“I’m not leaving them behind!”
“Yes you will.” Helen’s words were cold. Helen, her first friend, the first person Florence had left behind for her own sake.
“No, I won’t,” Florence insisted. She wasn’t the girl she’d been then. She was sixteen now, nearly middle-aged. She was a woman who would stay with the people she loved even if it meant death.
The debate ended in a blink. Cvareh appeared seemingly out of nowhere, collapsing to the ground, and Arianna with him. Blood poured from his mouth and from the wound on his side, but Ari seemed blissfully unharmed.
“Flor!” Her teacher scooped her up in her arms. “Flor, we need to stint the bleeding, now.”
“Cvareh—” Florence swayed from blood loss.
“We need to keep going!” Helen interjected frantically.
“Heard.” Will ran back to join them, firing at the planted charges.
The explosion sent them all flying, rolling head over heels. Florence cried out in pain as the wound on her shoulder tore further from the force with a violent rip. The wall collapsed between them and the Riders, heralding a silent aftermath and pitch blackness.
She blinked into the darkness, creeping panic raising every hair on the back of her neck. She was back in the Underground. One extreme emotion after another was the only glue holding her together, but even that had its limits. Pain was beginning to dot stars against the void and Florence blinked frantically, her senses ringing.
Arianna pulled the cap off a torch, bathing the passage in a faint reddish glow. Helen and Will were finding their breath again, coughing through the dust, rolling to their feet. Cvareh wasn’t moving.
“Flor, let me see it.” Her teacher moved for her.
“Will can help me.” Florence continued to apply pressure on her shoulder. It hurt, but she’d been trained by Ari for years in “what if” scenarios.
“Me?” Will balked.
“Ari, he’s not moving,” Florence insisted at her hesitation. “What’s the point of all this if you lose your boon?”
“Boon?” Helen repeated in a sudden moment of clarity.
Ari scowled at her. It was a face Florence didn’t get to indulge in often because it was one she only made when someone else was right and had bested her with the fact. Florence smiled tiredly.
“Pack this into the wound, and then stitch it up with this.” Ari shoved some supplies into Will’s hands.
“Do I look like an Alchemist?” He regarded the medical tools with skepticism.
“If you haven’t learned this yet, learn it quickly: I do not like to be crossed or questioned,” Ari growled. “I’m leading this trip and you would still be rotting in that cell if it wasn’t for me. I will put you back there personally if you don’t help Flor.”
Will laughed with a shake of his head, moving over to her. He set down the supplies in the flickering light of the torch that burned harmlessly on the ground between the five of them. “You made a scary friend, Flor.”
“I did…” Florence watched Ari as Will began to pack her wound. Her teacher flipped over the prone Dragon, regarding him thoughtfully. There was a softness to Ari’s brow that Florence hadn’t seen her adopt around the Dragon before. She had been Ari’s first priority, but there was genuine concern for Cvareh alighting the woman’s violet eyes.
Ari ran her hand over the oozing wound on his side, bringing her fingertips to his face. Florence watched as she pried the Dragon’s mouth open. Her teacher opened her mouth a fraction and bit down with a grimace.
Blood, Florence realized. Ari was a Chimera and that meant her blood had magic in it, and the magic that lived in blood had the power to heal. She was giving the man her strength, literally forcing life down his throat.
Arianna knelt at the Dragon’s side, bringing her face down to his. Her body blocked the act, but Florence didn’t need to see the details to know what was happening. Ari pulled away, waiting a moment before leaning forward again and repeating the process, slowly dribbling blood into the Dragon’s mouth from her own.
Helen sat opposite Florence. “So, who’s your new friend?”
“She’s not really a ‘new’ friend.”
“I was being relative.” Helen knew just how to twist the knife. She and Will were her first friends; everyone would be new compared to them.
“Arianna, she’s my teacher. She found me when I emerged from the Underground and took me to Ter.5 to learn from the Revos.” Ari glanced over her shoulder at the mention of her name, but continued to focus on a slowly stabilizing Cvareh.
“So you made it to Ter.5 then?” Will had almost finished his sloppy attempt at stitches. Turning to look at him was a mistake. It hurt her shoulder the second she moved her head and it made her catch sight of her ravaged flesh.