Trail of Lightning (The Sixth World #1)(76)

I panic until I smell cedar and tobacco on my skin and in my hair. I can almost hear the echo of prayer songs in my ears. Kai? My eyes search the darkness, but I can’t see anything.

Exhausted and confused, I fall back into sleep.

The next time I wake, it is at his gentle insistence. He is there with food, urging me to eat. So I sit up, wrap the sheet around my shoulders, and eat. But then I remember that my heart has been ripped open by a lightning blade and I weep. So he sets the food aside and climbs into the bed with me and holds me and lets me sleep.

The sun has crossed halfway across the sky before I wake again. The curtains in the room are drawn shut, but I can see the bright yellow of a noonday sun creeping through the corners of the windows. I am tempted to stay in bed, Kai’s arms wrapped tightly around me, but I know I have to get up. I have to find out what happened, how I am still alive. And there are matters that need attending to.

I slip out of the warm bed, careful not to wake him. Accidentally trip on something soft and fuzzy that makes an annoyed yelp and bolts for the slim opening in the door. Grace’s cat. I’m at Grace’s house. Just in an unfamiliar room. No, now that I look around, I recognize the room. It’s the same one Rissa was in the night the monster ripped her open. This must be their sick room. As my eyes adjust, I see it is. A table with bowls and bandages, a feather fan and a spool of dental floss, various mixtures and salves.

I search in the dim light for my clothes, but realize they must have been ruined, either too bloody to salvage or discarded in the aftermath. It doesn’t bother me to lose Clive’s ridiculous halter top, but I hope my moccasins were saved. And all my weapons. I need them. If I knew where they were, I would strap on every single knife and gun I own. I would sleep in them. I would never take them off again.

I finally find a bathrobe at the foot of the bed. It’s thick and woolly and a hideous shade of lavender, but it’s better than nothing. I slip it on, gingerly belting it at the waist, hyperaware of the wound on my side. I open the door and the murmur of voices greets me from down the hall. Before I leave the bedroom, I look back over my shoulder at Kai.

His face is drawn and wan, and he has deep bruises under his eyes. His hair is stuck every which way in wet clumps, and his skin has a dull sweaty sheen to it, like he’s been running a fever. His whole body seems drawn into itself, like he has lost a lot of weight in a very short time, and he didn’t have much to spare to begin with. I know he must have used the prayers that Tah taught him to save me, but even more I know he drew from his clan powers, and his body is paying the price.

“Big Medicine,” I whisper.

I close the door gently behind me.

Clive spots me first. He gets to his feet, smiling big. “Monsterslayer!”

I wince. “Don’t call me that. Not today.”

He sobers. “Maggie, then.”

I look around the room at the unfamiliar faces. Take a step so the wall is at my back. “What’s going on?” I ask, voice tense.

“I put out the call,” Grace says. “They owe me a favor. So now they owe you a favor.” She’s sitting on the couch next to Clive. Rissa takes up another chair. I can hear Freckles in the kitchen, humming loudly and banging pots around. But it’s the others in the room that I want to know about.

“Hoskie,” Hastiin drawls.

I nod at the Thirsty Boy. He looks the same as he did at the checkpoint days ago. Shorn hair, scruffy beard. Blue fatigues and skull bandanna. He’s leaning against the far wall, closest to the door. Three more Thirsty Boys in fatigues and leather look up at me from lavender floor pillows. If I wasn’t so shocked to see them here, I’d laugh at how ridiculous they look.

Something crashes in the kitchen and we all jump, tense as cats, a room full of uneasy killers.

Grace sighs and pushes herself up. “I’ll go help him. He’s likely to make a mess of the coffee, anyway.”

“There’s coffee?”

Grace gives me a smile.

“Black, please,” I tell her as she hustles over to help her youngest with the domestic duties.

“What are you doing here, Hastiin?” I ask.

He shrugs. “You heard the lady. Thirsty Boys owe her a debt. She’s transferring that to you. Plus, wasn’t going to let you run off and kill the monsters by yourself and get all the glory.”

My eyebrows rise. “You’re here to help me?”

“Looks that way.”

“But you hate me.”

A tic in his jaw. “You owe me money. That’s not the same thing.”

I want to argue, but what’s the point? He’s here, and that’s the important part. And frankly, I’m so relieved to have backup, I could hug the bastard if I didn’t think it would send him running.

“Thank you,” I say.

He stares at me a minute, then grunts. “Don’t mean you don’t still owe me money,” he grumbles.

“How do you feel?” Clive asks.

“Like hell,” I admit. I close my eyes, lean back into the wall. “What happened?”

“You don’t remember?”

I remember most of it. The arena, the brutal kiss, the knife in my heart.

“It was chaos at the end,” Clive says gently. “Lightning struck Mósí’s glass house. The bleachers caught on fire. The crowd panicked and ran for it. Kai was doing what he could to heal you, but we had to get you out of there. I managed to save this for you.” He reaches around the other end of the sofa to produce a metal lockbox, dented and slightly charred, but otherwise intact.