Naeva-To Fight a Monster

Chapter 5

"Well, that was unfortunate," Polina said quietly, leading the way into the order home. "I was hoping we could at least convince her to work with us occasionally."

Erin sat on the couch, seemingly ignoring Polina's lament. "I thought Radley and Valerian would be here. Think they got a request while we were out?"

"Requests, huh," Polina mused. "We were vigilantes for so long, I almost forgot that's how most orders work. Have you seen any letters?"

Erin held up a flip-phone. "No, but there's a recorded call on this from the Gefroren border."

Polina started to speak, but then she stopped, her brow lowering in confusion. "Where did you get a cell phone? Did you use our rent money?"

"Nope." Erin zipped out of the room, then walked back in. "Rent money's intact. The phone was just on the table here, yeah? It says it's directly linked to like five other phones."

"Five others?" Polina asked, looking at the phone with a raised eyebrow. Counting on her fingers, she muttered, "So there are six phones in all. That makes Radley, Valerian, you, me..." She scowled at the two remaining fingers. "And two for potential members?"

Erin chuckled. "Or Naeva. Valerian probably bought them. You think he got the money fighting monsters on is own time?"

"Knowing him? Probably." Polina looked into a drawer and found the other two phones. "Still, he must have gone through quite a battle for this kind of money."

"Maybe we should head back out, yeah?" Erin noted. "We could stock up on food, or help the boys, or find our own job."

"Well, we already took care of the groceries last night," Polina said, looking at what she assumed was her own phone, "and it'd take us all day to get to where the boys went. If it's just a golem, like this call says, they should be back any moment now."

"We could use the money from doing our own—" Erin began, but the door opened, revealing a stumbling figure. Valerian, looking paler than usual, had an unconscious man slung over his shoulders.

The room was silent while Valerian stepped in, but then Polina recognized the form. He was so broken, so covered in his own blood, that Polina hadn't recognized him at first, but this was definitely Radley. His right leg and left arm were set in hurried casts, and makeshift bandages covered almost everywhere else. They'd looked like his clothes at first, if only because they had all soaked through.

Erin jumped from the couch, dropping her phone. "Oh my G—!"

"Get the vials from his room!" Polina ordered. "Quickly now!" Turning to Valerian as Erin complied, she asked, "Where are the ones he keeps with him?"

"All used or shattered," Valerian panted, swinging his cloak off his back so it rested across the couch, and then gently set the man down on it. Radley was barely breathing. "The golem knocked me through a wall. I survived by negating the force, but the landing was still enough to knock me out.

"When I woke up, he had already used three on himself while protecting the patients in the clinic. He used the rest of the vials on them. Or at least the ones that hadn't already been broken in the battle. I got us out, but the golem's still out there."

Erin returned with a raspberry vial. She tipped it into Radley's slightly open mouth, and to Polina's relief, he instinctively swallowed.

Several tense seconds passed, but then Radley took a long, slow breath. Everyone in the room let out a sigh of relief, except Valerian, who was already drinking a vial of his own. His bruises faded away completely.

"Shouldn't he be waking up?" Polina asked nervously.

"Not likely," Valerian said, lying down on the floor. "He is safe, but phoenix tears don't restore stamina. He will need to sleep for a while."

Polina sighed. "Okay, as long as he's not in danger anymore."

"He's not," Erin said, leaning over him. "His breath is stable again; look."

Polina opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came. This was as close as any of them had ever come to death, and the emotional shock of it had rendered any further speech pointless. Without a word, Polina and Erin followed the Becks' example and retired to their rooms for the night.