Children Of The Sky (The Scripts Of Neptune, Book 2)

Chapter 51

It was dawn when she found him.

She'd long since gone numb with cold and with worry, searching the city with a squad of guards from the wee hours of the morning onward when she'd realized he hadn't come back yet. He hadn't told her where he was going; he hadn't told anyone. No one they spoke to had seen him, either. The storm and the dark had kept most of them comfortably indoors.

Darcy almost missed him, when she passed the alley where his body lay. His hair was what gave him away, stark and white-blond against the drabness of rain-washed cobblestone and mud. Her breath hitched, and she was running almost before she'd realized why. The stone scraped her knees as she knelt at his side, shaking hands hovering uncertainly. He was breathing--thank the gods, he was breathing--but there was blood crusted in his hair when she looked closer in the shadows, and he didn't stir when she shook him gently. The weight in her chest doubled when she took his wrist and felt how weak his pulse was. Gods, he was cold as ice.

"Miss Eldin!" One of her guards, Loial, spotted her from the street and jogged into the alley. He was a slender man with fair hair and deceptive strength; he often sparred with her when she was training. "Thank Dreail, you found him. Is he--"

"He's alive," Darcy whispered, pushing Ely's hair back to get a look at where the blood was coming from. There was a deep gash on the back of his head, but nothing felt broken. "Go get the others and a stretcher. We have to get him back to the manor immediately. He needs a doctor."

Loial nodded sharply, shifted, and took off out of the alley. Darcy turned her attention back to Ely, fingers working quickly to unfasten the stiff armor on his arms and torso, checking for signs of broken bones. He was soaked to the skin; it'd been a stroke of pure fortune that the weather had warmed considerably during the night. Even so, the blue tint of his lips stood out against cheeks that were far too pale.

Loial, godsend that he was, brought the doctor with the stretcher. Darcy backed away as the man crouched and put his hands on Ely's head, raising an eyebrow at the gash and then closing his eyes to concentrate. Letting out a slow breath, Darcy tucked her hands under her arms when she realized they were still trembling.

"He's injured his back and broken a few ribs," the doctor said after a moment, opening his eyes and looking at Darcy. "Concussion, too, along with that gash. How far did he fall?"

"I don't know." Darcy glanced up and shuddered. Had he slipped and forgotten to shift again, or had someone pushed him? "Is he hypothermic?"

The doctor straightened and waved over the guards with the stretcher. "Not severely, but yes. He needs to be taken to the infirmary."

"Will he be all right?"

The doctor's glance made her heart sink. "We'll see."

***

It was a habit Jack liked to keep, taking up jobs around the ship sometimes. He'd found it connected him better with his crew, especially the newer men; he assumed it made it easier for them to see him as one of them rather than a distant leader.

And so he was on watch tonight. It wasn't late, but with the waning daylight hours, it'd long since gotten dark. He'd donned a coat against the crisp chill in the air, busying himself for a while with watching his breath fog like smoke as he stood up in the crow's nest. It was a clear night, moonless, not even a breeze stirring the air. The border between sea and sky stood unseen somewhere along the horizon, fluidly invisible and decked with glittering stars.

As his shift came to an end, he heard the scuffling sound of his replacement climbing the rigging. Tiberius Squill's tawny head and lanky frame appeared a moment later, a hesitant smile spreading across his face. He didn't smile much, Squill, particularly after the incident with Crynia's father, but he was a hard worker and had already proven himself worth the fight.