Breast chuffed at me. Jane is not dying. Jane has air. Jane should think of time.
In the deeps of my soul home, Beast looked away, bored. She was lying in front of the fire pit, flames casting light and leaping shadows across her.
Time. Great. I fought to relax, to not panic, and closed my eyes.
I had actually seen a time bubble once, or maybe a time loop. I had been working with Molly way back when, and we had found a time loop in an old house that had been diagnosed as having a poltergeist. Wrong. It had a vampire stuck in a time loop, in a time bubble, with a witch. I had always been aware that time slowed down in battle. Soldiers had reported that phenomenon from time immemorial. But this was different. More distinct. More intense. Longer lasting. Now Beast and I had more control over the experience. Now Beast could do something like slow down time, fold time, at will. Or place us in a bubble at will. Freaky stuff.
Unfortunately, it looked like I would be the one to pay the price for the time shifts, not Beast.
I managed to get an elbow out and rolled over slightly, so I could see. I was on a bed, in a room with some light. Fighting panic, I pulled a pillow to my middle and shoved it hard against me. I was able to inhale. A long moment later I exhaled, slowly, slowly. My guts roiled like a bucket full of snakes. I pushed down on the nausea, hard. It would be really bad if I threw up right now. I took another breath and this time, I smelled Del everywhere, in the coverlet, on the pillows, permeating the air. This was her bedroom.
I coughed again. Stuff came up. Too tired to lift my head, I spat it onto the covers beside me. Old blood, black and phlegmy. Totally gross. Old blood meant that I hadn’t shifted totally. If I’d shifted, any blood in my system would have been absorbed by the shift and rearranged inside me. In a total shift, nothing got wasted. But in a partial shift, I was starting to realize, things could be way different. Things like my level of pain, and the degree of my body’s change, and the functions of my brain.
“How are you?”
I tilted my head to see Adelaide staring at me, but her head was at an angle that made my stomach roil. I closed my eyes. From behind the darkness of my lids I said, “I’m sick as a dog. How are you?”
“Alive. Thanks to your help. And thanks to the priestess.”
“And Derek. Last time I saw him he was chasing Peregrinus.”
“Peregrinus got away,” she said shortly.
I swallowed and the nausea faded just a hint. I could hear Del moving around the room. Cleaning up my mess. “The others?” I managed to ask.
“Leo and his heir are well. Grégoire is recuperating. Derek is injured, but will survive, as will most of his men. Your wolf raced away, last seen leaping through the front entry. And . . . and Wrassler. He said to give you his thanks.” I felt the mattress beneath me shift, which made sickness rise again. I swallowed it back down, desperate not to be sick, desperate to hear Del’s report. I pressed the pillow harder into me. “Leo has promised him the best of prosthetics for his leg. His arm may heal.”
I opened my eyes to see Del sitting on the edge of the bed. “How many dead and injured?” I asked.
Del sighed. “Of Peregrinus’ fighters, ten dead and left to rot. Of ours, seven dead, two of them Derek’s men. Nine injured, one critically. Four humans missing.”
“Missing?” I focused on her face. Missing didn’t sound right. Why would anyone be missing?
I realized I had spoken the question aloud when she said, “We don’t know. But it has something to do with Bethany. After she got all the Mithrans fed, she disappeared. And she took some of our people with her.”
I thought about that while I gathered my strength and pushed up with my arms, swiveling to sit upright, my knees held close, pressing the pillow into me as hard as I could. Del placed pillows behind me and I rested back on them. I was in a bedroom, a lacy, silken chamber done in shades of gold and cream and touches of sapphire. A nine-millimeter handgun—not one of mine—lay on the bedside table. The room looked like Del, all soft and reserved but with hidden surprises that could hurt you. “Sorry about the spread,” I said, my breath coming easier. “What time is it?”
She shrugged and crossed her arms over her middle. “It’s washable. And it’s nearly three in the morning.”
I could hear the vibration of generators. “I’ll have to deal with the power situation.”
Del nodded. I realized that we both were trying to avoid dealing with the reality. So I took a slow, deep breath and asked, “I’m guessing that everyone knows about the thing on the wall of Leo’s dungeon.” Del looked away. “What was it? Who was it?”