Page 120 of Demon's Bane

“Your maj—”

“Please,” he brushes aside the formality. “No need for the title.”

He glances at Joan, and that same damned look I’m becoming so familiar with spreads over his face. Some terrible mix of worry and pity and sympathy. Something I don’t want to see on another face so long as I live.

She still rests. By all indications from Vayla and Soleil, she’s doing as well as could be expected, her vital signs strong.

Not that those assurances do a damn thing to make me feel better.

Eren clears his throat. “I come with news from your village.”

“What is it?”

“It’s your sister.”

For one terrible, world-tilting moment, I’m certain he’s about to tell me Halla is dead. Help did not arrive in time. I failed her just like I failed—

Eren must see some of that devastation break across my face, because he gives his head a sharp shake and a strangled noise of protest lodges in his throat.

“Goddess, I should have led with this, but she’s awake. Has been for a few hours now.”

I’m on my feet before I’ve fully thought through the motion, but as soon as I rise, a terrible pain cuts straight through the center of my chest.

My mate laying still and sleeping. My sister injured and awake.

My two worlds tearing at each other.

Eren rests a hand on my shoulder. “Joan is well cared for here. Between Vayla and Soleil, she’ll be alright for an hour. Come, after receiving word from my commander, it’s clear I’m due for a visit there as well. We’ll go together.”

He makes a certain amount of sense. With no change in Joan over the last day and nothing I can do here to hurry her waking, with my head swimming in exhaustion and the bone-deep need to see for myself that Halla is alive, I nod slowly.

“A few minutes,” I relent, even as unease roils in my gut at the idea of leaving Joan for a single second.

Eren nods as well, gesturing to the door, and I follow him on unsteady, uncertain feet, feeling with each step like I’m leaving half my soul behind.

39

Joan

Light flickers behind my eyelids and the soft murmur of voices coaxes me up out of the darkness.

I blink, then blink again, trying to make sense of where I am. The room I’m in is dim, unfamiliar. I prop myself up on an elbow and—

Memories come rushing in like a flood.

Sharp and crystal clear, I see David, Tyvar, the Veil. The flash of silver in the moonlight. Pain and darkness and…

Everything after that gets fuzzy, but I look left, then right, searching for the strong, steady presence that’s been by my side the whole—

“You’re awake!” Vayla pauses mid-stride in the doorway, then calls back over her shoulder. “She’s awake! Go get Allie.”

Crossing to my bedside, she checks my pulse and asks if I’m in any pain. When I say I’m not, she lifts the bandage on my shoulder gently and grins at me.

“Looks like you’ll survive, then. The poison that wielder—”

“Joan!” Allie is next into the room, tripping over her own feet as she swoops down like she’s going to dive right on top of me.

At least until Vayla’s arm shoots out, stopping her in her tracks.