Page 250 of Psycho Beasts

The girls scrubbed the blood off Aran’s skin, and Jax wrapped belts around her limbs to stop the blood flow.

Her chest kept moving, but she was glacier cold.

Xerxes stopped pouring liquid down her throat and started stabbing her with various needles.

Jinx helped Ascher pull out bullets.

Glass from the window breaking had left long gashes across her body. Jala, Cobra, and Jess stitched them up.

Warren handed over supplies, wet rags, and drugs as Xerxes shouted at him to grab things.

Exhausted from using my powers, I could do nothing but lie among the carnage, praying that my friend would be okay.

Hours passed.

Aran’s condition didn’t change.

I stared down at her face, willing her to wake up.

I swore at her. Called her every dirty word I could think of. Promised to hunt her down in the valley of the sun god if she dared leave me.

Warren said something about the ball coming up.

I screamed expletives at him until he paled and said nothing of it again.

Xerxes kept working, injecting and stabbing her, ordering maids to get different drugs from the store. They came back with bags full, and he mindlessly stabbed her with needles.

Ascher pulled out bullet after bullet, working at an exhausting pace, refusing to stop until the hundreds of shards had been removed from her flesh.

Aran didn’t wake.

Time ticked by faster.

I got light-headed, sweat pouring off my face and blurring my vision, as I used my blood powers for far longer than I should have.

Everything cramped, and the world spun around me.

If there was any truth to the third trial, we needed the brothers.

I didn’t release them.

There was a long, ragged breath, and someone hacked aggressively.

I turned my head to the side in slow motion, body like a starfish across the bloody foyer, toward my best friend.

Aran’s blue eyes were open, and she was coughing.

For the first time, tears leaked out of my eyes, and I choked on a shallow sob. I’d never known such relief.

There were no words for the sensation slamming through me.

I crawled toward her, sobbing.

The girls cried with me.

Tears streamed down Ascher’s face.

Xerxes helped Aran sit up, all of us wincing at her mangled state, the holes that still were gaping across her body.

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