David Weber - Hell's Gate

The magister broke off, her mouth tight, and Morikan nodded in comprehension.

"Their last names are the same," Jasak added. "I found that out when she woke up. They're either married or brother and sister, and I'm inclined to agree with Magister Gadrial's theory that they're married."

The big healer looked into Shaylar's eyes, took in the ghastly bruises that had turned half her face into a swollen, black mass of pain, and his jaw turned to granite.

"Start getting your less critically wounded onto the dragon, Sir Jasak," he said briskly. "I'll tend to them once we get back to the base camp, but I don't dare wait that long with this one."

Jasak nodded tightly and turned away to begin giving orders, and Naf Morikan crouched down over Jathmar's still form. He drew a deep breath, closed his eyes, and reached out, summoning the healing trance that gave him the power to work the occasional miracle.

Shaylar had no clear idea what the giant leaning over her husband was doing, but it was obvious he was the person Jasak Olderhan had been waiting for so anxiously. The newcomer was so huge he reminded her painfully of Fanthi chan Himidi, but the difference in his personality and chan Himidi's was blindingly evident, even to her presently crippled Talent. chan Himidi had been one of Shaylar's dearest friends, yet she'd always been aware of his capacity for violence. Trained and disciplined, it had always been firmly under control, yet it had always been there, as well.

This man might wear the uniform of a soldier, and his personality was certainly just as strong as chan Himidi's had ever been, but his battles weren't the sort one fought with weapons.

The newcomer had lifted the blanket off Jathmar's burnt back and hissed aloud at the damage he'd found. But he didn't appear to be doing anything else at all. He was just kneeling there, hands extended over Jathmar's stretcher, eyes unfocused, staring at nothing… .

And then, suddenly, Jathmar began to glow.

Shaylar gasped. Light poured from the big man's hands, enveloping Jathmar's entire body. Then, despite the whirling black pain in her head, the marriage bond roared wide. Shaylar flinched violently in Gadrial's arms as Jathmar's pain blasted through her. She sensed Gadrial's sudden twitch of hurt as her fingers sank deep into the other woman's upper arms, but she couldn't help it. Her back was a mass of fire, her chest a broken heap of agony wrapped around ribs shattered like china someone had dropped to the floor, and her insides were bleeding.

Then she felt an odd presence, like a tide of warm syrup flowing over her?into her?and there was intelligence in the syrup. There were thoughts and emotions, a sense of awe that she was alive at all, and a determination to keep her among the living.

A soothing wave of light and energy she could sense but couldn't see sank down into her blistered back. The sensations were soul-shaking. She could literally feel her skin growing as blisters popped, drained, vanished. The damage ran deep … and so did whatever was sinking into her, repairing the deep layers of skin and tissue damaged in the hellish vortex of the enemy's fire.

It sank deeper still, down into her bleeding abdomen. She felt half-glued wounds knitting themselves together as new tissue closed the gaps and fissures in blood vessels, intestinal walls, muscles and organs. Pain flashed through her, bright and terrible, as ribs shifted, moving on their own, grating back into proper alignment. She writhed, whimpering, and the pain in her chest burst free in an agonized cry.

Shaylar's sudden scream yanked Naf Morikan straight out of healing trance. His head whipped around, and he stared, shaken and confused, as Shaylar writhed in Gadrial's arms. Motion under his hands jerked his attention back to Jathmar, and his eyes went wider still as he realized Jathmar was moving in exactly the same way.

"What the living hell is going on?" the healer breathed in shock.

"I don't know," Gadrial Kelbryan gasped, her own face wrung with pain from the crushing grip of Shaylar's daggered fingers as they sank into her biceps. "I don't know, but for pity's sake, man, finish the job! They're both in agony!"

The magister was right, and Morikan returned to the trance. He was shaken, intrigued, and utterly mystified, but he forced all of that aside, out of the forefront of his attention, and reached out to that healing flood of power once more.

Now that Jathmar was semi-conscious, the healer took care to stimulate the centers of the brain and spinal cord that produced natural pain killers. The patient's body flooded with his own internally produced pain-fighting serum in moments, which quickly put an end to his semi-aware thrashing about, and Morikan was dimly aware that his wife's cries had faded as well.

By the time the job was done, Morikan felt as if he'd spent the day slogging through a jungle under a hundred-pound pack. But Jathmar's grievous wounds were healed, and the healer let his hands drop into his lap.

"He's sleeping naturally," he sighed, sitting up from his hunched position over the stretcher. "He'll sleep for several hours, while his body replenishes its energy, mending itself. We'll need to wake him briefly to take some nourishment, but I'd rather wait until we've got him back to our side of the portal before doing that."

Jasak Olderhan had returned from overseeing the loading of his other wounded, and he arrived in time to overhear the healer's last sentence.

"Thank you, Naf. Thank you." He clasped the sword's hand in a firm grip. "Now let's get you back into the saddle. And let's get Shaylar onto the dragon, too. Magister Gadrial, I'd like you to go with us. Shaylar trusts you more than anyone else, and she'll need you to keep her steady."

"I'll just get my pack," Gadrial agreed, and bent her head, murmuring into Shaylar's ear.

Shaylar roused from deep confusion and the oddest dreams of her life and realized Gadrial was urging her to get up. She managed to obey, still supported by the other woman's arms, and realized Jathmar's stretcher had moved. She looked around, quick alarm cutting through her confusion, then relaxed?slightly?as she discovered that several men were maneuvering Jathmar and his stretcher upwards, toward a long platform strapped to the back of the immense animal still crouched in the stream.

At least the beast that couldn't possibly exist?the dragon, her mind insisted, because that fairytale label was the only one she could think of?wasn't still staring at her. That was a massive relief.

It had swiveled its head to watch the men climbing up its side with an almost absurdly attentive air, instead. The way its head was cocked, the intentness with which it watched what was going on, reminded her of the freight master on one of the famous Trans-Temporal Express' endless trains.

Cinches like the belly bands of an ordinary saddle, but far larger, were drawn up tight every four feet and buckled securely, securing the platform on its back. Sidewalls around the top of the platform, a foot and a half high, bore plenty of cleats for ropes or straps, and the purpose became clear as Jathmar's stretcher was hoisted up and roped into place so that his "bed" couldn't shift. They fastened straps to Jathmar, as well, so that he wouldn't roll off the stretcher.

It's a mobile hospital, Shaylar marveled. Or, rather, an aerial ambulance for evacuating wounded to the nearest real hospital.

They didn't load all the wounded soldiers onto it, however; only those with wounds serious enough to prevent them from walking out on their own. There were quite a lot of them, and she was glad of that. So fiercely glad it frightened her that Sharonian lives hadn't been sold cheaply. She only wished there were more dead soldiers, because however kindly Gadrial might treat her, however gentle and patient Jasak might be, she could not forget the slaughter they'd perpetrated. She would never forget it. Whether or not she could ever forgive it was a question for the future, and she was too battered to think even a few minutes ahead, far less weeks or months.