Chapter 18

18

A mbra regrets that, as bandaging humans turns out to be intensely boring, but the knot inside her chest loosens the moment the pristine white bandage is back in its place.

“See,” Gurlien says, twisting his arm around once the final bit of tape is in place. “I’m fine.”

“He still shouldn’t have injured you,” Ambra mutters, for what feels like the hundredth time in this process. “There were other things he could do.”

There obviously were, but even in saying that she knows that Johnsin never would have picked them. He liked blood too much and the pain, to miss a chance to do it to someone unsuspecting.

And now he never would again.

Gurlien flicks his sleeves back down, buttoning the cuffs around his wrists, right as both of their phones buzz.

Ambra freezes and Gurlien’s brown eyes widen, almost imperceptibly, before he slowly reaches for his phone and Ambra pulls hers out of her pocket.

It’s a group text, with her, Gurlien, Maison, and Chloe.

MAISON (3:02 PM): They know about Johnsin.

“How would he know?” Ambra asks, suspicious. “Isn’t he just as out of the loop as you?”

GURLIEN (3:03 PM): Thank you for the intel.

CHLOE (3:04 PM): Jose has a report that they’re circling some forensic mages in Miami, flying them in from Washington.

“That’s not good,” Gurlien murmurs, then gives Ambra a grim look, his lips flattening. “So they’ll know about you.”

Instinctive, she reaches a hand up to the leash, where there’ve been no traces of attempts, nothing, and her pulse flutters in her neck. Careful, she steps backwards, back into the concurrent circles of progressively more complex wards, the hair on the side of her scalp prickling, until she sits down on the overlarge bed in the center.

Another buzz of the phone, and even though it’s quiet, she flinches.

MAISON (3:06 PM): Someone sent me a query to help consult, someone who isn’t kept in the know.

“They want demon experts,” Gurlien mutters grimly, then refills two glasses of water, carrying them over to the bedside table.

Ambra’s heart pounds.

She knew this would happen, that they would discover Johnsin. That someone would put it together, would see the incredibly obvious trail of clues.

And she left them intentionally. Left them as a warning.

And despite that, she shivers in fear.

Gurlien drops off the water, then brings over one of the boxes of protein bars and a bag of chips that Ambra had bought specifically because the word spicy was written all over them.

“Is this the safest place in the apartment?” he asks, even though she had said so many times. Even though he had watched her put the protections down.

She nods, jerky.

“Then we’ll stay here,” he replies grimly, before going back to the bookshelves, pulling out some tomes, and grabbing the extension cord and her phone charger. “See if they make some moves, decide safety after a few hours.”

It’s another bit of kindness.

“You can be 45 meters outside of it,” Ambra says, almost automatically.

“I probably will be at some point,” he says, before flopping down onto the bed, staring up at the ceiling. “I’m tired from the practice and all the everything, so I’m staying here.”

She can’t tell if he’s indulging her or if he actually needs rest, but still, the closeness is…nice.

Carefully, she lays down on the other side of the bed, the heart hammering hard.

Hours pass, as Gurlien reads, naps, and reads again, but Ambra just lays still, the adrenaline never leaving her limbs, before…there.

The leash flexes, and Gurlien drops the pen he was jotting notes with, grabbing at his wrist.

Saying nothing, Ambra just nods, a lump in her throat.

“Okay,” he whispers, then weaves the leash through his fingers, sending a shiver down Ambra’s spine .

There’s another flex, something barely against her neck, and Ambra flinches.

“Here,” Gurlien says, before scooting closer to her on the giant bed, until he’s right next to her, the fabric of his shirt grazing her shoulder. Quick, he wraps the leash around his hand, and she shivers once more. “How much of that do you feel?”

Ambra swallows, and the leash isn’t cutting off her air or anything, but the tension might as well. “A fair amount,” she manages out. “It doesn’t hurt, but it’s like…” her mind flashes blank, trying to find an equivalent sensation. “How sensitive were you? Before your injury?” She blurts out.

His lips part, and he’s very close. “Fairly.”

Another tightening, a jerk, and she grabs his shoulder, flailing, in some strange fear. “Did you ever dive into a ley stream?” The words are torn from her, even then they make little sense. “Did you ever tap into too much magic that you weren’t supposed to grasp?”

A minute widening of his eyes.

“Did you ever plug into something and know, just know, that it’s too strong for you?” It tightens, vicious, cutting off her words with a squeak.

She fights against it, clawing up at her neck, before Gurlien catches her hand, holding it tight.

“Yes,” he replies strongly. “Yes, I know what that’s like.”

It’s still too taut for her to speak, so she struggles, before it loosens just a bit.

“It’s like that but around your neck.” It closes again, a vicious jerk, and her mind blacks out, her back arching off the bed.

Before Gurlien’s hand around the leash tightens, and he slams his hand against the bed, crashing her back down into the room with him .

She gasps, the air torn out of her lungs, and pain snaps down her back.

Gurlien grabs her shoulder, pinning her down, and that touch will do nothing if they try again, will do nothing against their pull. “I got you, you’re here,” he says, serious, and her whole body shakes against the bed.

Another attempt, slicing through the skin on her neck, and Gurlien grips the leash just as tight back. She sputters, choking on the leash, on blood welling up in her throat.

But his hand on her shoulder digs in, as she jerks with another attempt, fear coating her blood and pumping through her veins like acid, washing through her stomach and her lungs.

“You’re okay,” he murmurs, after a keening noise tears from her throat, and she’s manifestly not, but she turns her head towards him on the bed, the shaved side of her head gross with sweat against the pillow.

She blinks at him, and her eyelashes stick together.

He’s pale, a grim determination in his jaw, and she’s close enough to see the small variations of colors in his eyes, the flickers of lighter brown and even green.

They stare at each other, in the silence after the attempt, the only sound Ambra’s harsh breathing.

His lips part again. “Did I hurt you?”

It’s so laughably wrong that she huffs out, her throat raw.

“You’re bleeding,” he says, serious, because of course she is. “Your neck, your eyes, and your mouth. And nose.”

She lifts a shaking hand to her mouth, dabbing and coming away with a black smudge.

He’s still gripping her shoulder, still pressing her into the bed, and a rush of gratefulness floods through her.

“You…” she rasps, before she coughs, the taste bitter .

“I’m okay,” he informs her, holding up the hand with the leash. “This wasn’t…this was okay. I didn’t hurt you?”

He’s shaken, too.

Not trusting her voice, she shakes her head.

“Are they about to try again?”

She has no way of knowing, no way of predicting, but the leash is slack against her stinging neck.

“I don’t think so,” she manages out, her voice wrecked, and he releases her shoulder, a sudden lack.

Sitting up, suddenly terribly far away, he swings his feet over the other side of the bed and pads to the bathroom, emerging with a wet washcloth.

“Sit up,” he orders, and even though there’s no compulsion, she shakily pushes herself up.

Blood, hot and sticky, trickles down her shoulders, and some is smudged on the pillowcase.

He sits next to her, his knees touching hers, and carefully wipes under the leash. “So this is just abraded, I think,” he murmurs at her, as if the injury is just as mundane as a skinned knee in a child. “This should be easy to heal.”

It will be, but her fingertips tremble as she reaches up to slide her hand under the leash.

The very skin is hot to the touch, slick with sweat, and it mixes with the blood.

“Oh,” he murmurs, at something he sees in her face, at the trembling of her hands, at the shivering of her shoulders. “That took a lot out of you.”

Her breath hitches, and he’s not wrong.

She’s weak. She’s so weak the body fights her in staying upright, wanting to just slump over and for her eyes to close. Her stomach roils, simultaneously empty and full of bile, and she doesn’t know if she could even hold the glass of water still enough to take a sip, to wash out the taste of her own blood in her mouth.

All because the College wanted her again. Wanted to claim her, to shove her in a stasis chamber and never let her out. Wanted to take her from this small, carved out pocket of comfort and place her in the unending brightness and volume of the jail cell.

All because they couldn’t let her just live.

“Here,” he murmurs, and gently, as if she would break from something so small as a touch, wipes the blood streaked down her cheeks.

Her eyes blur, and to her horror, she’s crying.

She’s actually crying, her lungs hiccuping with the effort, her throat closing up until a sob wrenches its way out. She’s crying, sitting there on the blankets from the condo, on the too large bed, and no matter how much she wrestles to get the body under control, no matter how much she tries to stop these somehow automatic functions, the tears spill down her face, almost as hot as the blood.

Not saying a word, Gurlien shifts closer, then wraps his arms around her shoulders, pulling her into a tight embrace.

She slumps forward, pressing her face into the crook of his shoulder, as if that could stop the tears falling from her.

It doesn’t, and her shoulders shake with the effort.

Almost idle, Gurlien rubs a hand against the middle of her shoulder blades, and it sets off another wave of horrid, gut tightening sobs.

The College couldn’t just let her go. They saw the carnage and wanted her back. They saw the threat she wrote into the very magic of the room and decided that meant she was still theirs. That they had to keep her. That they had to pull at her to the point of pain, to the point of cutting into the body, instead of letting her have some peace.

Cutting into the body, the very body they had forced her into and then killed off her only companion. Harming the very place Ambra is forced into, the very vessel she can never leave and the constant reminder of everything she lost.

“It’s okay,” Gurlien says, almost clinically, placing his chin on top of her head, and she clings to him like he’s the only thing keeping her afloat. “You’re okay, you’ll be okay.”

She won’t be, but she lets her hands fist into the back of his shirt, as if the touch could somehow make his words true.

“They didn’t get you, we kept you here, you’re okay,” he repeats, and this close, she feels the rumble in his chest at his words.

He brushes some of her hair back, still in the hug, and she squeezes her eyes shut at the sudden shock of emotion that wells up at that motion.

“Why am I crying,” she mumbles, keeping her face pressed against his shoulder. Her throat is somehow even more raw than with the leash, and her head starts to pound, her pulse loud against her skull. “This is stupid, why am I crying?”

It’s not stupid, she knows that even as she says it, but the lack of control aches at her behind her breastbone.

“Well,” Gurlien drawls, as if this is a normal conversation and she’s not tucked against him. “I’d put my money on an intense situation, physical pain, fear, and still not knowing how to process those in this body. Yet.”

It has the intonation of an insult, but he’s not wrong, so she lets herself be lulled into silence, the exhaustion so heavy that if she releases her grip on Gurlien, she’s certain the weight of it would press the body into the bed and never let her go.

“Have you cried before?” he asks, which isn’t helpful. “I’m not talking about tears. I’m talking about actually sitting down and crying.”

“I know the body did,” Ambra replies truthfully, before pulling herself away. “More than I knew why.”

Shakily, she reaches for the glass of water, and it’s cool against the fingertips.

Gurlien watches her like a hawk, and there’s a smear of her blood against the collar of his undershirt.

“Crying is one of the ways the human body processes stress chemicals,” he says matter of factly. “Yes, it’s emotions, but it’s biological. You’ll be dealing with it again and it won’t be some sort of failing.”

That helps, so she nods, washing the blood out of her mouth with a grimace, and weighs getting out of the safety to make her way to the shower. To get the blood off of her, to focus on healing the skin on her neck and the stinging in her eyes while under hot water. To peel off the sweaty clothing sticking unpleasantly to her skin.

“Tell me,” Gurlien starts, and all her attention snaps to him, laser focused, “what exactly were they trying to do?”

He’s rubbing his hand along his wrist, right where the leash is still tied.

“They tried to take me,” she murmurs. “And you stopped them.”

“More specific,” he requests. “Were they trying to gain control? To force you to teleport to them? What was it?” At her blank look, he sighs. “I want to get familiar with the specificities. So I can block them better.”

“Teleport,” she replies curtly, putting her own hand on the leash and tugging it slightly, to generate the sensation on him. “Like snapping a rope around a dog.”

He blanches but recovers well, ducking his head. “They call you that?”

“When they called me anything at all,” Ambra replies darkly.

He watches her, like he’s debating telling her something, and she can’t parse it together. Her curiosity worn out by the competing pulls against her neck, all her brain seems to be able to do is just…spin.

Ambra stands, testing her weight on her knees, and they wobble annoyingly.

“My head hurts,” she announces, as authoritatively as she can. “My head hurts and I feel so completely gross.” Completely undercutting herself, she scrubs at the tears on her cheeks, and her face is still too damp.

“I’m not shocked,” Gurlien replies, then rubs his own forehead, grabbing one of the protein bars. “Eat something?”

That sounds like the worst possible idea, and she scowls at him, before something twists inside of her and she sighs, bracing herself on the bed so she doesn’t slump forward.

“Thank you,” she says, and there’s something horrible about it, about once again finding weakness. “Thank you. You…you saved me. I think.”

His lips part to respond, but she turns on her heel and all but stumbles towards the shower.