Page 158 of Alchemised
Helena forced a laugh. But the tension, the new undercurrent between them lingered. It was Lila who spoke next.
“You know, you can talk about—anything with me, if you want.”
“No,” Helena said. “I don’t need to talk. There’s—no point in talking, and as I have now been reminded publicly, I’m not a fighter. I don’t know anything about what war really is. So—what would I even have to say?”
Lila’s prosthetic leg clicked as she shifted and then said, “I think the hospital’s worse than the battlefield.”
Helena went very still.
“I realised it when I was in there for my leg.” Lila’s gaze was faraway, eyebrows furrowing. “At the front—everything’s so focused, you know. The rules are simple. We win some. We lose some. You get hit sometimes. You hit back. You get days to recover if it’s bad. But—” She looked down, her fingers tapping absently along the place where her prosthetic was joined to her thigh. “—in the hospital, every battle looks like losing. I can’t imagine what that’s like.” She looked at Helena. “All you see in there is the worst of it.”
Helena said nothing.
Lila sighed and unclasped more pieces of her armour, leaving them all over Helena’s bed. “When Soren told me what you said—I don’t agree, but I get it.”
Helena didn’t answer.
Lila nudged her with her elbow and stood. “Even if the trainees are just because of Matias’s meddling, I’m glad you’re getting more time off. I think you’ve needed that—some space from it all.”
CHAPTER 31
Aprilis 1786
FERRON WAS WAITING FOR HELENA WHEN SHE opened the door. The room had been cleaned, the floor, table, chairs, all spotless. Not even a trace of blood.
His mouth was set in a taut line as she walked in.
As she closed the door, he shrugged off his cloak. “Let’s see how you fight, Marino.”
He lunged so fast, his body blurred.
There was no time for Helena to go for her knife. She swung her satchel at his head.
It bought her a split second, but he snatched it out of midair, ripping the strap from her fingers, and threw it across the room.
She heard the glass vials shatter as she scrambled away. There was nowhere to run.
The door was too complicated to unlock.
She managed to get to the other side of the table, trying to create a barrier between them.
He kicked the table. The legs screamed across the tiles as it flew towards her. She dove. The table struck the wall so hard, the top split.
She hit the floor, her left hand bending the wrong way, a bone in her wrist cracking against the stone. Pain exploded up her arm.
She cradled it against her chest, trying to scramble to her feet.
“Ferron, stop!”
He didn’t stop. He grabbed her by the throat and shoved her against the wall, squeezing. His expression was void of emotion.
She clawed at his grip with her uninjured hand, fingernails carving grooves into his skin. She tried to knee him in the groin, and he kicked her foot out from under her and brought her to the floor.
The force knocked her breath out. She saw stars.
He pressed his knee into the middle of her chest, bearing down enough to make the bones strain. “Anything?”
She couldn’t breathe, her lungs spasming. She writhed, trying to twist out from beneath him, scrabbling at every part of him that she could reach.
