Page 76 of Swords of Soul and Shadow (Gate Chronicles #3)

With that disturbing thought, Kase made himself look forward to his training that afternoon instead.

Hopefully, he could convince whoever he needed to let them outside.

With the greenie Laurence Hixon still unable to use his legs, he only had two other greenies to train.

He thought he could swing a little practice on the Cerl hover, if he was lucky.

Maybe he could convince Hallie to come along.

He wanted to show her more about the hover, and she’d probably want to sketch and study it. She was a scholar, after all.

He smiled to himself. How had he gotten so lucky?

They entered the next cavern and passed a group of soldiers chatting with a few medics, preparing to aid some of those in the upper tunnels for movement to the city.

The hospital ward looked the same as he’d left it three days prior, overflowing with the injured and overworked medics and nurses.

He wasn’t sure just how they were able to handle the swell in patients.

The chorus of moans and curt instructions inundated his ears.

He wove his way around the men and women and children laid out in varying states of distress.

Medics and volunteers with sweaty faces and haunted eyes bustled from person to person trying to make sense of the mess they still found themselves in.

Had there been another attack? A cave-in? Or something else?

He tried not to look too closely, but a few patients had what looked like black spider webs crawling up their arms. Not many, but enough for Kase to shift away from them. It was clearly contagious, and nothing Kase wanted to catch. He hated spiders.

Kase’s own brow dampened in the compact quarters. The atmosphere wasn’t ideal for him, nor the patients laid out in rows. He kept his eyes open for the pretty redheaded scholar. She’d told him she helped out here every day.

When he didn’t see her anywhere, he began to lose hope that she was there at all. Surely that meant nothing sinister. He was about to give up when he spotted Zelda. She’d tied on a medic apron and was wrapping a man’s ankle wound.

He shouldered his way past a few family members surrounding a young girl whose arm lay at an odd angle. Kase looked away hastily. At least it seemed to be the worst of her injuries. A broken arm could be fixed.

Zelda tied off the bandage on the man’s ankle and looked up. Her eyes narrowed, and Kase itched to run a hand through his hair. He glanced back at the guard trailing him through the ward.

Zelda ignored Kase and spoke to her patient. “If you start running a fever in the next few hours, you come right back here.”

The man mumbled something back, getting up off his makeshift chair of an overturned bucket and hobbled off. Zelda dusted her hands off on her apron.

“I’m in need of a salve,” Kase said, holding up his wrapped hand. The sock was now a deep red from where he’d kept his fingers tight around it, but it looked like his hand had ceased bleeding.

Zelda stared at him hard. “We don’t have time to deal with minor injuries.”

Sergeant stood a short distance away, having fought his way through the crowds.

He still looked ready to flay Kase alive if he did anything that would jeopardize his well-being with the Stradat Lord Kapitan.

Kase flicked his gaze back to Zelda and leaned in.

“Listen, I really need to speak with Hallie. It’s urgent. ”

“Miss Walker, you mean?”

Kase clenched the sock bandage. “Yes, I mean, I’m looking for Miss Walker. I need to speak with her.”

Zelda raised a brow and shot back, “Did you get into an argument?”

Confusion molded Kase’s features. “Argument? No.”

“Then why is she in such a foul mood?”

He hadn’t said anything in his note to offend her. She’d replied, but it hadn’t been anything special, just a note to say she would see him when he was done with his house arrest and that she was helping out where needed.

Granted, it was him. Kase was highly aware of his specific set of skills that riled her, but if he’d upset her somehow, it had been unintentional.

He was certain if he had said something untoward, she would have called him out on it.

Maybe it was because he hadn’t sent another note?

He probably should have. He’d written to her in the journal several times over the course of the last few days but had only sent the one.

“I’m not sure what you mean, Mrs. Walker. I haven’t spoken to her in person since the other day.”

“She’s in the supply tent.” Zelda fixed him with a steely stare so sharp it could’ve cut him open.

“You may have won over my husband, but if you do anything to hurt my daughter before we leave…” She took the small set of shears from her apron and pointed them at him.

“I know how to bake the most delicious pastries without anyone being the wiser as to what might be hiding in them.”

“I’m sorry?”

It wasn’t even the threat of poisoning him or the shears pointed at his chest that made him step back. Hallie was leaving?

“What do you mean, before you leave?” he pressed her again. “They’re not supposed to let people above the surface until the day after tomorrow, and that’s only an estimate.”

Kase’s trip to Kyvena only proved how dangerous it could be outside the city.

“I don’t trust you one bit.” Zelda started walking past him, but stopped at his shoulder, looking up, her face stone-like. She tapped his shoulder with the shears. “However, I’m giving you one chance to make it right, because you saved my life and my husband’s. I’d advise you not waste it.”

She left it at that and disappeared into the throng. What in the world had happened in the last few days? And how could he make anything better if he didn’t even know what he’d supposedly done wrong?

He wound through the ward, asking one of the haggard nurses where he could find the supply tent. One patient, an elderly man who had a bandage over one eye, grabbed his hand. “Are you Kase Shackley?”

Kase paused. He wasn’t sure which would be better, to not answer at all or say yes. The man was already in the hospital ward, possibly even missing an eye. Would anything Kase said make it better or worse?

He gave him the ghost of a smile. “Yes.”

The man’s dark eyes lit up. “Did you really take out those Cerl machines?”

“I did.”

The man’s chin wobbled. “Thank you.”

Not sure what else to say, Kase gave the man a nod as his neck burned. How funny life was. A year ago, praise like that would’ve had Kase tugging on his jacket and puffing out his chest. It’d have him bragging to anyone who would listen that he was simply the best pilot Jayde had.

Now, he was the only pilot Jayde had. The only qualified one, at least.

A few other wounded cheered him as he passed.

One man, a medic with blood staining his apron, stopped and actually saluted him.

He weakly returned it. He hadn’t realized how fickle the populace was.

He hadn’t gotten into the hover intending to change their minds—only wanting to save them.

Honorable, he guessed, but he hadn’t realized the effect it would have.

The few days since also allowed the rumors to grow even more. The attention embarrassed him a little.

Kase of old would laugh at him now and call him weak.

Before he knew it, the supply tent stood before him in all its run-down glory. It was white and thin and could probably be described more accurately as what used to be a tent. The entrance fluttered in an unseen wind. His guard followed silently behind, though with an annoyed look on his face.

Kase took a minute to adjust the sock on his hand. No one had offered to clean and wrap it with a proper bandage. Too busy to notice the blood, he guessed. It stung when he moved his hand.

Still a stars-idiot move, though it’d gotten him here.

What would he say to Hallie? He’d come here to help him process everything, that her wisdom and advice was the one he valued most, but after his conversation with Zelda, his anxiety had ticked up at least two notches.

Maybe Hallie’d found out about the card game.

Could he explain away his loose words? What excuse could he pull?

None. But then again, how would she have found that out?

Eravin wouldn’t know who she was…wait, no, he did know.

He’d known enough about her to threaten her before he’d left Kyvena.

Waylan knew her from the University, and that red hair and those beautiful golden eyes would stand out amongst any crowd.

But would they run into one another down here? What were the odds? The Catacombs were crowded—too crowded. Besides, what reason would they have to tell her about what happened the other night?

He was being paranoid. His guilty conscience was simply getting the better of him. But he had no reason to even feel guilty, right? He’d defended her honor. She would appreciate that, wouldn’t she? That is, if she ever found out.

And he wasn’t planning on telling her anything. For now. She had enough on her plate.

Wait.

Zelda. Zelda must’ve told her. But her mother didn’t know everything. Only that Kase had showed up at her tent drunk and with busted knuckles.

Which was apparently enough to warrant telling her daughter he was trouble.

Kase wasn’t sure he disagreed with her, but he would’ve liked to have been the one to explain to Hallie what happened…in a few months. When this was all over.

But what if he was wrong? What if it wasn’t his fault at all?

Plenty of other things could’ve happened in the past few days.

They were in the middle of a war, hiding underground with no idea when everything would go back to normal.

How self-centered was Kase to imagine only he could possibly frustrate her?

He was just better at it than most…well, that, and Zelda seemed to think he was at fault.

“You’re wasting my time, Pilot Shackley.” Sergeant’s gruff voice grated on his nerves.