A Shrine to an Unknown God

OPEN WOUND

I CRAWL OUTSIDE on my hands and knees. Darkness has fallen. The night is crisp, the sky clear. Marisol, Dahlia, and a newly-conscious Ezra crowd around me. I collapse onto my back beneath the stars. The moon is full and honey-colored.

The second Dahlia sees the blood she gags and walks away. "Oh, God. Oh, God..."

"What happened?" Marisol asks.

"Get—get the arrow out of me," I snap.

"No—" Ezra shakes his head. "Oh, my God. That's literally the worst possible thing you could do—we just need to get you to, like, a doctor. Like, right now."

"Didn't you just tell me that you flunked out of nursing school?" Marisol replies. "Why should we listen to you?"

"I didn't flunk out." Ezra crosses his arms over his chest. "I dropped out. It was my decision. Not the establishment's."

"Motherfuckers." In my half-delirious-with-pain state, that's the only form of address I can think of. "Have—have either of you ever been shot by an arrow?"

They look at me blankly. Marisol shakes her head.

I rip up my cloak to show the scars on my thighs. "This one was from an arrow." Higher to show the ones on my stomach and hips. "So were these two." I drop it down and point to the one on my cheek. "This one, too. Now get the goddamn things out of me."

The rest were from other weapons—swords or spears or daggers or even plain old kitchen knives. Most from training. Hardly any from actual battle. Life at the agōgē is brutal. We're pitted against each other and told that we either draw blood or we don't get fed.

(More often than not, no one gets fed. It teaches us how to fight on a half-full belly, but it also teaches us cunning and resourcefulness. We have to steal our food to survive.)

Marisol and Ezra look at each other. She shrugs.

Ezra wavers one hand over the arrow in my shoulder. "Fast or slow?"

"Surprise me."

Marisol offers me her hand. "Squeeze if it hurts."

I wrap my hand around hers. I'm surprised at the warmth and how small they are. Her hair tickles my skin as she leans over me.

Ezra rips the arrow out of my body.

I scream, squeezing Marisol's hand so tightly she screams, too. My legs fly upwards and bend at the knee. My body contorts itself in pain.

Ezra's eyes are wide and green as the sea. "Oh, my God! I'm sorry—I'm sorry!" he yelps.

"Shh, shh, you're okay, you're doing great!" Marisol strokes my hair back out of my face with her free hand. "Just focus on me!"

She is easy enough to focus on.

"Was fast good?" Ezra asks. "Should I do it fast again?"

"I don't care." I speak through gritted teeth and half-lidded eyes. "Just get it out."

He yanks the second arrow out of my ribs. The pain is so intense it numbs my entire body. I cry out to the heavens. My hands instinctively close around the wound.

"They're out!" Marisol crys. "Hooray!"

"I have some Neosporin in my mom-bag," Ezra says. "That'll help. Here, let me..."

"In your what?" Marisol asks.

"My mom-bag. It's a fanny pack with a bunch of emergency supplies."

He reaches underneath his cloak and pulls out this small shimmery-silver thing. A fanny pack, I guess. His mom-bag. I find comfort in the fact that even Marisol seems to find it odd. He opens it with a zzzzz and roots around inside. "A-ha! Here she be!" He brandishes a vial of Neosporin, I guess, and squirts a glob of it onto his finger. "It's a little... uh, salty, from where it was in the ocean after I almost died in that crash, but it should still be fine! My mom-bag's mostly waterproof!"

I scoot away from him. I don't know what Neosporin is, exactly, but I know I want nothing to do with it. "What the fuck is that?"

"It's... it's just Neosporin."

"But what is it?"

"It's just, like... an ointment." He shrugs. "You rub it on cuts to keep them from getting infected."

"I don't need your witchcraft." I sit up, sending spots dancing across my vision, and point to where the arrow hit my shoulder. The cut has already closed over, leaving a small white scar. "My wounds heal themselves."

"It's... literally Neosporin," Ezra mumbles. "Not witchcraft."

Marisol stares at my new scar. "Um, what the fuck?"

"My father is a god," I remind her.

"Right!" She laughs, cold and sharp and quick as a knife. "So you just get magical healing powers or whatever?" Her voice is shrill. "That's completely wonderful!" The way she says it makes it seem as if she thinks it's exactly the opposite of completely wonderful.

Ezra looks around for somewhere to wipe the glob of Neosporin. He finally decides on Marisol's shoulder.

She swats his hand away (too late) with an indignant "Dude!"

"Ezra, let me see your wound now." I grab Ezra's head.

All I see in his curls is dried blood, no open wound.

No open wound.

In the time it took us to get to my house, his wound completely healed itself.

He isn't mortal.