Page 31

The Healing Center is, but it isn't, what you would consider a modern medical center in the traditional sense or those seen in the human world.

Yes, there were a few trained medical doctors, nurse practitioners, and nurses on campus just in case something happened that thaumaturgic healing needed assistance with; allopathic medicine. But mainly the Healing Center was more like a spa that catered to thaumaturgic and hardcore homeopathic healing. They offered services like acupuncture, chakra aligning, crystal therapy, massage therapy, yoga and tai chi, and mental health counseling.

However, what wasn't advertised on the brochure of services was the restricted healing pools that were reserved for critical injuries and injured Royals; they were housed in the basement.

The mud is disturbing in my opinion. I had seen healing pools before, and had been in one when I was younger, but refused to use healing mud again after that incident; I didn't like the way it made me feel, and the fact that you have to sit in them naked creeps me out and makes me question hygiene and if they are to health department code or not.

Thaumaturgic mud looks like gritty chocolate pudding, and it smells salty but sweet at the same time, almost like saltwater taffy that is way too sweet. It feels like gritty pudding, too, but with an unimaginably annoying constant transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation that gets stronger and stronger the longer you are in the mud until you can't take it anymore and crawl out of the pool to get away from it.

At least that was my experience.

Since no one was at the reception desk, I signed in and helped myself to a dressing room key.

After grabbing a towel, I closed the curtain behind me.

"I really don't want to do this," I whispered, looking at my reflection in the mirror. "But he isn't giving me a choice... Damn it," I huffed, slipping out of my hoodie.

Once I stripped down to my panties, I tossed my hoodie on the floor; it was soaked with blood from the stitches I ripped out.

Yes, I needed healing.

With open wounds, you have to put this gelatinous blue salve on them before getting in the mud. It protects the wound but supercharges the thaumaturgic powers of the mud to heal the wounds with deep tissue damage. Bones are harder to heal, and usually, the mud doesn't touch the more severe breaks unless there are open wounds so the mud can access them, in a sense. That's why I was in traction after falling out of a tree instead of being submerged in healing mud...

That, and I didn't want to be submerged in mud and give up control of the mud.

As Viggo said, a person has to want to be healed. If you don't want to be healed, the mud won't heal you.

It's the whole freewill thing.

After an hour or two in that bubbling gunk, there, in theory, should be no scars or pain left.

Only the nightmarish memory will remain.

I looked myself over in the mirror.

"Shouldn't I keep these scars as a permanent reminder of the travesty that took place in Seattle, of the dozens that were killed, that lost their lives, and for what?" I asked. "Aren't I plagued by enough nightmares already? Do I need to add more to the ever-growing list of things tormenting me?"

I didn't revel in killing the Upír that I did, or the facilitation of the execution of the Sentinel that was being controlled by a Stregone; in fact, I refused to talk or think about it.

It is what Sentinels and Guardians do, and I accept it because that is what I am training to be, but taking a life is taking a life. The only thing getting me through this is Harper's strange words of wisdom: 'Kill them before they kill you, Love.'

The wall-length mirror in the dressing room decided for me, and it quickly ended the war with my conscience.

I'm not narcissistic by any means, I knew I was unique and beautiful in my own way, but the reflection looking back at me wasn't something that I ever wanted to see again.

Down my back were four sets of deep purple and black claw marks that went from the tops of my shoulders to the tops of my hips. The purple and red marks on my neck were swollen and looked terrible.

I had never seen anything so disgusting in my life. Even the disfigured Upír I stabbed beyond recognition didn't look this bad!

My complexion was pale, I had dark circles under my eyes, my hair had lost its shine and vibrancy and curl, and my lips were split and cracked...

I looked like the walking dead.

Female emotions got the best of me and I started crying.

I cried because I looked like a scarred-up monster.

I knew from my studies that these types of scars would continue to look like this because they don't heal like a simple cut or abrasion, and they would always bleed soul-deep. These are inflicted by those who embraced Devilry; their effects are permanent on the skin, a constant reminder of their power and strength, and a permanent reminder of your failure, one I refused to be haunted by any longer.

It took more than twenty minutes to compose myself.

When I was slightly more coherent, I slipped out of my panties before I wrapped the towel around my body and then walked down the hall to the stairs.

I hope a Practitioner is working tonight; I don't want Viggo to see me like this, to see me weak and broken, disfigured and monstrous.

And I was crying again.

I paused inside the stone arch entryway that led to the underground pool area and allowed the horrible salty-sweet smell to assault me, clearing away my vanity-induced outburst.

The pools and area were empty of patrons and the Attendant and Practitioner were nowhere to be seen.

I guess the curfew applies to everyone when a threat is perceived.

Viggo was sitting on one of the lounge chairs by the closest pool, a small table next to him with a jar of that gelatinous blue salve and some sterile medical instruments on a metal medical tray. His back was to me, but he knew I was there.

"I was wondering if you took off," Viggo eventually commented.

"We had an agreement," I reminded him.

"We did," he agreed, but his tone made it more than obvious that he didn't want to uphold his end of it.

"Is there a nurse or something?" I asked, shuffling my feet as I went, trying to prolong the evitable.

I already knew the answer, but I had to somehow verbalize how I was feeling about this without straight out saying it.

I was unbelievably nervous to let Viggo see me like this.

"No, but I have done this before. I assure you I will be gentle," he said, motioning for me to join him on the lounge chair.

Reluctantly I did, and sat next to him, hiding my neck with my hair.

Viggo turned his body to face me, but I kept my eyes down because I didn't want Prince Viggo de Babineaux of all creatures to know that I had been crying.

"All will be well, Ariadne," he promised. "It is going to be okay, and in a couple of hours it will be a distant memory."

"I know," I whispered then clenched my eyes shut and turned around so my back was to him before I released my towel then hugged it to my chest.

Viggo gasped, and it made me shy away from him.