You Must Fall In Love

Chapter Sixty-Three

It was over.

Christine knew it was over because of the silence that had fallen, punctuated only by Rob's harsh breathing. Nimrod was on the floor, tongue lolling, looking even more grotesque than he normally did. He had bitten his lip clean through on impact. There was almost a hole in it. The blood was bubbling in his throat.

"Turn him," she gasped, when she was cogent enough to speak. "Before he..."

Rob grabbed Nimrod's sleeve and tugged him roughly on his side, letting the dark red pool on the carpet instead of in his windpipe, on his shoulder and all down his neck.

"He won't die, at least," said Rob. "I don't think he deserves to live, but I'm not about to make that call. Not after what I saw in that... never mind."

Yusuke was on the floor too. His leg was twisted, his chin was black and blue and he still couldn't reach his sword, but he was clearly conscious enough not to faint, however much that meant. His lips were trembling from the effort.

In a roundabout way, it was almost good that Nimrod had gone to such lengths to soundproof the room. They would need all the time they could get.

"Yusuke," she said, "are you..."

Stupid, stupid question — of course he wasn't okay — but she had to speak, if only because of the immense guilt that surged through her at that very moment, the ocean through a hole in a dike.

He hadn't done this to protect Rob. He had done this to protect her.

They had all done this to protect her.

"Don't move," said Jen. "I think I can fix this."

She sounded dazed, like she had on Sports Day in Primary Five when heatstroke had taken her legs from under her. Her face was still a nasty shade of white-green, the halfway color between artichoke and pebble, and her fingers shook when she made the sign of the cross on Yusuke's forehead, but she was determined, too, to stand.

"In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, I ask that you receive succor in your pain, and that his angels surround you with their wings. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, Amen."

"I... I don't feel anything," croaked Yusuke.

Jen smiled, but her eyes glimmered with tears.

"I know," she said. "I'm spent. It was a prayer."

Yusuke smiled back and closed his eyes, doing his best to give the impression of rest.

Christine bit her lip, only not as hard as Nimrod had. If Jen had been the Hart Princess, none of this would have happened. She would have stopped Nimrod somehow. She would have been training since childhood to take up her role, to learn everything that came with it.

She wouldn't...

"Christine," said August, "how did you do that?"

August was still stuck to the door. Spells didn't go away when their casters were incapacitated — otherwise, magic couldn't work at all. But he was doing his best, at least, to look dignified.

"Do what?" she asked.

She still had bad memories of his touch. A halo of bad memory, actually, radiating out from his pretty face like sunbeams off a toilet. But August didn't have his usual cocky grin on, and the way he had rushed to defend Rob despite their differences made her think that he might have certain reasons for behaving the way he did, for saying that he had been the only one of them telling her the truth.