“Critical. That’s all I know.”
The ICU was a busy, noisy place, with nurses and doctors bustling about, but I still felt like I’d been completely alone for the last couple of hours. Talbot had never showed up like he said he would. I hadn’t wanted to call April—because if April knew, then Jude would, too, and I didn’t know how the news would affect him—and after I couldn’t get ahold of Gabriel, there was no one else left to call who could come be with me. Not Daniel. Not Charity. Not even my mom. “They wanted to use my blood for a transfusion, but at the time I thought that would be too risky. It might infect him, you know? But maybe I was wrong. Maybe letting him get infected would help his body heal. Or my blood might do nothing at all.”
“Could you live with yourself knowing you had passed this curse on to him?”
I’d heard Daniel, who had suffered with the effects of the curse most of his life before he was supposedly cured, say that he’d rather die than live with the potential of becoming a monster again. Giving Dad healing powers might help him live, but he might never be the same person again. And I didn’t know what he’d choose if he could.
“But there has to be something I can do. I mean, I’m a freaking superpowered, demon-slaying, pseudo-werewolf, but all the power I have inside of me isn’t worth crap if I can’t use it to help my dad.”
“Perhaps there is a way…” Gabriel said hesitantly. “It is risky, though. And I cannot guarantee it will work. I have only tried it three times, with varying degrees of success. Yet it helped you some.” He seemed to be debating it out more with himself than explaining it me.
“What do you mean?” Then my mind flitted back to something Talbot had said to me last night, and I realized what he was referring to. “You and Talbot used your powers to help heal me—after I was attacked by those wolves in the warehouse. You did some sort of power transfer to help my body heal itself when I was unconscious and wasn’t able to do it myself?”
“Yes,” Gabriel said.
My memories surrounding the aftermath of what had happened in the warehouse were still fuzzy, so I’d never quite gotten the implications of that before now. Gabriel and Talbot had helped heal me. But I hadn’t known that was even possible—that healing other people was one of the many powers of the Urbat. Yes, they could heal themselves, but other people? I’d been the recipient of a power transfer before that day—when Daniel and I ran through the ravine in the woods after saving Baby James. I hadn’t had the ability to keep up with him until I felt a burst of energy travel through Daniel’s body into mine, tethering us together, making his power mine for a few moments. He’d shown me later that same night how he could heal himself, but he’d never mentioned that he could heal other people.
“Why didn’t Daniel tell me about this power?”
“He probably has no idea. It is a closely guarded secret. I did not know myself for hundreds of years. Not until Sirhan asked me to help him try it on his wife, Rachel. It did not work as well for her as it did for you. I believe that was the first and only time Sirhan had attempted it.” Gabriel scrubbed his hand over his bearded chin. “It is a remnant from the original Hounds of Heaven, the ones who were called by God and imbued with powers to help and protect the people of their clan. Legend has it that, in addition to being strong warriors, they were also great healers and teachers. They were like angels here on Earth, gifted with every power to help mankind. That is, until their power corrupted them, and they coveted their abilities for themselves. They succumbed to the same fate as the fallen angels of heaven, forsaking their duty and blessings to become as lowly as the devil’s demons. The power to heal others has been forgotten by most Urbat. They deal death now instead of life, and I am not sure the gift has been used on a normal human since those primitive times.”