And then it clicked. His dad was the Uncle Tevin that Jackson had been telling her about when he explained why the royal family got sequestered when a mesmer came over the wall. She nodded, then conceded, “Still. I think it’s best I find another class to go to next week. I’ll be in touch.”
Rachtin nodded regretfully. “When will he wake up?”
Jade smiled. “Probably in about five minutes. I just wanted him out long enough for me to leave.”
Rachtin nodded in understanding, then glared at the rest of the students. “This isn’t to spread beyond this classroom unless you’re being interviewed by someone from the royal family or someone they’ve sent. Do you understand?”
A chorus of “Yes, sir,” rang out from their lips, and Jade wiggled her fingers at them and grabbed her fire tree as she nodded respectfully to Rachtin and Tristan, who still looked concerned.
Tristan held the door open for her as she left, whispering a soft, “Sorry about all that.” She smiled and shook her head.
“Not your fault. Have a good day, Tristan.” She then walked out, quickly disappearing around the corner and heading towards her workshop.
She had a lot to think about. Still, she couldn’t help but sing softly with a wry grin, “Light him up, up, up. He’ll taste fiyaaaaaaaaaaaah.”
Chapter Seven – Neighbors
To Jade’s surprise, when she rounded the corner, the hallway wasn’t as empty as she had anticipated. At the far end of the hall in front of her workshop door were a few people hovering anxiously, as if they could will her to appear. Tucking her burning branch behind her back, she approached them quietly, scaring a few of them enough to make them jump when she asked innocently, “Whatcha doooin?”
It was pretty much a rhetorical question because she could see why they were there. The boy on the makeshift stretcher in front of her was covered in what looked like a torn up blanket that was slowly becoming a dark reddish-brown and the smell of iron assaulted her nose. One of them asked quickly, “Are you Jade?”
She nodded, walking past them to unlock her door and hold it open. “Bring him in, gently. He obviously doesn’t need to lose any more blood.” They scrambled to oblige, gingerly but quickly pulling the makeshift stretcher up and carrying him into the room, moving him to the table she pointed at as she brushed against them with the barest fingertip as they passed in order to grab her new dots. As soon as they’d entered, she followed them to a table, setting her fire tree on the next nearest table and putting a gentle hand on his arm as his injuries flooded into her mind’s view.
She frowned at the sheer magnitude of his injuries. Gesturing to the ‘bandages’ they’d shoved on him, she ordered, “Gently get rid of anything covering the wounds. I’ve stopped the blood flow, but I don’t want to heal any threads into his injury or use more blood to clean it out if I don’t have to.” She frowned again as she muttered, “And then you get to tell me how he got mauled by a giant animal so badly while at Dracona.”
Seriously, where did this happen? She wanted to stay waaaaaay clear of wherever it was. Still, she didn’t have much brainpower to devote to the problem, given that she was trying to keep this dude alive. He’d lost way too much blood. The other two had finally finished pulling away all the bandages and clothes covering his wounds by the time she’d identified all of the wounds and what she needed to do.
Concentrating, she pulled out as little blood as she could in order to get rid of the contaminants that were obviously on the claws of the creature. After that, she quickly knit together muscle and bone. The kid was a mess. It was a full ten minutes later before she finally sat back, perspiration beading on her forehead. She glanced around, only to notice that the table looked like a massacre had happened, what with all the blood and bloody rags sitting there.
Unable to stomach the view, she silently called to the blood, and one of the boys cursed as it started to move, wriggling through the air until it formed a globe above her hand. She grimaced, seeing how much blood he’d actually spilled. It was likely that this wasn’t everything either. The poor sap was at least completely out the whole time, so he didn’t have to deal with the pain of her healing him. She put it on the table a little ways away from her fire tree. As a globe, it looked less grotesque than when it was splattered everywhere, though the others seemed a little unnerved by her actions.
“Is Walter okay?” Guy number one was looking warily between her, the blood, and the body…er, boy, on the table. With her little blue dot confirming that the body’s name was indeed Walter, she nodded.
“Yes, he’ll be fine, just a little weak for a few days until the regeneration I set in place completes. He didn’t have enough nutrients for me to work with to do more than set it in motion, so he’s going to feel sick and need to eat a lot.” She could have talked about his red blood cells or the hemoglobin in them, but they wouldn’t understand, so why bother?
Guy number two nodded, and she finally got a good chance to study the three of them. Guy one looked older; he was probably one of the assistant professors like Tristan. His hair was a nice sandy brown and was pulled back into a low ponytail to try and control the light waves she saw. It was Fabio hair pulled back, even if his body didn’t quite match. He was fit, but didn’t have the romance novel vibe. His hazel eyes were still worried. Guy two looked to be an older student, and it was almost as if he was mimicking his idol, the way his dark brown hair was also grown out and pulled back. His slimmer features almost gave him an evil villain vibe if it wasn’t for his panicked baby blue gaze.
Good ol’ body Walter was the only one who didn’t have long hair, and he looked much less fit than the others. He was probably a second year, but maybe it was just that he looked innocent and younger in his passed out state. Looking between the three of them, she asked firmly, “Now, can you please tell me who you are and how on earth this boy got mauled?”
Guy one winced, then said a little guiltily, “Ah, right. Sorry. I’m Baronet Randall Rosen, this is Lord Sean Macmannon, and the guy on the table is Walter Licnus.” He looked hesitant to tell her how he’d gotten injured, but Jade just stared him down with an eyebrow raised. He let out a breath and explained, “He was trying to bond an iompro in the contractual magic class. We thought he had it, but the next thing we knew, it went berserk and started attacking him. He was suffering backlash from the failed bond, so he didn’t block anything. It took a bit before we could uh…dispose of the beast.”
She stared at him as if trying to ascertain that what he was telling her was the truth. Why on earth would anyone try to form a contract with something like a bear!? At least, that’s what the claw marks had reminded her of, and wait…wasn’t contractual magic her next class? Looking at the kid in front of her, she was no longer quite so keen to go to it anymore. First, fire turned out to be a mess, and now she wasn’t sure she wanted to go to contractual… This wasn’t a great omen for her future magic classes.
Realizing she’d overlooked an important piece of information, she zeroed back in on Randall as she asked, “Wait, you said he was suffering backlash from a failed contract? Explain, please.”