Earthrise (Her Instruments Book 1) (13 page)

Hirianthial rested his gaze on Reese’s slack face. “Not easily, no.”

The many shifts Hirianthial had spent on patient watch had taught him how to relax so deeply he encroached on sleep’s soft threshold without crossing it. In such a state he not only maintained his emotional equilibrium but could track the auras of any people in his care. Reese was close enough that her presence intruded on his, but even Irine’s registered, a sparkly, healthy gold muted now by a gray veil of worry. The colors paled as she fell asleep, coiled into a ball beneath Reese. The hammock’s webbed shadow fell over her body, cast from the dimmed overhead lights.

Allacazam’s body created no aura, a fact Hirianthial found fascinating and enigmatic in the extreme. But the rest of the crew he could sense even through the bulkheads—not with enough granularity to assess their health and mental state, but strongly enough for him to sense their distance and that they lived. In busy hospitals he’d been overwhelmed by the amount of data his abilities had brought him without asking, and he’d learned not so much to ignore the people around him as to allow their auras to blur into one undifferentiated mass. His workplaces had developed auras of their own, the combination of thousands of patients and personnel on their business, and though he never paid attention to it he always knew in the back of his mind the “health” of his workplace.

There were days that death and suffering had blackened the entrance to the hospital so that he hated to enter, and days when miracles sent white ripples through a floor to lighten the mood of the entire workplace. But it had been long and long again since he’d been somewhere small enough that each person cast a distinct emotional, without the blur created by his cultivated psychic myopia. He found it pleasant and drifted, a lagan tethered to those distant auras as to buoys in the darkness.

The flare of Reese’s pain doubling brought him to the surface immediately. He slid a hand above her chest and felt the tear as if it were in his palm. With his free hand, Hirianthial punched the intercom’s bridge combination. “Sascha. Tell me we’re close.”

“We’re just coming out of Well. Half an hour at the most, depending on how quickly they dock us.”

Hirianthial glanced at Reese. She was breathing too quickly for slowsleep. “When you connect with the docking authority, put me through. I’ll get us a space.”

“You’re the boss, doc. Stand by.”

Irine uncurled and rubbed her eye. “Are we there?” Then, “What’s wrong?”

“We’re running out of time,” Hirianthial said.

Irine’s tail lashed. “The insystems just fired. We must be on final approach.”

Hirianthial said nothing, leaning against the wall in an effort to seem less concerned than he was. He left his hand over Reese’s chest, trying to gauge the extent of the trauma. He’d always taken for granted the vague knowledge he’d gained through his abilities and had used them in tandem with his clinical experience and observation of physical symptoms to make his diagnoses... but he’d always confirmed and refined those findings with diagnostic equipment. Having no scanner to track the extent of Reese’s danger frustrated him.

“Docking authority is pinging me, doc.”

“Can I talk to them from here?”

“Yeah, hang on. Okay, you’re live!”

“Starbase Kappa, this is Doctor Sarel Jisiensire of the TMS
Earthrise
. We have a medical emergency requiring immediate surgery. Do you have an emergency deck berth?”

“
Earthrise
, this is Kappa Docking. We are transmitting a vector and docking assignment now. Please advise as to the nature of the emergency so we can prepare for your arrival.”

“I have one human female suffering from rupture of the esophagus with possible pleural effusion, currently coming out of slowsleep. Vital statistics are fluctuating.”

“Thank you. We’ll have a team waiting for you. Kappa away.”

Sascha’s voice returned, now hard with tension. “I’ve got the assignment. We’ll be there in under ten minutes.”

“Now what?” Irine asked.

“Now we go wait at the exit,” Hirianthial said. He gathered Reese into his arms though he felt as if he was embracing an armful of naked swords and said, “Show me the way out, Irine.”

“Yes, sir,” Irine said and darted out the door. Hirianthial followed. With Reese pressed against his chest he could feel the hard and irregular thump of her heart.

“You are not allowed to go this way,” he told her. “I simply won’t have it. I know you can hear me, Theresa Eddings. You are ten minutes away from the medical care that will save your life so you simply cannot, will not, are not allowed to falter now.”

A flicker of gold against the knife-sharp black. With Irine so far ahead of him, he leaned down and whispered into one ear, “You cannot die yet, Theresa. What other human woman has been held in the arms of an Eldritch? Surely that’s too good a story not to live to tell.”

The ship shivered before he reached the exit. And again when he caught up with Irine at the edge of the vast docking bay with its ominous spindles and their long shadows on the cold ground. It seemed to take too long before the thunderous groan of the dock doors sliding into their pockets sounded. Hirianthial didn’t wait but squeezed through them sideways and delivered Reese into the arms of the medical team waiting there. As they put her on the stretcher he said, “I’m certified. I’m coming with you. Don’t try to stop me.”

The orderly glanced at him and shrugged before heading back toward the corridor.

On one side, the smell of antiseptic... on the other, a field of waving flowers. Reese tried to choose the flowers, but the harder she reached for the field the further it receded. Exasperated, she put her hands on her hips and tried commanding the field to stay put, but it was no use. Come to think of it, she’d never been in a field of flowers. The image had come off a calendar some repair shop had given her, and the smell of the flowers... that was one of Irine’s perfumes. She couldn’t even have original dreams. Reese gave up and decided to see if waking was any better.

Waking was worse. She was under a halo-arch in an unfamiliar Medplex. Not just a clinic, a small place that supported only routine medical visits, but a real Medplex, a space hospital. She’d seen the inside of a Medplex only three times and hated every memory involving one. That she was trapped not just in a Medplex but also apparently as a patient horrified her.

How had she gotten here? The last thing she remembered was throwing up on the bridge.

“She’s awake!”

The twins’ faces appeared above her. They made no move to hug her, and their unwonted caution scared Reese even more than the halo-arch. She swallowed and discovered she could talk, though her assumption that talking would hurt puzzled her. “Where am I?”

“Starbase Kappa,” Sascha said. “In the Medplex.”

“I figured that part out,” Reese said. “Why am I here?”

The two exchanged glances. “You don’t remember?” Irine asked.

“Remember what? Throwing up on the bridge? I got that part,” Reese said. “I hope Hirianthial wasn’t too upset about his clothes.”

“His clothes!” Irine shook her head. “Reese, you almost died!”

Reese laughed. “I did not.”

They didn’t laugh. The halo-arch beeped into the silence, doing whatever it was halo-arches did to monitor the condition of their occupants.

“I didn’t,” Reese said again. “It was just stress.”

They continued to not say anything. Reese started to worry. “Guys?”

“You’ve been unconscious for a day since they operated,” Sascha said.

“Operated!”

“I’ll go get Hirianthial,” Irine said and vanished.

“Sascha, what is going on here? This is crazy talk.”

“Boss, just relax, okay? Hirianthial will explain it.”

“Right,” Reese said, rolling her eyes. “The Eldritch doctor.”

She expected a chuckle, but instead Sascha’s gaze hardened with disapproval and his ears flattened. “’The Eldritch doctor’ saved your life, Reese. The surgeon said so. You would have died on the way to Starbase Kappa without him.”

Reese stared at him. “You’re not kidding me.”

“No.”

Reese flushed. “Well how was I supposed to know that? I was unconscious!”

His expression didn’t change. “Well, now you do.”

“I still don’t understand how I can have been that sick,” Reese said. “I feel fine now!”

Sascha managed half a grin. “You’ll understand well enough when you get the Medplex services bill.”

“The bill!” Reese exclaimed, trying to sit up. The field from the halo-arch repulsed her and she squirmed, trying to find a way around it. “What bill?”

“There is no bill.” Hirianthial’s hair preceded him into view, swishing over the edge of the field. The lines beneath his eyes were far more pronounced, and his baritone had deeper tones, rough edges. “Welcome back, lady.”

“What is going on here? Let me out of this so I can see you all at once.”

“If you promise not to leave the bed,” Hirianthial said.

“Yes, yes, I promise, let me up!”

He tapped a few notes on the edge of the arch. “All right.”

Reese struggled to sit up and surprised herself by feeling too weak. The twins caught her before she could wobble and propped her up. “Just a touch of vertigo.”

“Right,” Sascha said dryly.

“Now,” Reese said, staring at Hirianthial. “Explain.”

He remained composed. She had expected him to look ridiculous against the backdrop of a modern medical establishment with his anachronistic clothes and princely demeanor, but for some reason this was the one place he seemed to suit. He wasn’t wearing the doublet she’d thrown up on, though. Her cheeks warmed at that memory. She hoped he’d been able to clean it up... the camellias had been pretty.

“We sealed your esophagus and used a resurfacing agent to encourage the regeneration of the mucosal layers,” he said after a moment. “You’re on antibiotics until we’ve cleared your system of the infection that started this problem, and to ward off any infection that might have thought about colonizing your chest cavity.”

“You make it sound like it I was some sort of road that needed repaving,” Reese said, rubbing her throat. She didn’t feel like she’d had one of her body parts sewn up.

“It was only like a road that needed repaving if part of the road had collapsed and the rest of it was nearing the same state.”

Reese swallowed, waiting for the customary jolt of heat and nervousness that accompanied unpleasant news. Instead her stomach tightened. That was it. Nothing more. No burning, no sour tastes, no convulsive need for chalk tablets. That finally convinced her. “Blood and Freedom, you replaced my esophagus!”

“More or less,” Hirianthial said.

Reese leaned forward and covered her eyes. “What did I owe?”

“You didn’t hear him before?” Irine asked, poking Reese gently in the ribs. “There is no bill.”

“No bill?” Reese said. “How is that possible? You didn’t pay it, did you?”

“If by pay you mean handing over coins, then no, I didn’t,” Hirianthial said. “If by pay you mean work here for a few shifts until the value of your operation had been recouped by the Medplex, then I suppose I did.”

Reese pointed a finger at him. “I didn’t ask for your help!”

“I owed you a debt,” Hirianthial said. “You saved my life.”

“I didn’t want you to pay me back,” Reese said. “I wanted you to get the hell off my ship and take your slaving pursuers with you!”

“Regardless, I’m a doctor,” the Eldritch said. “If someone starts dying in my presence, it’s my duty to stop it.”

“I didn’t ask for your help—”

“Actually, you did,” Irine said.

Reese glared at her. This time she noticed just how poorly her glare worked. Irine didn’t even wilt.

“You did,” the tigraine said. “You made him your proxy and told him to make all the relevant medical decisions to save your life. I was there, I heard you.”

“I don’t remember saying that,” Reese said.

“I’m not sure what you’re so upset about,” Sascha said. “You’re here, you’re healthy, and you don’t have to pay for the medical procedure that saved you. What have you got to complain about?”

“I don’t want to owe anyone anything,” Reese said.

“Too late,” Sascha said. “You owed that woman something for her help in bailing you out. Now you’re going to owe our creditors for our repairs. And you certainly owe the doctor there for taking care of you despite being so rude about the whole thing.”

“He and I are
even
,” Reese said, clenching her fists.

“She’s correct,” Hirianthial said. “And since I came with nothing to your ship, there’s nothing I need to retrieve.” He bowed, a formality she thought would look silly and instead looked far too serious, too final. “I thank you for your help in effecting my escape, and I wish you well. Good day, madam.”

And then he was gone.

“What did you do that for!” Irine said. “You sent him away!”

“Of course I sent him away!” Reese exclaimed. “Haven’t you noticed he’s got slavers and pirates after him? We can’t afford another episode like the one we just got out of. You haven’t even told me what the damage was from the whole thing!”