Page 25 of Fated in A Time of War
“So you don’t die stupid,” I say, and let my mouth hitch toward a smile that isn’t humor. “So the child I’m trying to save doesn’t lose both his chances today.”
That lands. He flinches, barely, an electric twitch under scales.
“Thirty seconds,” I say again. “Count to thirty out loud if you have to. Growl it for all I care.”
He stares at me like I’m the cliff and he’s the tide deciding whether to break. Somewhere high above, someone shouts “Clear!” and a drone whines in the wrong direction. My heart hammers hard enough to shake my ribs.
For the first time since he threw me over his shoulder in the ruins, he doesn’t push me aside.
He stands there, imperfectly still, heat licking through the narrow space between us, and lets me be the one who doesn’t move.
He finally lowers himself to the damp floor, a grudging collapse that sounds like surrender even if it isn’t. The tunnel wall takes his weight with a groan of ferrocrete and rust, and he sits there, bleeding into the dust. His eyes stay on me, unblinking, daring me to waste the time he thinks we don’t have.
I kneel in front of him. The stink of iron is thick—hot and raw, like a forge gone sour. My hands hover for half a breath before I force them to move. I can’t hesitate. Not with him letting me close.
“Hold still,” I murmur. My knife flashes dull silver in the green-glow light as I cut away the shredded edge of his chestplate. The blade scrapes against the cracked plating with a sound that bites into my teeth. Beneath, I peel back the broken harness until muscle and scale are laid bare.
He’s torn open along the flank. The scales there are cracked, edges lifted like shattered glass. The skin beneath is slick, blood pulsing in thick ropes. It isn’t human blood—darker, heavier, syrup that clings to my gloves and shines like oil. But it’s blood all the same.
He flinches when I press around the wound, jaw ticking. “Don’t?—”
“I’m not asking permission,” I cut in, calm, steady. My voice has to be the rock here, not the quake. “I need to see how deep it runs.”
His breath growls through his teeth but he doesn’t shove me off. His claws curl into the dirt. His restraint feels louder than any shout.
I reach into my pouch, fingers finding the small vial of emergency nanites—tiny, humming things suspended in nutrient gel. Next, a pouch of crushed herb that smells sharp, bitter-sweet, like scorched mint and pine resin. Ataxian coagulant. Contraband to the Alliance, but I’ve carried it for years. Old remedies don’t ask which flag you bow to. They just work.
I mix them in my palm, the gel fizzing faintly as the powder eats its way through, releasing a sting sharp enough to water my eyes.
“This will burn,” I warn, and smear it directly into the wound.
He jerks, muscles bunching under my touch. His eyes flare like twin suns, teeth bared in a snarl—but he doesn’t shove me away.
“Breathe,” I say softly. My hand presses firm against his side, holding the mix in place as it bubbles and seals. “In. Out. Same as me.”
“I don’t—” he starts, voice breaking into a hiss as the nanites take.
“Then pretend,” I say. “Pretend you do.”
For a heartbeat, his breath syncs with mine, ragged but there. My pulse slows to meet it.
The wound starts to close—clots forming faster under the nanite-herb mix, scales knitting with an unnatural shimmer. The bleeding doesn’t stop entirely, but it stutters, slows.
“Better than bleeding out on the floor,” I murmur.
He snorts, a rough half-laugh. “Better than being patched by an Ataxian priestess? Doubtful.”
“Not priestess,” I correct gently, dabbing excess blood away with a scrap of cloth torn from my hem. The copper scent mixes with the herb’s bite until the tunnel tastes like medicine and death. “Healer.”
He studies me, eyes narrowed, but doesn’t argue further. Maybe because he can feel the way his body’s not unraveling anymore.
Silence stretches. Not the comfortable kind. The kind that’s raw, heavy with things neither of us can say.
So I fill it. Not with talk of war—that’s a chasm we’ll never cross. But with what comes after.
“When this is done,” I whisper, binding the dressing tight against his side with tape, “people will need more than soldiers. They’ll need someone to grow food again. To rebuild walls. To teach children. To… remember what quiet feels like.”
He scoffs, a rough sound in his chest, but it isn’t sharp. It’s worn around the edges, tired.
