Page 134 of Grave Situation

Before Peiris can answer,the sound of Jaimin shouting my name carries to us, and our new companion raises a brow.

“Your friends?”

That answers the question of whether they’ve been watching us since we arrived. “Yes.” I raise my voice. “We’re over here!”

Peiris steps back, and I half-raise my hand to them, then gasp.Fuck, that hurts.

Arimen gasps. “Talon, you’re bleeding!”

“It’s fine,” I lie. I’m not looking at my arm. Tia told me once that wounds hurt more when you look at them, and she’d know more about it than I do.

“She did,”Leicht agrees,“but that doesn’t make it true.”

Ignoring him as the sound of running footsteps echoes closer, I look at Peiris. “Please don’t go. I have the st— the wellspring here.” My good hand fumbles with my shirt, but it’s not easy to get to the pouch one-handed. Peiris seems uncertain but doesn’t leave, to my great relief. I’m not in the mood to chase them all over the city, especially given their fighting ability.

“Talon?” Jaimin and Coryn race around the corner and skid to a stop, taking in the scene before them. Coryn raises his sword, and Peiris’s swings up in response.

“We’re all friends!” I shout. “We’re— Ow!” In my haste to stop any maiming, I automatically lifted my wounded arm. It was a mistake.

“You’re hurt.” Jaimin pushes past Coryn and stretches an arm toward me. Even before he reaches me, the pain in my arm lessens, and finally, I glance down at it.

My knees wobble just a tiny bit. That’s alotof blood. And, oh fuck, is that white thing mybone?

I swallow down bile and look away. Jaimin takes gentle hold of my elbow and wrist, and the pain disappears entirely, but I keep my focus on Coryn and Peiris while he heals me.

“No fighting,” I say firmly. “Peiris, meet Coryn—and this is Jaimin, healing me. Peiris saved us when the zombies got the upper hand.” My ego doesn’t like to admit that I was losing the fight, but I was losing the fight.

“Thank you, Peiris. It’s nice to meet you,” Jaimin greets them. “You’ll have supper with us this evening, won’t you?”

I slide him a sideways glance, but he’s still looking at my arm. My plan was for Peiris to join us, of course, but I don’t know where Jaimin thinks we’re getting food for another mouth from.

“I can bring you a goat,”Leicht suggests.“But you’ll need to carry it down to wherever you’re cooking. Unless you want me to drop it? That would tenderize the meat.”

“No, thanks. Also, could you not talk about dropping things and tenderizing meat? I’m trying not to throw up right now.”

“That’s very kind of you,” Peiris replies politely, not committing either way.

“I like your hair,” Coryn tells them, then turns to me while they’re processing that. “How many came for you? We only had four, and Jaimin sensed them before they were close.”

“I counted nine before I didn’t have time for counting anymore. But I think there were more.”

“Many were already burning before I reached you, and I accounted for six,” Peiris puts in. Coryn frowns.

“That’s more than they sent last time. Were any of yours living? Ours were all—” He stops abruptly, gaze slicing to Peiris, who doesn’t seem at all surprised.

“Undead? It was hard to miss the way amputated limbs kept moving.”

I file away the information that they’re not distressed by the presence—or existence—of zombies. We can talk about that later. “I don’t think any were alive. They were all completely silent, and their faces looked… vacant.” I grimace. “But I stopped paying attention after the first minute. I was just burning anything that came at me.” My knees wobble again. I’ve used a lot of magic today, plus Jaimin’s still healing me, which means my injury was serious. That’s going to eat up energy too.

“Ours were all zombies too,” Coryn confirms. “I cut them up as much as I could before we came looking for you.”

What a delightful thought. “Let’s go, then. It would be bad if they crawled off before I can burn them.” I’m not even sure what would happen.

“It’s not as though they can reassemble,” Peiris says calmly. “They’ll just return to the mage who raised them and likely be burned. Nobody wants a disassembled body roaming around.”

Jaimin’s hands tighten on my arm. “You seem to know a lot about this.”

“Peiris is the person we came here to meet,” I interject. “I was just about to show them the stone.”

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