The Prison Healer (The Prison Healer #1)(22)

“Are you all right?”

Kiva couldn’t answer, still too busy trying to breathe. But she was aware enough to know that it was Naari who had asked the question, the guard having been the one to pull Tilda away.

Through watering eyes, Kiva saw Tilda wrestling against Naari’s grip, fighting like a rabid creature. The guard had dragged her until she was pressed up against the worktable, and despite Naari being fully armed as usual—two swords strapped to her back and a plethora of weapons attached to and hidden among her leather armor—she wasn’t reaching for any of them, instead holding Tilda at bay with her hands. But Naari didn’t see what Kiva could from the ground: Tilda fumbling blindly on the worktable, before wrapping her fingers around the sharp carving blade.

“Look out!” Kiva rasped, her voice like gravel.

Naari moved fast, but Tilda was faster, striking upward toward the guard’s head. For someone without sight, her aim was scarily accurate, and Naari had barely any time to react. It was all she could do to release one hand from Tilda and use it to block the blow, the blade sinking into her gloved wrist.

She didn’t cry out or reveal any sign of pain. All she did was fling Tilda around and, in one swift movement, elbow her in the side of the face.

The fight left Tilda in an instant, and she crumpled to the ground, unconscious.

Kiva was still panting for air, startled by how quickly the struggle had ended.

“Are you all right?” the guard asked again.

No, Kiva wasn’t all right. She’d just been attacked by one of her patients—someone she was trying to keep alive, to protect at all costs.

“Are you all right?” Kiva returned, wincing at how much it hurt to talk. She sounded as if she’d swallowed an entire quarry’s worth of luminium dust. Felt like it, too. But still, she was the prison healer, and her focus went beyond her own needs and to the blade sticking out of Naari’s wrist.

Following her gaze, the guard looked down and, showing no emotion, yanked the blade out.

Kiva flinched, even if Naari didn’t. But then she noticed what she’d missed before—there was no blood, not trickling from Naari’s arm, not even on the blade.

Rising, Kiva walked on shaking legs toward the guard and the prisoner. Tilda was out cold, a pinkish bruise blossoming at her temple from Naari’s blow. Kiva wasn’t sure which of them needed her attention first, so she took her lead from the guard, who jerked her head at the prisoner, and together they dragged Tilda back to her pallet.

Kiva wasn’t surprised when Naari reached for the shackles on either side of the mattress, binding both of Tilda’s hands before reaching for the chest strap and tightening it over the woman’s torso. The restraints were attached to all of the infirmary’s beds, including within the quarantine room, but they were rarely used. Despite what Tilda had done to Kiva, she didn’t like seeing the woman bound, repelled by the idea of trapping someone so completely, even if that someone had just tried to strangle her.

“She’s not going anywhere,” Naari said. “Now see to yourself.”

Kiva looked blankly at the guard until Naari prompted, “Your throat. Do you have something that will help?”

Unsure why Naari even cared enough to acknowledge it, Kiva nodded slowly and shuffled back toward the worktable. Her lungs burned with every breath, her knees still trembled, but she forced herself to think and reached for a vial of tallowfruit nectar. Tears sprang to her eyes as she swallowed it back, the citrus tang stinging the whole way down, but the nectar was the best remedy for throat and lung damage. Kiva considered a dose of poppymilk to help with the pain, but she quickly discarded the idea, needing a clear head right now.

“Your turn,” Kiva said, her voice already stronger than before.

“I’m fine,” Naari replied, remaining in position over Tilda’s bed, as if expecting the woman to awaken at any moment and burst out of her restraints.

Kiva didn’t want to argue with the guard. Everything in her knew how dangerous that could be. And yet . . .

“You were stabbed,” she said in a careful tone. “You should let me look at the wound.”

“I’m fine,” Naari repeated, more firmly this time.

Kiva bit her lip. Her eyes swung back to the blade on the table, again noting that it had no blood on it. But . . . she’d seen Tilda stab Naari. She’d seen the blade sticking out of Naari’s wrist.

“At least let me give you something to clean the wound,” Kiva said quietly. “You can do it yourself, if you don’t want me to. But you don’t want to get an infection, so—”

Naari turned from Tilda, her dark eyes locking onto Kiva before she stepped forward, her jade earring glinting as she closed the distance between them. Kiva wasn’t sure if she should back away or not. She couldn’t read the guard’s expression and feared she’d been too assertive. Naari didn’t act like the other guards at Zalindov, brutal and unforgiving. But for all Kiva knew, she was exactly like them.

“I—” Kiva opened her mouth to apologize, but Naari stopped her with a look.

And with an action.

The guard was tugging the glove off her left hand, the one that had been stabbed. As the black leather came free, Kiva’s eyes widened.

There was no blood, because there was no wound. And there was no wound, because there was no flesh.