Alterant (Belador #2)(42)

She couldn’t push him to say more when every word obviously took a toll on his waning energy. “Go ahead if you think you can do something. I can’t walk.”

“Up.” He kept his hand out.

Too exhausted to argue, she grabbed his hand with both of hers and let him pull her to her feet. She sucked in a sharp breath. Tears threatened at the surge of blistering pain. The minute she balanced herself on one leg he let go of her. “What the—”

Before she could fall, he scooped her fireman style over his good shoulder, then started walking. He was headed in the direction of the waterfall they’d passed earlier.

“Put me down. You’re in no shape to carry me.”

He said nothing, just plodded along like a man who had been beaten with a club.

Struggling would only hurt both of them, so she kept still.

Time in the universe of pain moved at an excruciating pace. Every misstep over the rugged terrain jarred her leg and brought tears to her eyes. There was no way she’d cry out or complain, when he had to be hurting just as much.

He muttered something and plowed on.

She couldn’t pay attention to his words past the mind-numbing ache. The sound of rushing water got louder and louder, then she saw the lake and waterfall out of the corner of her eye.

He walked into clear water that wasn’t cold, but cooler than the sauna they’d been trudging through.

Everything below her waist had turned into one gigantic, infected throb.

Tristan held her with his one arm and sunk to his neck. He whispered words that sounded like a chant.

She asked, “What are you doing?”

He just kept murmuring strange words.

“Are you trying to put a spell on me?”

He paused from chanting. “If I did . . . it would be . . . to shut you up. Trying to draw out . . . the saliva. Water helps keep the wound clean . . . while the saliva seeps out.”

She believed him. “The burning from the saliva is going away, but I’m still getting weaker.”

The next time he spoke, his voice came out more even. Not so tight with pain. “I don’t think I can pull the saliva out of you the way I can do it on myself. You’re going to have to help with that.”

“Guess this isn’t a majik pond after all.” Her knee had quieted to a dull thrum of hurt that still pulsated in time with each heartbeat. She couldn’t see past hair that had fallen into her face. She tried to push it away with one hand.

“Hold your breath,” he said right before he lowered her beneath the surface.

She sucked in a lungful of air just in time. He kept her against him, tucked within the grasp of his healthy arm. Beneath the water, she watched him go into a Zen-like state, eyes shut. Slowly, he moved his damaged arm away from his body.

Her stomach clenched at seeing his mangled arm in vivid detail.

He continued doing something, because muscle snaked around bone, straightening the arm as it floated.

The blood stopped oozing from his wounds. Loose muscle continued inching back into place. Bone extended, connecting broken pieces, all of it smoothing into normal shape.

She opened her mouth in shock and sucked in water, choking.

He lifted her up until her head broke the surface. She gasped for air, hacking up water.

Tristan snapped out a curse. “Thought you could hold your breath longer than that.”

She coughed again. “How’d you do that?”

When he didn’t answer, she turned to face him. He was staring at her with indecision at first. “You really don’t know how to heal yourself?”

The last thing she wanted to do was admit a weakness to another person, especially a male, but he was insinuating this had to do with being an Alterant.

Tristan used his now-healing arm to wash the last of the mud still clinging to her hair.

She’d normally mouth off at him for acting as if he could do as he pleased with her, but she didn’t have it in her to care at the moment.

Her entire body was ravaged and exhausted from the fight.

The demon’s saliva continued to drain her life energy.

Her knee felt as if an elephant had stepped on it and she had the headache of death.

She heaved a sigh. “No, I have no idea how you healed yourself. And why didn’t you shift to fight those demons?”

“Had to save my energy for . . . later.” Tristan hoisted her into his arms, which were now both functioning.

Shifting into his Alterant state drained his energy? Interesting. He must have believed he could beat those demons without shifting and hadn’t planned on the saliva killing his supernatural energy.

But what did he plan to do that was important enough for him to weigh saving his power for later?

She could ask him questions once they got out of here. Saving her leg came first, and he was still healing. “What are you doing to fix yourself?”

“If you really don’t know how to heal yourself, we need to get busy. The longer that saliva is in your system the harder it is to draw out.”

If she hadn’t seen the repair to his arm with her own eyes, she wouldn’t have believed him. “So how does this work?”

“I’ll show you.”

Wasn’t that what Storm had said when she’d asked how the tracking majik worked?

Why couldn’t men just give a straight answer once in a while? She didn’t like the idea of trying something unknown, but she couldn’t walk out of here.