Flames of Fury

Chapter 38

Happy Friday!

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Ember

I can't bring myself to look back at Mags and Xander standing in the palace doorway, likely watching me as I retreat back into the palace. I told her I'd go with her, be there in the field healing anyone who needed it. But they both shot me down immediately, though for different reasons. Xander said they couldn't risk one of three true healers in the grove getting injured in battle. Mags, however, outright refused to let me go back there citing that I had spent too much of my life in that pit and she'd sooner die than see me down there again.

I both adore and hate that all-or-nothing, absolutist quality about Mags. It makes her a fierce friend and formidable foe, but it also makes her appear stubborn and rigid sometimes. Seeing her with Ro and Varian has been very entertaining as they really are the only ones that can get her to bend. It's incredible.

I head straight over to the infirmary, I might as well wait there. I need to be there when people start porting in so I can make sure none of them are Mags or her family, and if Gods forbid they are injured then I need to be here to heal them.

The other two healers, Heather and Dr. Alers, are there showing the medical staff from Shadowmoon around the infirmary. They came straight to us this morning volunteering their time and skills for today's battle.

The beds are empty, supplies are stocked, and operating rooms are clean and sterile. All we can do is sit and wait, and hope that we're not needed.

Just under an hour later teleporters start appearing in the halls holding and carrying bleeding and wounded warriors. Normally these wounds would begin to heal on their own but the poisons the Drow rely on prevent natural healing from taking place.

Despite the influx of warriors needing patching up, there's nothing too serious or overwhelming that me and the other healers can't keep up with.

Or, at least it wasn't, until Xander appears in the hall with so much blood all over him I don't know where the source is.

"Ember!" He shouts, frantically searching the halls. "Ember! Alers! Help me, it's Ro!"

I drop the gauze I was applying to a young man from Pine Grove and race towards the room Xander goes into alongside Dr. Logan from Shadowmoon.

I've been a doctor for many decades and in full control of my healing abilities twice as long as that. But never in my nearly two centuries of life have I ever seen a sight as gruesome as the one before me now. I'm not sure I can stomach it, and knowing it's Ro only makes it that much harder.

Ro lays on the hospital bed painted red from the neck down with an arrow lodged in his throat.

"Ember!" Xander is in front of me now, his voice is muffled like I'm listening to him from under water. "Ember! Heal him!" I snap out of the shock that had taken hold of me and rush over to Ro's side with shaky hands. I grab a wrist checking for a pulse and flush his body with golden light, willing his body to heal.

My heart begins to thunder in my chest and there's a high pitched tone ringing in my ears. Flashbacks of Griffin's death enter unbidden into the forefront of my mind.

This isn't going to work. It's too late.

"What are you doing? Why did you stop?" Xander is shouting, on the brink of hysteria.

"I— I can't. I can't heal the dead. I can't — I'm sorry, I'm so so sorry." I'm sobbing by the end. Ugly, fat tears roll down my face.

"No, no he can't be." Dr. Logan tries to remain the professional she is but her voice cracks exposing her true emotions.