why do you not just open an emergency support bridge?”

“What?”

She looked at Jo. “May I?”

Jo looked doubtful, but stepped aside, and the woman knelt down to look hard at Thomas.

“I’m no Healer,” she said — there was emphasis in the word, as if it was a special title. “But if you are, it should be possible. As I understand, it is a simple foundational skill. I witnessed my sister do it as a child. Here.” She reached out and grabbed Thomas’s right hand, placing it over Zach’s stomach where the belly button was, and Thomas’s other hand over Zach’s forehead.

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

Thomas did not like getting close to her. He especially didn’t like having her close to anybody who couldn’t defend himself. But her touch was gentle and her voice was calm and clear. “I know not how it was done, but she took over for the breaths and the heart.”

“You can do that?” Jo demanded, as if Thomas had been holding out on them.

“I don’t know! I’ve been a healer for like three weeks!”

The woman looked sorrowful… if a fake porcelain doll face could halfway copy the expression of pity. “I’m afraid you must. He does not sound well at all.”

Thomas tried to stop freaking out and instead concentrated hard. He’d done weirder things with his mana in the mimic dungeon, right? This bridge thing sounded a little bit like magic CPR, except without the rescue breathing and rib-breaking aspect.

He tried to feel out with his Healing mana and felt it immediately connect through Zach’s body. Like if he sent a little zip of energy through his right hand, it immediately went up the torso with the vital organs, then traveled through the neck and brain and into Thomas’ left hand, with only a couple of motes lost in transit. It was so easy, it was natural.

Thomas breathed in, and Zach breathed in too, with a full, uncomplicated breath.

“That is it!” the woman clapped with a genuine, if creepy, smile.