“It is time for you to leave as well.” Negasi sounded like he was under some great strain. “Step outside and, once you are there, take back your magic.”

Lindsay looked down at Noah for a long moment, looking past the burns to see the man who was his.

The man who trusted him.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered, and then he turned and walked away.

Outside, he closed his eyes and slowly withdrew the magic that was keeping Noah safe.

There was dead silence and the total absence of Noah. Lindsay had become accustomed to him all the days that he’d held Noah’s magic in trust for him. On the drive here, at least he had known Noah was alive.

Now, there was nothing.

The air was split open by a sound Lindsay couldn’t even name until he realized it could only be Noah, screaming.

He spun and had his hand on the door handle, ready to rush back inside to help, when he realized this was why Negasi had sent him out. If he’d been in the room, he wouldn’t have stopped to think before he took away Noah’s pain. With the door between them, he was able to gain perspective—if his magic were to

interfere with Negasi’s healing, it would mean further disaster. He let his head fall forward against the door and took a slow, deep breath. If he wanted to be there for Noah, he would have to accept Noah’s pain.

Slowly, he pulled the door open and stepped inside. “May I come in?”

There was no answer. Negasi was rigid, his face streaked with sweat, and he struggled to hold Noah down. Noah was fighting him as though he would rather use the last of his energy on getting free instead of living.

“Noah.” Lindsay rushed across the room to put his hands on Noah’s shoulders. “Noah, I’m here.

Listen to me. You need to be still, Noah.”

Something seeped through because Noah fell still. He was shaking violently and, when Negasi moved the placement of his hands, he screamed again before subsiding. Suddenly, his eyes opened and he looked right at Lindsay.

“I’m here. I won’t leave you.” Lindsay met Noah’s gaze and hoped his presence made some difference to how much pain he knew Noah must be in. “You’re going to be all right.”

“I did not expect him to have so much strength,” Negasi said tightly. “He might live a few hours if nothing goes wrong. As for the rest, we will have to see.”

The other voice didn’t draw Noah’s attention, he was fixated on Lindsay. His lips moved, but Lindsay couldn’t tell what he was saying, because his face was so ravaged. Now that he could see Noah clearly, he wondered what had made him certain Noah could be saved.

“It’s all right, Noah. We’re with the healer. Negasi is trying to help you. I need you to let him help you.”

Noah seemed to understand, because his breathing changed, like he was trying to get control of it.

Sometimes, he lost focus as his gaze wandered, but he would calm as soon as he got Lindsay back in his line of sight. Negasi kept working, his hands pinning Noah’s down as he tried to repair some of that damage there.

Outside, there was the roar of an engine as a car pulled up. It coughed and died and, moments later, the door banged open.

“Beppe,” Negasi said by way of explanation. “He’s human, but I need his drugs for this, and his equipment.”

“How bad is really bad?” The man who came in was older, tall and dignified with nearly white hair. “I never can tell.” He carried a large black bag, and he had a bright red duffel with EMERGENCY printed down it slung over his shoulder.

“Should-be-dead-an-hour-ago bad,” Negasi clarified. “I’ve done what I can for now.” He wiped his face on his sleeve. “He needs fluids and drugs.”

“That would be bad,” Beppe agreed. “I’ll see what I can do. Hello there.” He leaned over Noah and spoke to him. “I’m going to give you something for the pain. Do you have any allergies?”

Noah tried to shake his head a little.

“Excellent. Not that it matters much at this point, but it’s good that you can hear me.” Beppe was putting on gloves with a snap-snap. “You’ll need to move back, young man,” he said to Lindsay.

“I’m going to move to let the doctor help you,” Lindsay told Noah. “But I won’t be far.” He waited to see the understanding in Noah’s eyes before he stepped away.

“We have a problem,” Kristan hissed, grabbing his arm and pulling him all the way out of the room before he could protest. “Huge.”

Lindsay stared at her for a moment. A huge problem. What now? He took a deep breath. “Tell me.”

“We have to get out of here. Not back to the house. They know where it is.” Kristan actually looked distraught. “Vivian didn’t say how they found out or where she is. She just said we can’t go back. We have to leave as soon as we can.”

Glancing at the door, Lindsay nodded slowly. “And the others?”

“She contacted them too. We can find them again when it’s safe.” She took a breath, and let it out.

“We’re going to Detroit. That guy in there, Beppe, he’s gonna fix me up with a car. I have cash. We have to go as soon as Noah can be moved.”

Lindsay didn’t know when that would be. “I’ll ask them to make sure he can travel.”

“I know how to find another healer. We have to go where one of us knows people and...” Kristan left it at that, shrugging. “I’m going to get some cigarettes and something to drink. I’ll get some food too. Go on back in.” She nudged Lindsay out of the way, toward the healer’s room, on her way to the door.

Lindsay stopped with his hand on the doorknob and took a deep breath. Noah was going to be all right. Negasi and Beppe were going to help him. He had to be all right. And then they would leave Atlantic City and find another place to stay. Again.

Chapter Seven

Dane knew where he was before he was conscious. Not precisely where on a map, but he knew by the sound and the smell of it that he was on a cargo plane. He also knew something was worse than wrong. He couldn’t remember being in this kind of pain, a pain that had him biting through his tongue to try to pretend he wasn’t awake. His body felt sticky with blood, and there were streaks of searing heat through his flesh that never faded. His mouth slowly filled with blood from the marks of his own teeth in his tongue, and there was no abating it.

“Pray hard.” The voice came from a few feet away. He knew it, but he’d never heard it sound that way before. Jonas. “Maybe you’ll die.”

They didn’t. Couldn’t. Dane opened his eyes and found his vision cut in half. One eye worked, he had no idea what was wrong with the other. When he winced, dried blood crackled on his face, and he didn’t want to know. He tried to move, and when shifting didn’t spill his guts on the floor, he pushed himself to sitting up. It was like he weighed a hundred pounds more than he had when he’d last been conscious. He had to turn his head to locate Jonas just beyond the bars of two cages—one for each of them.

Anything that was wrong with him faded into irrelevance when he managed to focus enough to see the condition Jonas was in. The other feral was naked. Most of him was naked. The rest of him was gone.

Missing.

“What the fuck happened to you?”

“Time.” Jonas was missing his arms from the elbows down and half of his head. There was no bleeding, as though he’d been halfway through healing when someone had stopped him. He lay in the corner of his cage like he’d been thrown there, and his legs were bent oddly in front of him.

Time. Dane’s good eye adjusted to the low light and he made out the glimmer of something around Jonas’s neck. His fingers told him the same thing was locked on him, made of something cold and too heavy for its size. His stomach twisted and he thought he was going to be sick.

“What did you do?” Dane couldn’t think of a reason why he and Jonas would end up in the same hellish situation. They were on opposite sides. That was part of the whole scheme of the universe.