Can't Cheat Death - Brennan Sorrengail

XI - Iosaph

When I'd at last been released from the infirmary wing it was nearly pitch-black outside. Rain clouds had swarmed the sky since I'd woken up and I couldn't help but feel that the sky shared my pain. When Nolon had walked me to the hallway, handing me a small bottle of pain medication to deal with the other cuts and bruises he'd left unmended, he leaned in close. "Remember, if your eye gets worse come back. Strain will ruin all the work I did trying to save it. Come back in a few weeks so that one of the healers can do a checkup." 

I nodded along, only half listening through the pounding in my head. The slight distortion between my eyes had caused a persistent migraine throughout the afternoon and I had been hesitant to eat anything with my stomach in such tight knots. 

"Get to bed cadet, you're still expected in class tomorrow." Nolon didn't wait to see me off, he turned around and reentered the infirmary, shutting the door behind him.

Alone in the hall, I swallowed the bile rising up in my throat and shuffled down the hall back towards the Riders Quadrant. It was eerily silent in the dark halls, and I half expected Brennan to jump out from the shadows and actually kill me this time. I don't know why he's the first thing that comes to mind as I hobble towards my dorm but once he's in my head I can't seem to get him out.

I'm sure he was hoping Cassian Moren would take me out, kill me before I had the chance to make good on our deal. That had to be why he'd been so obscure in the training session, why after our names had been called in challenges, he'd already been staring me down, as if waiting for my reaction. Rage pooled in my belly and suddenly I wish Brennan would come leaping out of the shadows so I could give him a piece of my mind. And my fists. And my feet. And my blades. 

He's so dead.

When I enter our cramped dormitory, Iosaph is leaned against her bunk post, her eyes nearly closed as she teeters on the edge of falling asleep or off her bed. I try to close the door as quietly as possibly, but it's no good, as soon as it shuts closed with a creaky hinge for good measure, she's practically on top of me.

"Isla!" 

One of our other bunk mates flips over, chucking a pillow our way before rolling back to face the wall.

Much quieter this time Iosaph leans forward and whispers, "Isla!"

I force a tight grin and pull away, turning the newly scarred half of my face towards the wall and using my hair to cover it as best as I can. "Hey, 'saph."

"We were worried sick! Once Alill and I brought you to the infirmary they wouldn't allow any visitors! Some old fart told us to 'just go back to class'!" Iosaph waves her arms around indignantly. 

"To be fair, I wasn't exactly in any state to be taking visitors," I say, but bite my tongue as she leans forward, her brow furrowed.

"Were they able to heal the damage?" She lifts her hand to brush aside my hair and I can't help but flinch from her touch. I hate how her hand is nothing more than a blur of dark skin against the candlelit backdrop of our room. I hate how I can't make out the details of her fingers, details I never bothered to look for in the first place. 

Iosaph's fingers stop in midair, hovering a foot from my face. I can't make out her expression but her fingers tremble enough for even my damaged eye to see. 

"I- I'm sorry," she mutters, slowly lowering her hand, and guilt rushes through me like a floor. 

"Don't apologize!" I reach for her shaking hand and take it in my own, swallowing down the anxiety the burns like acid beneath the surface of the skin. "It's just... they couldn't..." Finding the words without choking up was impossible.