My Familiar Stranger (39 page)

The next morning he woke lying on his back. The first thing he did was turn his head to look at Elora. She was turned facing him, eyes wide open and staring back with irises the cold color of translucent ice blue. Shocking to look at and frightening in implication.

He worked to keep his face passive as the urge to panic sent the painful tingle of adrenaline pumping through his body. He was so glad he wasn’t hooked up to a monitor.

His heart wanted to believe that the figure lying in the bed next to his was Elora Laiken, but the person looking back at him had the eyes of a vampire. The incongruity was confusing as hell.

She didn’t appear to be gripped in the mindless blood lust common to new vampire, which was hopeful. He reasoned that, if she could converse, she was still in control even if infected.

“Hey,” he said quietly.

“Hey,” she whispered in a rough voice. “Are we alive?”

He was so relieved his brain sent a jolt of thrill chemicals through his system to mix with the adrenaline creating an even more uncomfortable stinging sensation, but his only concern was for the crystalline-eyed beauty on the other bed.

“Seems we are destined to die of old age, you and I.”

“What fun would that be?”

Ram opened his mouth to speak, but felt a burning behind his eyes and his vocal chords didn’t respond. Finally he was able to get out, “Lots.” Swinging his legs toward Elora, he sat up and slid off the bed revealing a remarkable set of male genitalia as the front opening hospital gown stayed at his waist. But that was not what caught Elora’s attention.

“Rammel. Oh, gods no, Ram! What’s wrong with your face?”

He was so focused on the issues involved in possibly being mated to a vampire that it took a second to realize she was talking about his injuries.

“Well,” he smiled, which hurt his face, “I guess I’m no’ so pretty anymore.”

Then she remembered seeing the slashing descent of a knife, the blood, his head hitting the wall, the fear of losing him. Tears overflowed Elora’s eyes and ran onto the pillow.

“Let me see.”

He hesitated, then decided she would imagine worse if he didn’t show her. So he opened the blue cotton gown.

She stared at the damage looking like her heart would break, transfixed by the sight of a wayward line of stitches that started at his left cheek bone and continued down his chest, close to one nipple, ending just above his waist.

When he retied the gown she said, “Yes. You are, Ram - so pretty.” Her beautiful bottom lip trembled as she battled catches in her breath that sounded like a series of little sobs. “Beautiful inside and out.”

He had to swallow hard to get past the lump that had formed in his throat. “Please do no’ weep, Elora. Great Paddy, you will make me bawl as well.”

He stepped closer to the bed so that he could cup her cheek and brush tears away with his thumb.

“I’ll be right back.” He shuffled his way to the door slowly, not bothering with the wheel chair, and paused once to look back before he slipped out.

The nurses were surprised to see him out of bed and on his feet without assistance. He spoke quietly, leaning over the station counter. “Get the docs on duty here right now. Be quick about it and quiet as you can be.”

Accurately reading the urgency and demand in his tone, one of the nurses jumped up from her wheeled desk chair sending it careening into a cabinet as she started away.

In his peripheral vision Ram caught movement at the door to Elora’s room. A nurse was going in to perform some routine task on her rounds. He flew toward her with no concern for either his stitches or the pain, grabbed her arm, and mercilessly jerked the poor woman back hard enough to cause a bruise.

“No one goes into her room until I’ve talked to the doctors.”

The nurse rubbed her arm with wide eyes and backed away just as the doctors arrived.

“Sir Hawking, why are you out of bed? What is the emergency?” Seeing the look on the nurse’s face one of the doctors said, “Now look here. You have simply got to stop terrorizing the staff.”

Ram pulled them aside and indicated they should lower their voices.

“Somethin’ is wrong with Lady Laiken. I want you to look at her. I think Monq should be called in as well. Her eyes have gone… pale.

Be sure that you do no’ show surprise when you see her. She does no’ know anythin’ is wrong. Do no’ alarm her in any way.” He glanced at the nurse. “And make sure that every person in this fuckin’ place knows that no one else is to enter that room other than her doctors, Monq, Sir Storm, Sir Caelian, or me. Unless I say so.”

While Ram waited, he used the time to call Storm from the nurses’ station phone. Then he called the Operations Office and instructed them to procure the biggest bouquet of stargazer lilies, Mexican red roses, and tree fern that could be reasonably accommodated in a hospital room. He added that cost was not a consideration, but time was and that he wanted them delivered as fast as possible. “Oh, and no baby’s breath.”

What to put on the card? There was a pause while Ram struggled to compose himself. When he was sure he could keep his voice steady he replied. “Proud to be your partner.”

When the doctors emerged, they looked grim and agreed that Monq should come up as this was a development outside their experience. Or anyone else’s for that matter.

When Ram got Monq on the phone he said, “Come to the infirmary right away. Whatever you’re workin’ on is no' as important as this. Hurry. Please.”

As Ram put the phone down one of the doctors noticed that his color was not good. A nurse was instructed to get a wheelchair quickly just as Ram started swaying on his feet. He grunted as the doc caught him around the waist to keep him from falling and tearing stitches and tried to hold him up until the chair arrived. The doctor, not used to lifting two hundred nineteen pounds of well-muscled elf, was red faced, straining and wheezing by the time someone came to his aid to help ease Ram into the chair.

Monq rushed off the elevator and was ushered directly into one of the offices where Ram was waiting. The doctors who had seen Elora reported what they did and did not know after which Monq wheeled Ram back into her room.

“Look who I found outside,” Ram said mustering as much brightness as he could.

“Good afternoon, Ms. Laiken.”

“Lady Laiken,” Ram corrected.

Elora opened eyes that were eerily striking, eyes that might even be beautiful in an exotic, other worldly sort of way. If they belonged to someone else.

“Hi,” she replied with a little smile. “You gonna tell me what happened, Monq?”

“I think that can be arranged. Let me take a look around first.” He reached for her face and she slapped his hand away. “My dear, in addition to the other bullet points on my phenomenal resume, I am a medical doctor. My interest is purely clinical.”

Elora looked at Ram for confirmation. He nodded, then wheeled around saying he would wait outside. When the door closed, Monq withdrew a flashlight and shined it in each eye. Then he asked her to say “ah” as subterfuge so that she wouldn’t question why he was also looking at her gums. He took a glance at the wounds on her abdomen carefully keeping his expression blank.

“Are you experiencing any pain?” he asked.

“Uh, yeah.”

“How bad is it?”

“I don’t know how to answer that.”

“We usually use a scale of one to ten.”

Elora’s brows drew together. “I still don’t know how that works, Monq. My ten is slipping dimensions in an experimental device that skinned me alive and turned me into dog chow. Somebody else’s ten might be a paper cut.”

“Very well. Use your own words.”

“I need drugs. And somebody to tell me what happened.”

“Alright. I’m going to chat with your doctors on the way out. Your little elf friend will be right back in to answer your questions.”

“My little elf friend?” She snorted. “I dare you to say that to his face!” Monq smiled. “So what’s all the secrecy about? What are you not telling me?”

“That you’re going to be back on duty in no time at all, strong and healthy as ever. I’ll be back to see you tomorrow. In fact, maybe we’ll have a session right here since you’re practically tied down.” She groaned.

Outside Monq told Ram that he and his assistants would put everything else aside to run tests. The nurse would be in to draw blood in a minute and he would let Ram know as soon as he had something to tell.

“She needs to be kept as quiet as possible. Rest can only do her good, but she’s probably not going to settle down until somebody fills in the blanks. I told her you would come back in and answer her questions.”

He held the door open so Ram could wheel himself back in. After briefing her, Ram gave permission for Elora’s friend, Elsbeth, to act as Elora’s nurse. She came in carrying a protein drink for Ram with a pink straw and a no-nonsense insistence that he would be drinking it. For Elora, she brought an affectionate smile and some apparatus for withdrawing blood.

“What’s that for?” Elora wanted to know.

“Routine tests.” Elsbeth was so nonchalant that Ram concluded she was either a very good friend or a passable actress. “Are you hungry?”

“No.”

“Your doctors say you can have anything you want. Hot chocolate? Brownies? Hot fudge sundae?”

“No. Thank you though.”

“If you change your mind, use the call button.”

“Okay.”

After she pulled the door closed there were no excuses left why Elora shouldn’t hear what happened. He sat on the side of his bed facing her.

“What do you remember?” Ram asked.

“After I was sure that Kay had you and there was nothing more I could do, Baka and I started after the vamps. We were about ten minutes into the tunnel when I realized he wasn’t with me anymore. I turned around. His face was frozen in the strangest expression… I started back to see what was wrong and then he fell to the ground. When he went down, Ghost was standing behind him holding a dart that was aimed at me. I thought maybe I could outrun it. There wasn’t anything else to try. I knew he would pin me before I could get a stake out of my boot and the gel in the pistol wouldn’t have any effect on him.

I turned and felt the hit and went down pretty fast. I had a minute to regret going back for Baka. I remember thinking I didn’t want you to have to go through losing another partner. That’s it.”

Ram sighed heavily. “Whatever I add is second hand because I was no’ there. I’m repeatin’ what was told me by Kay and Storm.”

He covered Baka’s plan to bury the nest and destroy the hidey holes in one stroke.

“Of course everyone’s priority was you. Baka insisted that there was no’ enough time for standard search procedure. He remembered that you had asked for his shirt to train Blackie for trackin’ vampire. Storm thought it might be a long shot, but had Sanction bring Blackie and a shirt from your hamper. The dog, Elora - your dog - was nothin’ less than amazin’. They said they could no’ have found you in time without him.”

Big tears starting running down her face again. “Come now, darlin’ girl, you know everythin’ turned out right ‘cause here you are. Alive to hear the tale.

Anyway, Blackie led Storm, Kay, Sanction, and Baka straight to you. Ghost had left you shackled and locked away for two hungry vampire. You were bitten.”

Suddenly Elora dragged in a gasp and looked at Ram with wild eyes. When she could speak she whispered, “Vampire…”

She choked and tried to sit up. Ram stood, stepped to the bed and used the built in motor to quickly raise the back so that she didn’t have to struggle upright, then put a box of tissue on the bed where she could reach it.

“They were touching me,” she said with a shuddering breath and a look of vulnerability that leveled him, “and…“ For a few seconds her face froze into a silent cry of horror. “...biting.” She looked down and began frantically shoving the bed covers away so she could she what had been done to her.

“No!” Ram grabbed her wrists to restrain her, but thought better of it after a few seconds. He decided it was not in her best interest to tax her strength wrestling with him. Eventually she would have to see.

All modesty forgotten she pulled the hospital gown up and away so that she could see her legs and abdomen. Ram smothered a gasp of his own. If watching her act out her terror wasn’t enough, seeing her beautiful body torn and savaged in this way pitched his emotions straight to a place past fury; that place where rage overlaps insanity.

He was irrationally angry at his teammates for killing Gautier Nibelung without him. He wanted the personal satisfaction of squeezing the foul spirit out of him with his bare hands and cursing it into the abyss from which nothing returns.

When Elora saw the red, swollen bites, gouges, and slashes covering her torso and thighs, her first thought was that she was looking at someone else’s body. It took a few seconds for her mind to catch up and adjust to the idea that the grotesque flesh was hers.

She sat up, pulled the gown down, and wept. Ram reached for her not caring that it pulled at his own stitches to do so. He angled his body so that he could sit on the side of her bed and hold her in his arms. He couldn’t change what was done, but he could be her rock, the one who would always be there to give comfort.