Encala (27 page)

“
I see… and are you aware
that she has concussions… and yes, Boy, I said that in the plural.
The x-rays show she has had numerous head injuries
recently.”

Kyle shook his head, “She rides horses for a
living, breaking them in causes a lot of injuries.”

“
You are sticking with that
story?”

“
Of course,” Kyle said,
irritated.

“
How about the old rib
fractures?”

“
Same thing… have you ever
broken in a horse? You fall off a lot, get kicked.”

“
I see.” It was silent
while the Sergeant wrote for a while.

“
Are you aware that she
checked out of a hospital in Maine, against medical advice, running
from you?” The officer watched him carefully.

“
That was a
misunderstanding,” Kyle said, sighing.

“
The report says... and I
quote ‘
Emily Russo left against medical
advice, quite adamant on leaving the hospital to get away from an
abusive husband. The husband was extremely irate when he discovered
she was gone
’.” The officer looked up at
him.

“
As I said,
misunderstanding.”

“
You scumbags always have
an excuse don’t you?” the officer said, standing up.

“
Excuse me?” Kyle asked,
trying to control his temper.

“
You’re under arrest,” the
officer said, and Kyle was forced to his feet as his hands were
cuffed behind him. He didn’t resist. It wasn’t his place to expose
his kind. He was forcefully led to the patrol car, and looked up as
Mark and Chevalier pulled up in the Humvee.

Chevalier hopped out and ran at Kyle,
“What’s going on here?”

“
They think I beat up your
sister again,” Kyle said, looking Chevalier in the eyes as he
explained his story in whispers too low for the mortals to
hear.

Chevalier looked at Kyle and then glared,
“You hit her? Your own wife?”

Mark was just coming up the walk and watched
them curiously.

“
You better hope I don’t
see you after tonight,” Chevalier growled, and then stormed into
the hospital with Mark close behind him.

“
I hope he does find you in
some dark street corner,” the officer said, and pushed Kyle into
the back of the car.

Chevalier stopped at the front desk, “I’m
looking for my sister, Emily Russo.”

The nurse slowly looked through papers and
then pushed a button on the desk, “Go through the doors and to room
number six.”

Mark and Chevalier followed her directions
and walked into the room. Chevalier frowned and walked up to the
bed. Emily was lying perfectly still, her head bandaged and her
left arm in a cast. The doctor looked up at him, “Are you
family?”

“
Yes, we’re her brothers,”
Chevalier said, and the doctor looked from him to Mark.

“
Do you know she’s being
abused by her husband?” the doctor asked, feeling Emily’s
wrist.

Chevalier tensed and Mark heard a growl
starting.

“
No, we didn’t know,” Mark
said quickly.

“
She has a laceration
across the back of her head, and multiple concussions in various
stages of healing. She has a broken shoulder blade, that and the
laceration are new for today. So…” the doctor thumbed through her
file, “She has signs of a previously broken jaw, ribs, hip, femur,
nose, cheek bone, ankle, at least four concussions and... well…
there are signs of sexual assault, though that’s been quite a few
years ago. I’ve never seen anything like this.”

Chevalier’s hands tightened into fists.

“
I know you’re upset, but
let the cops handle her husband… right now we need to concentrate
on Emily, ok?” the doctor said, not fully understanding Chevalier’s
anger.

“
The baby?” Mark asked. He
knew Chevalier couldn’t currently talk.

“
It’s too early to
tell.”

“
Why isn’t she awake?”
Chevalier asked, taking her hand.

“
She’s sedated. She
wouldn’t leave her I.V. in.” the doctor said, concerned.

“
Can we have a moment?”
Mark asked, and the doctor stepped out, shutting the door behind
him.

“
Get Kyle out of jail and
get me that Ancient,” Chevalier hissed.

“
I…” Mark sighed, “I can’t
leave you here alone.”

Chevalier nodded, “Very well. Take the arm
in the cast. Do not let go under any circumstance.”

Mark nodded and sat in a chair by her bed,
holding her arm.

“
I don’t have to tell you
what part of that you need to keep to yourself,” Chevalier said,
watching Mark closely.

Mark frowned, “No, you don’t… you killed
him?”

Chevalier nodded.

Nurses came in every fifteen minutes all
night to check on Emily and to adjust her medication. They often
forced her eyes open and shined a bright light across them. They
wrote everything down in a chart and then left with a sad smile to
Chevalier and Mark.

“
Maleth is here,” Mark
said, breaking Chevalier’s trance. They both looked up when the
Elder walked into the room.

“
Hello, Dad,” Mark said,
and Chevalier glanced at Mark and then back to Maleth.

Maleth sat in a chair and lowered his voice
to softer than a whisper, “The Encala won’t trade the Ancient for
their Elder.”

“
Get him,” Chevalier
whispered.

“
We’re trying. The doctor
doesn’t remember attacking Emily.”

Chevalier nodded, “I figured.”

“
We tried to bail Kyle out.
For some reason, he’s going by the name Keith Russo… but anyway…
the judge won’t set a bail until he knows how bad Emily is,” Maleth
explained.

“
Kyle is trying not to
implicate any of the heku in the abuse,” Chevalier said, touching
her cheek lightly.

“
Abuse?” Maleth asked,
curiously.

“
Emily has been through a
lot of abuse, mostly at the hands of her ex-husband, Keith. Then
you add damages done by the Ancient, and the car wreck… it all adds
up to domestic violence,” Chevalier whispered, his insides
tightening.

“
The baby… is
it…”

“
They don’t know.”
Chevalier looked at Emily’s peacefully relaxed face, “Let’s turn
her.”

“
What? Turn Emily?” Mark
gasped.

“
We can’t without her
permission,” Maleth reminded him.

“
It could save her from all
of this. We could turn her right now,” Chevalier said, looking up
at the heku around him.

“
We can’t do it with
three,” Mark said.

“
Why not? We have the two
out of three Elder approvals that we need… we can do
it.”

“
No, we can’t. Three of us
can’t drain her fast enough to make it work,” Maleth said, touching
Chevalier’s arm lightly. “She wouldn’t want to be turned. She has
never expressed a desire for it.”

“
Get me that Ancient,
alive,” Chevalier hissed.

“
There’s one thing…
something I wanted to just bring up,” Maleth said, and waited until
Chevalier looked at him.

“
What?”

“
The dog, Emily’s new dog…
he attacked the doctor.”

“
So? He doesn’t like heku,”
Mark said, softly.

“
I don’t think that’s the
case. As soon as the doctor became aware of his actions, the dog
let him be,” Maleth said.

“
I still don’t see why
we’re talking about the dog right now,” Chevalier said.

Mark nodded, “He started to growl the other
day, just before her headache started.”

“
Chev?” Emily whispered,
and the three heku turned to look at her.

“
I’m here, Em,” he said,
rubbing her hand.

“
I hurt.”

“
I know. You’re in the
hospital,” he said to her. She still hadn’t opened her
eyes.

“
Make them stop. I won’t do
it,” she whispered.

“
Tell me, Em, who?”
Chevalier asked, softly.

“
Tell them I won’t do it,”
she said again.

“
Who?” he asked her,
frustrated.

“
The pain doesn’t matter. I
won’t do it,” she said, frowning slightly.

“
Do what?”

“
Who?” he growled when she
didn’t answer.

“
Visiting hours were over
at 11pm,” a nurse said when she walked in the room.

“
Can’t we stay? Please?”
Mark asked her.

“
Are you her husband?” the
nurse asked, looking at him over her reading glasses.

“
No, her husband is in
jail… we’re brothers and her dad,” Mark explained.

“
Then out,” she said,
irritated. “You can wait in the lobby if you want, visiting hours
start at 7am.”

Maleth and Mark stood up, but Chevalier
didn’t move. They each took an arm and had to use their strength to
get him to stand up and let go of her.

“
She’ll rip out her I.V.,”
Chevalier said, as he was pulled to the door.

“
We’ll watch it,” the nurse
told him, sounding insulted.

The few mortals in the lobby thought the men
in the corner were sitting in silence, still as statues, but they
were, in fact, carrying on a conversation. They were desperately
trying to figure out how they were going to get at the Ancient.
They were interrupted at 7:30am when a pretty nurse came and
touched Maleth on the shoulder.

“
Sir?” she asked, smiling
sweetly at him.

Maleth turned to her, “Yes?”

“
Are you Emily Russo’s
father?”

“
Yes,” he
replied.

“
She’s… well…” the nurse
hesitated and then sighed, “She’s asking for her husband, and we
thought maybe you could talk to her. She doesn’t seem to believe
that her husband is in jail for... domestic violence.”

Maleth nodded, “She’s a lot closer to her
brother, maybe he should go.”

The nurse smiled, “Ok, come with me.”

Chevalier thanked Maleth and followed the
nurse into the elevator.

“
Where is she?” Chevalier
asked.

“
She was moved to the ICU
last night,” the nurse said sweetly.

Chevalier nodded and followed the nurse out
of the elevator and into a large round room. The center desk was
also round and full of monitors and folders. Glass rooms lined the
outside circle, most had curtains pulled across the glass.

The nurse opened Emily’s door and smiled at
Chevalier.

“
Please, let me break it to
her alone,” he said to the nurse, and she nodded and shut the door
after him.

“
Chev,” Emily said, and
smiled.

Chevalier sat down in a chair by her and
took her hand. He frowned when he saw that her hands were
restrained to the sides of the bed with soft leather
restraints.

“
How are you?” he asked,
softly.

“
Let my hands go, please,”
she said, pulling at the restraints.

He smiled and kissed her hand, “I’m
imagining they are there to keep your I.V. in.”

“
Please,” she
begged.

“
How are you?” he asked
again.

“
I’ve had worse,” she said,
and looked up at the I.V.

“
I need to explain some
things. It’s important that you understand me.”

She looked over at him, “What’s wrong?”

He smiled, “Where should I start. Your
injuries, the ones from last night and the ones from previous
years… the doctors are blaming it on domestic violence.”

Emily frowned.

“
We know… some of it was
from Keith. So Kyle took the fall.”

“
What do you
mean?”

“
Kyle has been arrested on
domestic assault charges, from what we can tell… a lot of
them.”

“
Why did he do
that?”

“
I think to save me from
going to jail. He knew I would want to be here. So he went to jail
as Keith, which means he probably kept Keith’s I.D.” Chevalier
watched her carefully.

“
He’s still in
jail?”

“
We’ll get him out, ok? As
soon as a judge posts bail.”

“
If Kyle is Keith, then who
are you?”

“
Your brother… so is Mark,
and Maleth is your Dad,” he said, shrugging. “It all happened so
fast and spiraled into one huge, confusing mess.”

“
I thought I was the one
with the head injury,” Emily said. She laughed once and then
winced.

“
Don’t laugh, Em,” he said,
touching her arm.

“
I don’t remember why I’m
here,” she said finally.

“
It was another ancient
attack.”

“
Why don’t I remember?” she
asked, confused.

“
It was right after one of
your headaches,” Chevalier said. He didn’t mention that he’d been
trying to control her even though his intentions were
good.

“
Please let my hands go,
they hurt,” she said, looking into his eyes.

“
No”

“
They hurt.”