PROMISE

CHAPTER 22

Hain opened his eyes slowly. He lay on his back in a wide bed, the head of it tilted at an upward angle. Dim light trickled around him, the room's single window awash with darkness. A sharp smell like lye clung to the air.

"You're alive," someone said in a flat drone from beside him. "How wonderful."

Hain tipped his head toward the voice. Next to the bed stood a thin, female Vrai, her white ringlet hair bound up in a bun atop her head. Her hands were busy hanging a clear bag of fluids onto a metal rack beside the bed.

"Where am I?" Hain asked, his voice thick with sleep.

"The hospital," she said as she plugged a thin, clear tube into the bottom of the bag. "In Promise."

Hain's brows stitched together. "What happened?"

"Well," she said, "it turns out people don't like it when a stranger leads packs of Vrai into their home." She pointed to his head. "Hence the attempted murdering."

Hain ran a hand over his head and felt a mountain of bandages bound about his skull. Memory flitted behind his eyes at the touch.

Hume.

Lilith.

Shouting.

Crack.

Blackness.

He shook the memory away and looked back to her.

"I didn't lead the Vrai into your haven. They were here when I came," Hain said. "And I don't understand why you're acting like I should favor you people any more than the Vrai. From where I'm standing, you're no different from them."

Sanger spun to face him so quickly that ringlets of hair whipped free from her bun.

"We are nothing like them." She jabbed a finger at his face as she said it. "Nothing."

Hain forced a laugh. "We're nothing like them," he said, miming her outrage. "That's a hard sell, considering someone in a room full of your people tried to gun me down."

She opened her mouth to speak, but seemed to rethink it at the last moment.

"I don't have to prove anything to you. I know who we are." She turned away. "In fact, just stop asking me questions. I'm not even supposed to be talking to you."

"Says who?"

She groaned. "What part of 'stop asking me questions' don't you get?"

"Alright. Alright." Hain held up his hands defensively. "I just wanted to know more about why you thought I deserved to die."

"Seeing as I've saved your life twice now, I think it's fair to say that I'm decidedly in the do-not-kill-the-human group."

"Twice?" Hain said, not hiding his confusion. "How could you have saved my life twice?"

"Typical human," she said, with a sneer. "You only remember when people do things to you, not for you."

Hain plied through his fragmented memories until he felt recognition bloom.

"You were with Lilith in that tent when I woke up," he said. "I kicked you."

"Now he remembers," she said. "Good to know that you're not just a perpetual victim."

Hain fought the urge to snap back at her.

"Sorry about the kick," he forced himself to say. "I'm guessing you're friends with Lilith then?"

"We are." Her tone went stiff. "Just friends, I mean."

"And you're the healer."

"Physician." Heat returned to her voice. "Not a healer."