Storykiller (22 page)

“We have to get you to a hospital,” he said.

Snow shook her head. “The Scion will be fine if you can slow the bleeding.”

Brand and Micah looked at her, her eyes fluttering, her face flushed, and she continued. “Superfast healing comes with the superhero package, just slow the bleeding and she’ll be fine. I promise.”

“Oh yes, a promise from you—” Brand began but Tessa cut him off.

“Give her a break,” Tessa said wearily. “She did good
.” Micah and Brand looked at Tessa, perhaps to check to see if she was delusional.

“She doesn’t have a scratch on her Tessa, she’s covered in
your
blood,” Micah said to Tessa, a bite in her voice. Tessa tilted her head back and pressed on her wound.

“Trust me. In fact, Snow—” she looked at her, beautiful despite being wounded and nearly unconscious,
in the kitchen chair. “What do you need, what can we do?”

Snow blinked at Tessa dreamily. “Have your minions draw me a cold bath, Scion.” She blinked again, her eyes fluttering. “You should see me in the winter. I am magnificent in the win—” And then before she could finish the sentence,
she slumped out of her chair and onto the floor, passed out, somehow still looking elegant.

“Pfft,” Brand said waving a dismissive hand at her theatrics. But Tessa pressed him.

“No, something’s wrong with her,” she insisted, even as her vision swam. Brand crossed to Snow and touched her cheek. He drew back in shock. “What?” Tessa asked, “Cold?”

“No, she’s burning up,” Brand said, holding his hand as if he’d been burned.

“Well, that can’t be good,” Tessa said,
before she too passed out, everything going black.

When Tessa woke up, she was on the couch in the living room, a blanket laid over her. She had a brutal headache, but she felt strong again, unlike how she had in the moments before she passed out. Tessa raised her arm and found it well bandaged. She touched her shoulder and neck and found the same. Though both injuries throbbed lightly, they were a dream compared to the pain she remembered before passing out. Snow must have been right about her healing ability. Asleep in a chair across from her was Brand. Tessa didn’t see Snow or Micah but there were lights on upstairs, so she threw back the blanket and followed the light. The light in the master bathroom, accessed only through her father’s bedroom, was on. When she got there, she found Micah hovering over Snow, still unconscious, but naked and submerged to her neck in the big bathtub. Micah jumped at the sight of Tessa and then breathed a sigh of relief.

“Thank God you’re okay,” she said, and went to hug her, careful of her bandages. When they broke apart, Micah cast a worried look at Snow in the bath. “I don’t think it’s working,” she said, her brow knitting in concern. Tessa reached down and felt Snow’s cheek. It was dangerously warm. Tessa touched the water, which was cold but could be colder.

“Let’s try this,” she said, and unstopped the tub, turning the cold water on to let it run. She looked around the room. “Hold on,” she said. When she came back five minutes later, she was balancing two pair of socks, two sweatshirts, a blanket, and two big bowls of ice. Micah raised an eyebrow at her in confusion as Tessa closed the door behind her and put towels at the base of the door to stop any air from escaping. “I turned on the upstairs air conditioner and shut the vents in the other rooms,” she explained, handing Micah a sweatshirt and a pair of socks. “It’s about to get very cold in here.” Tessa dumped the ice into the cold running water and pulled on her own socks and sweatshirt. Then she sat next to Micah, both of them huddled under the blanket,
on the cool tile floor and watched Snow for signs of life.

“By the way,” Micah said, “I’m pretty sure Brand’s going to wake up in love with her.”

Tessa smiled and cocked her head. “Why’s that?”

“Turns out it’s harder than it looks to get an unconscious woman out of a skin tight leather catsuit. I needed help,” she said. Tessa tried to keep a straight face and then burst out laughing. Micah tried to resist but failed, joining her. “I thought his eyes were going to fall out of his damn face,” she said between peels of laughter. After a few minutes,
they caught their breath and resumed stoically watching Snow.

“Nothing on Robin and Fenris?” Tessa asked. She had avoided the question as long as she dared.

“No,” Micah said. “Not yet.” She reached out for Tessa’s cold hand and held it. After perhaps ten minutes, and with both Tessa and Micah’s teeth chattering thanks to the icy conditions they had created, Snow finally let out a soft moan. Tessa and Micah shot up as if one.
Tessa reached out to feel Snow’s forehead, which was cool, bordering on cold. She looked back at Micah and smiled optimistically.

“I think she’s out of the woods.”

Snow slitted open just one of her eyes. “I’m never going back to the woods again, Scion. Not least in this godforsaken climate.”

Tessa smiled. The bitch was back. And it was good.

Tessa left out some fluffy towels for Snow as well as clothes that would be at least three sizes too large and also be nothing she would want to be caught dead in (which Tessa had to admit was half the fun). Micah searched the house for more ingredients to make an actual meal since it was well past time that any restaurant in Lore would deliver food, while Tessa woke up Brand to see what they’d found in their witch research. Brand showed her their list of witches, now totaling twelve, and Tessa sighed at the futility of the effort. They hadn’t found any connections to the Troll; the research was far too broad. How on earth would they find what all of this meant? But just as she was lamenting it, Brand turned everything around.

“Well, I mean, I guess maybe it’s too obvious, but aren’t we talking about something very specific now?” Tessa looked at him blankly. “I mean, ‘Franken-Dogs’, that’s what you called them. Is there a reason we think we’re not dealing with Dr. Frankenstein?” Tessa looked at him stupidly for a moment and then jumped onto him with a full body hug.

“Ohmigodyou’reagenius!” she shouted. Tessa released Brand and he sat back up, dazed. Superpowered full body hugs were no bullshit. “I can’t believe I didn’t realize it. Of course! Dr. Frankenstein!” Tessa shouted. Brand shrugged nonchalantly but was clearly pleased with himself. As Tessa got up to tell Micah, the front door sailed open and Robin walked in. Tessa’s heart leapt and she threw herself into his exhausted arms, not caring about anything except that he’d come back, and in one piece, mostly. He hugged her back, one hand on the back of her head, drifting into her hair, his face buried in her shoulder, as hers was in his. It was the kind of hug people write cheesy movies about. Full of promise and genuine affection, things to come, other things better left unsaid. Robin stroked Tessa’s hair and breathed her in.

Things happened so fast.

As they separated,
Snow came down the stairs, somehow looking herself despite the Halloween costume that were Tessa’s shorts and Oxford sweatshirt, both of which she was swimming in.

“Snow,” Robin said, nodding his head at her in acknowledgement.

“Robin,” Snow said, doing the same.

“Wow, you guys really bonded on that death-defying mission,” Micah said from the kitchen doorway, rolling her eyes.

Tessa looked between Robin and Snow.
“Baby steps Mike, baby steps.”

Snow cast her eyes at Brand and Micah. “Thank you, minions, for reviving me. I…I owe you,” she said. Tessa could see the sentence was painful for her. Micah smiled and waved a spatula in a gesture implying it meant nothing, and Brand looked at his shoes and seemed to wish himself into the hardwood.

“No, uh…no, uh problem,” he said. The group moved into the kitchen to tend to Robin’s wounds, and Micah shooed them over to the kitchen table away from the food, which was pancakes and which smelled amazing. Snow sat in a chair at the table. Brand perched nervously on a stool as far away from Snow as possible. Tessa pored over the first aid kit for things to patch up Robin’s injuries, which were many, but none as significant as Tessa’s had been.

“Any sign of Fenris?” Tessa asked, as she wrapped Robin’s hand in thin white gauze.

He shook his head. “Are you okay?” he asked her as if she was the only person in the room. Tessa nodded.

“I’m fine.”

“Yes, yes, we’re all fine here. Thanks for caring,” Snow said waving her hand around, annoyed. Robin bit his tongue, likely remembering how useful Snow had been mere hours ago.

“We have an idea about who might be behind all this,” Tessa said, and looked to Brand.

“Dr. Frankenstein,” Brand supplied. Robin sat back in his chair, chewing on the idea.

“Makes sense,” Robin mused.

“But it doesn’t fit with magic,” Snow said, pressing her lips together in thought. “Dr. Frankenstein is science, not magic. Magic and science are, of course, more related than most realize, but not The Doctor. Magic feels
wrong
for him. Perhaps the two events are unrelated?”

Tessa chewed on her lip. “It’s possible.” She looked dejectedly at her friends, lost and tired, hurt and confused. Robin spoke up.

“Can I have pancakes?”

The absurdity of their lives must have hit each one of them in that moment because they burst into laughter. Even Snow smiled, sort of. Micah began doling out plates of the fluffy, golden-
brown discs and started another batch. They ate in blissful silence for whole minutes before something crashed powerfully against the front door.

Tessa reached out her hand for the magic axe. “La Colombe Noire!” she shouted, and the now familiar crackle and pop of energy flashed, followed by the axe snapping powerfully into her hand. Micah and Brand gasped at the sight and the group, following behind Tessa, moved toward the doorway. As they turned the corner, the door fell open and a massive Franken-Dog was quite literally thrown through the doorway. Micah and Brand both shouted out in relative terror, but it didn’t move. A moment later, Fenris, injured and completely naked, stumbled through the doorway. Tessa dropped the axe and ran to him. She got under his shoulder just before he lost his footing. He looked up at her, his eyes still piercing but strangely unguarded for the first time. They took her by surprise.

“I have an idea,” he said, and then collapsed, the full weight of him surprising her. As he lost consciousness, he shifted and Tessa found herself trying to hold up a ten-foot unconscious
wolf in her foyer.

Robin ran to Tessa and helped lift Fenris. Together they half-carried, half-dragged the unconscious wolf to the couch. Realizing there was no way he would fit, Micah and Brand moved some chairs away and they laid him on the floor. He was leaking blood all over the hardwood, but it was impossible to see where his injuries were beneath his thick grey fur.

“He’s HUGE,” Micah said, staring at Fenris and then looking from face to face in the room, hoping for some acknowledgement of the very obvious fact. Tessa looked up at Snow and Robin.

“Why did he shift?”

“It’s his natural state,” Snow said. “He can’t maintain a human form without exerting his will, at least not naturally,” she added. Robin nodded in agreement.

“We can’t fix his wounds like this, I can’t see anything!” Tessa said, holding a hand against an area that was bleeding badly and pulling at the dense fur helplessly.

“We could completely shave him,” Snow offered brightly, already chuckling at the idea of an embarrassingly hair-free wolf version of Fenris. Tessa and Robin both shot her looks that said ‘shut up’ and she grumbled something about how she was only joking. Micah went to the kitchen and brought back the first aid kit, which was getting slimmer by the moment. Tessa nodded at her to set it down but then saw what she had in her hand.

“That could work,” she said, nodding at Micah.

“What?” Robin asked.

“It’s smelling salts. It could wake him up, so we could work on him,” Micah said, showing him the bottle.

Snow shook her head, “But he’ll be disoriented and still a wolf. He could kill us all.”