Page 25 of Panther in the Shadows
"Bullshit." She moves past me, heading for the main room without waiting for permission. "Where's your first aid kit?"
I follow because arguing with her seems pointless, and honestly, my shoulder feels like someone poured acid into the wounds. "Pantry. Left side, third shelf."
She opens the door and stops. Just stops and stares.
The pantry is larger than most people's bedrooms. Walls lined with wine racks holding bottles that cost more than cars. Spanish reds from vineyards my family used to own. Rare vintage whiskeys in crystal decanters. Shelves stocked with ingredients most chefs never touch in their careers. White truffle oil. Saffron threads worth their weight in gold. Aged balsamic that predates my exile.
And on the third shelf, wedged between a bottle of 1947 Château d'Yquem and a tin of Caspian caviar, sits my first aid kit.
"You live like this?" Her voice carries something between disbelief and understanding. "Down here where no one sees?"
"I see it." I lean against the doorframe, watching her take in the wealth I never display above ground. "That's enough."
She reaches for the first aid kit but pauses, fingers hovering near the vintage whiskey. "This must have cost..."
"More than it should." I shrug with my good shoulder. "But it's mine. Earned it myself. Not inherited, not stolen. Every bottle, every luxury. Built from nothing after exile took everything else."
She looks at me differently then. Seeing past the crime lord to something underneath. Then she grabs the first aid kit and closes the door. Sets supplies on the counter with efficient movements. Gestures to the chair. "Sit. Shirt off."
My panther purrs at the command, responding to the authority in her voice despite everything she's been through tonight. Strength that doesn't break under pressure is rare and valuable.
I sit. Peel the shirt off slowly because the fabric has dried to the wounds in places, and tearing it free sends fresh fire through my shoulder.
Moira hisses through her teeth. Four parallel gashes from collarbone to shoulder blade. Deep enough that white bone shows in places. Ragged edges that speak to claws tearinginstead of cutting clean. And the skin around each wound carries an oily black discoloration that shouldn't exist with shifter healing.
"How bad?"
"Bad. This is necromantic corruption. It's fighting your healing. Poisoning you slowly."
"Can you fix it?"
"Maybe." She wets a cloth with water from the blessed container she packed. "This will hurt."
I set my jaw. "Do it."
She presses the cloth to the worst gash. Salt water mixed with something older floods the wound, and the burn that follows makes my vision white out for three seconds.
She works in silence. Cleaning each wound with blessed water that sizzles when it touches corrupted flesh. The black discoloration retreats slowly, fighting every inch, leaving pain in its wake that would have normal men screaming.
Panthers don't break. We endure. We survive. We heal.
The salt water does its job. Gradually, the corruption pulls back. The oily sheen fades. My shifter healing finally catches hold and begins knitting torn muscle.
"There." Moira sets the cloth aside. "It'll scar, but you'll live. Try not to shift for a few days. Let the tissue solidify before you put that kind of stress on it."
"Thank you."
She starts gathering supplies. Cleaning up. Moving with the exhaustion that comes after adrenaline fades and leaves nothing but bone-deep weariness. But she's stalling. Cleaning up to avoid stopping, to avoid being alone with what happened.
"Sit." I gesture to the other chair. "Tell me about the boat accident."
She freezes. "What?"
"The boat accident. Your sister drowned. Your father too, based on what that thing said." I keep my voice gentle. As gentle as someone like me gets. "Someone has been binding Elspeth's spirit for a long time. Feeding on her terror and suffering. Using your failure to save her as the foundation for whatever they're building now."
Moira sinks into the chair like her legs quit supporting her weight. Stares at hands that still carry traces of her sister's corrupted magic. "I was thirteen. Elspeth was eight. Mum had been gone for two years by then, so it was just the three of us. Dad took us out on the boat to fish. It was tradition. Every autumn, right before the storms came, we'd go out together."
Her voice goes distant. Hollow. Reciting facts instead of feeling them.
