Page 83 of Healer to the Ash King
“But I want to see the other matches.”
“Go. Healer’s orders.”
Grumbling, she shuffles unsteadily toward the arena exit.
I turn back to the fight just in time to see a bloodied Teagan plunging her knife into Beaori’s breast.
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Teagan halts mid-stab, bloody spit flying through her clenched teeth with every hissed breath. She’s astride Beaori, and Beaori doesn’t try to throw her off. That was the killing blow.
The King’s herald calls the match in Teagan’s favor, and contest aides hurry forward to help the battered contestants to the sidelines. I scan Beaori’s wound quickly—Teagan’s knife sliced through the flesh of the breast, but didn’t get near the heart. I seal off the blood flow from that injury and the ankle wound, but I don’t heal them completely yet. That will come later.
“Can you do anything about the pain, Healer?” Beaori’s voice is thick with agony.
I meet her gaze, remembering the look on her face as she aimed her arrows at me. “I’ve done all I can for now,” I tell her sweetly. “I need to conserve my energy.”
Fury sparks in her eyes.
Before she can say anything else, I turn away and approach Teagan. She lies in the shadow of the arena wall, on her side. Her face and hair are coated with blood and grime.
A contest aide kneels beside her, his fingers fluttering anxiously over the hilt of Beaori’s hooked knife, which protrudes between Teagan’s shoulder blades. “Should I pull it out?” he asks.
“In a moment.” I kneel beside her as well, sending tendrils of my magic into the wound, probing down to the spinal cord and vertebrae. As I thought. She should have been paralyzed by this. The match should have gone to Beaori.
Teagan blinks at me through blood-matted eyelashes, and in her green eyes I read awareness and fear. She knows that I know.
Maybe she is counting on our previous history to keep me silent. After all, I know her family. I’ve healed them. It’s not a strong connection—I don’t owe any allegiance there, like the other healers who serve nobility—but suddenly I understand why the King was so anxious to find someone unconnected, someone without bias.
Perhaps I’m not as unbiased as either of us thought. Because I want Teagan to win. Or I did, until this moment. Lies, bribes, and unfair advantages—is that the kind of queen the Ash King needs?
“Pull it out,” I tell the aide. He grips the weapon and tugs it out of her spine with difficulty—it’s stuck in the bone. Once it’s out, I tell him to take it away and clean it. He obeys, and Teagan and I are left alone for a few moments.
Alone is relative in this situation—we’re still in the arena, within full view of the crowd of onlookers. But they’re distracted for the moment, watching the cleanup of the combat site as workers collect Teagan’s sword, rake away the bloodstained sand, and scatter fresh sand in its place. A trio of jugglers walk from one end of the arena to the other, leaping and cartwheeling as they go.
As I seal Teagan’s wound, I bend close to her ear. “What is it? Your ability?”
“Survival,” she whispers. “When you healed me from plague last year, I’d already been sick with it for much longer than the others. I simply—didn’t die. I can’t heal myself or anyone else. But while mortal wounds and illnesses do affect me, they don’t kill me. My spirit hangs on. My brain keeps functioning even when it shouldn’t.”
“It’s an unfair advantage,” I whisper. “A Ricter should have caught it.”
“It’s a barely detectable talent. Only a very powerful Ricter can identify it.” Her cracked lips tighten.
“Your father paid off a Ricter,” I say. “Maybe more than one.”
“Don’t tell the King, Cailin. Please.” She fumbles for my hand, squeezing it. “I would make a good queen. You know I would.”
“It was you, wasn’t it?” I say quietly. “You told the Ash King about me somehow. Not personally, because then he would have suspected a connection—no, you hired someone else to tell him about me. You wanted me in this position, so I’d feel obliged to keep your secret if I discovered it.”
She closes her eyes. “Ihopedyou would keep it, yes. I consider us friends.”
I barely know her, and she’s putting me in this position? I’m already keeping a secret for Khloe—can I conceal this for Teagan?
“If friendship isn’t enough,” she whispers, so low I can barely hear her. “I’m willing to add a monetary incentive.”
I’m spared from answering, because two aides are approaching. “If Lady Teagan is stable, we’ll move her to the recovery room,” one of them offers.
“She’s stable,” I answer. But I don’t deaden her pain, either. Maybe it’s cruel of me to punish her and Beaori like this, but I’ve fulfilled my responsibilities—they won’t die, and they’ll be fully healed soon. They both deserve a little pain while they wait.
