“She said ten. Ten and the French one as well. There were only three when I got to her.”
“She made them pay.” Cian gently tugged down her pants.
Glenna bit back a sound of distress as she saw the bruising, the cuts. “Ribs.” She made her voice brisk. “Probably kidney. Bruised. Shoulder’s bad, too. The gash on her leg is fairly shallow. But God, her knee. Not broken, at least. Nothing broken.”
“She…” Larkin reached down, took one of Blair’s limp hands. “She said her vision was going double. Concussion, she said.”
Now Glenna spoke gently. “Why don’t you step out? Let Moira and me take care of her.”
“No, I won’t leave her again. She had pain. A lot of pain. You need to give her something that will take away the pain.”
“I will, I promise I’ll give her what I can for it. Why don’t you build up the fire then? I want it warm for her.”
Blair could hear them, the voices. She couldn’t quite separate one from the other or pick out words, but the sounds were enough to assure her she was alive.
The pain spoke to her as well and that told her she’d gotten her ass thoroughly kicked.
She caught scents as well now. Peat smoke, Glenna, and something strong and floral. But when she tried to open her eyes, they wouldn’t cooperate. That had panic trickling into her chest like nasty little drops of acid.
Coma? She didn’t want to be in a coma. People fell into comas and sometimes they never climbed out. She’d rather be dead than trapped inside the dark, hearing, feeling, but not being able to see or speak.
Then she felt something slide over her, like silk. Just a flutter over her skin, under it, then deeper, deeper still to where the pain was clenched in fists.
Then the silk heated, then it burned. Oh God. And the fire of it forced those fists open until the pain spread and broke into a thousand jagged pieces.
Her eyes flew open in blinding light that had her flailing out.
“Son of a bitch!” In her mind she screamed it, but it came out as a hoarse croak.
She sucked in breath to curse again, but the worst of it ebbed and became a slow, steady throbbing.
“It hurts, I know, it hurts to heal. Can you look at me? Blair? No, stay up here now, and look at me.”
Blair forced her eyes open again. Glenna swam into view, her face close. Her hand cupped the back of Blair’s neck, lifted it gently up. “Drink a little of this. Just a little now. I can’t give you too much because of the head trauma. But this will help.”
Blair swallowed, winced. “Tastes like liquid tree bark.”
“Not that far off. Do you know where you are?”
“I’m back.”
“What’s your name?”
“Blair Murphy. Do you want rank and serial number?”
Glenna’s lips curved. “How many fingers?”
“Two and a half. Vision’s a little blurry.” But she struggled to use it, to see. The room was full of people, she realized—the whole team. “Hey. Dorothy, Scarecrow, the Tin Man.” She realized then her hand was gripping Larkin’s, probably hard enough to grind bone to bone. She relaxed her fingers, managed a smile. “Thanks for saving my life back there.”
“It was no trouble. You’d taken care of most of it yourself.”
“I was done.” She closed her eyes again. “Tapped out.”
“I shouldn’t have left you alone.”
“Cut that out.” Blair would have given him a light punch to go with the words if she’d had the strength. “It’s wrong and it’s useless.”
“Why did you?” Cian asked him. “Why did you separate?”