by Casey White
Daniel smiled faintly. “Yeah. I like you too. But-”
“So I’d feel kind of like a dick if your leg started rotting and fell off. I’d kind of like to keep liking you.”
“Leon, it’s fine,” Daniel said. “I’ve been teaching myself how to do things for centuries.”
Leon’s shoulders slumped—but Daniel saw his eyes roll. “You always have to pull out the age card, don’t you?”
“True is true.”
With a final sigh and a grumble, Leon dropped the stack of books alongside the bench. “Fine. There they are. Are you happy now?”
Daniel snorted, reaching for the one on top. “Sure. Now...you should get reading, too.”
He hadn’t missed the book Leon had shoved into his pocket, and he didn’t mistake the look that passed across his face. “I guess,” Leon mumbled. “I just...yeah.”
More than anything, Daniel wished there was a way to take it all back. To take the book away, and the magical gift he’d unwittingly shoved on him, and to just...walk away from it. To leave Leon in peace.
He couldn’t, though. And so he forced himself to open the first book—a field guide on treating open wounds—and look away from Leon. He’d find a way to make it up to him, but...later.
The chapters stretched out before him. Daniel buried himself in the words, taking in the sutures and splints and the proper way to pack a wound. Within moments, he might as well have been in a different world.
Even if his eyes were occupied, dragging most of his thoughts along for the ride, a constant storm of deeper worries whirled in the black of his mind. Leon was right—he did need a hospital. Even if he could learn all of this, it wasn’t like he’d be in a place to act on it. The moment he opened his eyes, he’d be right back in Maya’s car, bouncing down the road at eighty miles an hour.
Going to a hospital would require having a story to tell them and the time to heal, neither of which he had. He couldn’t afford to lay down somewhere quiet and open for Indira and her goons to find him again. The hospital was out.
The idea of stitches, he dismissed just as quickly. There were too many problems for that to be viable. They’d be difficult to administer to himself, and there’d be too much risk of getting it wrong. He had no way to clean the wound, and even with his rudimentary knowledge he knew you didin’t want to trap a burgeoning infection inside.
Besides. He smiled tightly, turning another page. They had neither needle or thread, and nothing to sanitize either with. No, it wouldn’t work.
If he couldn’t use stitches, then he’d have to-
“Jesus Christ,” he heard Leon mutter. His friend sounded...strained. Enough so that Daniel tore his eyes off the book, glancing over to him.
“Something wrong?” Daniel asked.
Leon shook his head. He paced back and forth across the entryway of the hidden basement, his book open and raised. “O-Oh. You know. Magic lessons, dead mages. The usual.” He grabbed the pipe he’d unceremoniously jammed back through his belt. “I’m getting instructions on this thing.” For an instant, a smile tugged at his lips. “It’s kinda handy for it to come with a manual, at least.”
“I bet. And?”
Leon’s nose wrinkled. “I think I’m starting to get it.” The pipe waved through the air as he gestured, his nose still buried in the text. “This thing is the source of my magic. Apparently it’s called either a relic or a focus, and we’re called demibloods. Demis, for short.”
“That sounds familiar,” Daniel hazarded. If he stretched his memory, reaching back to his own research on the matter, he could remember something pretty much like that.
“Fucking stupid name,” Leon said, his expression darkening further. “Demis? Demi what? What are we partway to? It doesn’t make any-”
“Leon.”
Leon rolled his eyes, coming to a stop. “This is mine,” he said, gripping the thing a bit more tightly—and that ghostly smile reappeared on his face. “It says I’m on my own for figuring out my powers, since they’re all different. Oh, and if I put this bastard down, I die.”
Daniel stiffened. “W-What?”
“You heard me.” Leon’s hand dropped, his knuckles gleaming white around the metal rod. “Not immediately, but within a couple days. What the actual fuck?”
“Well,” Daniel said, swallowing. “Don’t, um. Don’t put it down?”
“I got that much. Loud and clear.” Leon slipped the pipe back into the pocket of his jeans, letting his head roll back. “This is just a lot,” he whispered.
Daniel closed his book slowly, laying it flat across his lap. “I know,” he said softly. “I’m sorry. Maybe- Maybe, when this is done, we can find a way to turn your magic off. Take it away, without-”
“Can’t do that, either,” Leon said with a laugh. “It’s pretty fuckin’ clear, Daniel.”
“Oh.” What did you say to that? All Daniel could do was nod, letting the silence hang between them.
Finally, when Leon’s shoulders started to loosen, and he began his pacing again, Daniel set his book back on top of the stack.
Like lightning, Leon whirled. “Are you done? What are you-”
“I’ve got all I can use, I think,” Daniel said. “It’s not like I have a ton of choices, after all. Let’s, ah…”
He reached out, grabbing for the knot holding his bandages tight.
Leon darted over, grabbing hold of his hand before he could undo them. “Daniel, don’t mess with those. You’re still-”
“I’m fine,” Daniel said, smiling crookedly. “Alex is keeping the worst of the pain off, I think.” Whatever paste she’d given them, it’d worked wonders—as long as they didn’t try to go climbing any staircases, that was. He smiled thinly. “This isn’t even real, anyway. It’s in our heads, right?”
Not that he wanted to die. But he could at least look, couldn’t he?
Pulling away from Leon’s touch, he worked his fingernails into the knots, loosening them one after another. “That medicine has been on it for a good few hours,” he muttered all the while, making a face as one of the knots fought him. “It should...be-”
With a final rasping of fabric, the bandage slid loose. “Okay,” he said, exhaling. “Let’s see what we’re dealing with.”
“Why?” Leon said. He crouched beside Daniel, frowning. “Why do we have to undo all my hard work? Just leave it be.”
Daniel let his hand rest on his leg, locking eyes with Leon. Even despite the chill of the paste smeared all over the wound, he could feel the pain sparking back to life at his touch. This was going to hurt. “Because I already told you. This isn’t a real injury here. I...should be fine. Even if we have to play around a little.” His smile went wry. “And because if we need to try this a few times to get the hang of it, I’d rather do it here, where Alex can give me a hand in the painkiller department.”
Leon’s brows pulled together. “I-I guess, but-”
“Out there, it’s going to be worse.” Daniel kept his voice low. He needed to be calm, here, if he wanted Leon to be calm. This was confusing enough for Daniel, and he wasn’t the one trying to deal with a magical gift piled on top of the bloodshed and fear. “We’ll be moving. And...I won’t have Alex’s help. I want to show you, so you can remember. Just in case.”
Just in case. He’d have laughed, except it’d ruin all his hard work in staying calm. He could pretend that he’d be the one doing all this, but in the end, he’d need the help of Leon and the others. It was all but a certainty.
When Leon fell quiet, not protesting further, Daniel started to unwind the bandages from around his leg. One soft white strand of gauze after another fell to the bench, toppling to the floor. Spots of red-brown stained them. The farther he went, the less they were ‘spots’—and the more it became simply the color of the cloth.
“Y-You probably won’t have proper bandages or anything,” Daniel mumbled, keeping his eyes on the injury. “You’ll have to-”
“I think I can handle ripping u
p some shirts,” Leon said, sighing. In the blink of an eye, he was there, his hands pushing Daniel’s aside. “That’s what people do, isn’t it?”
“I guess.” Daniel sat back, letting Leon work. “It’s just- Just keep it in mind.”
Another twist, and the last of the gauze fell away. Daniel’s head swam at the sight. Alexandria had given them medicine, but only just—dried blood still caked around the wound, and even if the edges had started to heal, the gouge torn through his calf was...well...it a sight. He’d never been one to have a weak stomach at the sight of blood, but it was different when it was his leg laying there ruined, instead of a photo in a medical journal.
“You really need surgery,” Leon said, his face as pale as ever. “Like, seriously. We can try to patch it up, but we need to get you to a hospital, and-”
“How are we going to explain it?” Daniel whispered. “What, are we going to say I accidentally shot myself? Oh, I know, we can say you shot me on accident.” He shook his head. “What kind of idiots would believe something like that?”
“W-Well, I’m magic now, right? Maybe I could-”
“It’s too risky,” Daniel whispered, leaning back against the wall. His head pounded. “Even if we could convince the hospital, with those people still looking for us...no.” He clenched his fist, a lance of pain rippling through his gut as Leon prodded. “I’ll...I’ll figure something else out for the long-term. Let’s get through the now.”
“...I guess. If you say so.”
“I do,” Daniel whispered, grinning. It only looked a little like a grimace. “Now, uh. There’s a curtain over there.”
Leon stood with a final, weary look at Daniel—and then his gaze turned to the elegantly-woven fabric in question. His lips curled up. “Sorry, Alex,” Daniel heard him say.
The ripping of cloth filled the air a moment later.
Pack the wound. Pad it. Wrap it—tighter. No part of it was terribly complicated, when push came to shove. But with both of their hands covered in blood and every twist filling Daniel’s limbs with agony, it was still harder than he’d expected. He kept a smile on his face as best he could, refusing to let Leon see how much it hurt. This was just the warm-up, the dress rehearsal.
The bullet hadn’t gotten lodged in him. That was the single positive he could think of. Even his painfully basic medical knowledge had given him plenty of insight on how bad an idea digging the bullet back out of his leg would be, but the idea of spending the rest of his life with a hunk of lead inside him was equally unappealing.
He’d been almost fast enough. He stole glances now and again before the wound vanished entirely behind scraps of deep blue and silver embroidery. The shot had torn clear through the back of his leg, but it could have been worse. Much worse. He’d spend the next few weeks limping, but it hadn’t hit an artery. In the end, that was the best he could hope for.
By the time they finished, Leon’s shirt had soaked clear through with sweat, and Daniel knew he didn’t look much better. But the wound had vanished, tightly wrapped in whatever usable fabric they could find.
Overhead, the winds hadn’t stopped shrieking since he unwrapped the bandage. Daniel leaned his head back again, flashing an exhausted smile toward the ceiling. “Sorry,” he whispered. “I know you gave me better medicine. I just...needed to figure this out.”
“She mad?” Leon tossed the last of the fabric aside, sitting on the other end of the bench.
Daniel shrugged. He eased himself straight, turning until his leg dropped from the padded fabric and his heel hit the floor. They needed to be moving, not lazing around. “I guess,” he said. “You know how she is. It’s not like she tells me what she’s thinking.”
“But you can tell.”
A chuckle burst from his throat. “Can’t you?”
“What, you mean the fact she’s screaming like a pissed-off cat, and the whole place feels more like a haunted house than a library?” Leon snorted. “I’m getting the message.” He lifted his chin, mirroring Daniel’s searching of the rafters. “Hey, Miss Alexandria. Sorry. We’ll get out of your hair in a little bit. Please don’t eat me?”
“She’s not going to eat you,” Daniel mumbled. “She only eats people she hates.”
“W-Wait, what?” Leon said, twisting back to face him. “She eats people? Daniel, I was joking.”
“Eh. Anyway, we should-”
“Eh?” Leon’s voice rose sharply. “This is a bit more than an ‘eh’ moment.”
Daniel laughed, but his thoughts were drifting away, turning sour. Alex only ate people she hated—but while he’d been certain that she liked Leon, now, he wasn’t so sure. She’d put him here at his side, like some kind of matchmaking old biddy, but...that was when Leon had been fully human. He wasn’t, anymore. So much had changed.
Now, all he could see was Alex pinning Leon in the door. She’d stood against him once. What was to say she couldn’t do it again?
His eyelids drooped, wobbling lower. “I-It’s fine,” he whispered, rubbing at his face. “We...We should go.”
“What?” Leon said from alongside him. “Go where? What, uh. What did you have in mind?”
Daniel shook his head. His lungs ached with a yawn that fought to escape. He pressed a hand to his face instead, trapping it inside. “We...We’re still in trouble. They’re out there. While we’re here…”
“We should take it easy.”
“We should make the most of the resources we have,” Daniel said, casting a sidelong glance toward Leon. His vision blurred. He blinked stubbornly until it cleared. “There’s a fight coming. Out there. We should...We should-”
“Okay, I amend my earlier statement,” Leon said, arching an eyebrow. “You should take a nap.”
“Damn it, Alex,” Daniel muttered. He wasn’t enough of an idiot to wonder at his sudden exhaustion—although given everything they’d been through over the last twenty-four hours, it’d make sense for it all to be catching up with him. “I don’t- I’m not tired. I’m just-”
“Don’t be an idiot.” A hand landed on his shoulder, firm without being rough. In the time it took for him to make an irritated noise, Daniel found himself yanked back down to the padded bench. “We’ve got all the time in the world, right?”
“W-We should…” Daniel gave up fighting, letting a yawn burble past his lips. “Look up Indira. Her friends. Olivia. And...those mages. What they-”
“Demis,” Leon said, pushing him flat. “Remember? Look at everything I’m learning.” Something settled under Daniel’s head—a wad of the unused fabric, Daniel realized. The warmth of Leon’s leg pressed up against his scalp, reassuringly steady.
He tried one last time, even when faced with the inevitable. “B-But, I...I should-”
Leon waved The Basics back through his sight. “I’ll keep reading this,” Daniel heard him say. “Maybe I’ll figure something else out. And you, make the most of the downtime. Okay?”
“Ass,” Daniel mumbled. His eyelids drooped lower still, heavy and irresistible. It was Alex’s doing, he knew. She’d decided he’d pushed too hard, and that was where his own input ended. Fighting it would be useless. He’d learned that before.
This time, though...He smiled faintly, turning just enough to pull his leg to a more comfortable position. Leon’s chuckle filled his hearing. They had all the time here they could need.
So why should he bother fighting?
“Just for a bit,” he whispered. Even he could hear the words come out a muddled, nonsensical mess.
He was gone before he could try again.
- Chapter Twenty-One -
The mounds of books stacked around them wobbled, teetering ominously.
Daniel leaned back, taking his eyes off the pages before him for a minute. His fingers squeezed against the bridge of his nose, trying and failing to ease the ache in his skull. When he woke up, he’d found that Alexandria had stuck a table into the corner of the room—which they’d immediately claimed, heaping it full of all t
heir findings. It’d seemed so easy, then. It’d seemed like just a matter of time until they’d have their answers.
It was proving to be anything but.
“You finding anything else?” he said.
“What?” the books said.
He leaned forward far enough to see Leon, still completely absorbed by The Basics.
That was all. He waited, staring—until after another moment, Leon blinked. “Oh. I mean- What?”
Daniel chuckled. “Just wondering how it’s going.”
“Oh.” Leon wrinkled his nose. The book sank a few inches towards his lap. “I don’t know,” he mumbled. “It’s a lot of information, but...at the same time…”
“Not enough?” Daniel’s heart sank.
Leon nodded, his eyes still downcast. “It’s all good, but...It’s not what I need, y’know?”
“Yeah.” There had to be some way to straight all this out. Some way to help. “Sorry.”
“It’s not your fault,” Leon mumbled, and then sighed. “I’d just like to know what I can do to help. I figured, if there’s magic out there, someone’s got to have a clue what kinds of things you can do with it.”
Leaning back, Daniel fished for one of the books he’d set aside—the one marked with a too-familiar pipe on its cover. “I was looking,” he said. “About your pipe, and- Well, about what the other people who owned it could do. Their magic sort of works along similar lines, right? And, well, it says the past owner could do temperature regulation, so maybe…”
He trailed off, watching Leon’s face go stormy. There’d been more, of course. It’d told him the past owner’s name had been Marv. He’d been born in Texas. He’d had a brother, and he’d only gotten the pipe a year and a half ago. None of that information would help Leon, and so he damn sure wasn’t going to burden him with it, but...he couldn’t quite get the words out of his mind.
