Ferus : Book 6 of the Heku Series (21 page)

Quinn nodded and Anna
appeared at his side, “Show us how to do it so we can change the
bandages.”

Quinn and Anna watched
carefully as the doctor showed them how to cover the wounds with
the ointment and then wrap gauze around them to keep them clean. He
left instructions to clean the wounds with peroxide before using
the ointment, and to keep her out of a bath for a few days until
they fully scabbed over.

Dr. Edwards handed over
antibiotics and pain pills, glancing nervously at Zohn and
Chevalier before leaving. He promised to be back in a few days to
check on her.

“Mark,” Chevalier called
out, and sat beside Emily in the bed.

“Yes, Elder?”

“Hurt him… if I see him
I’ll kill him, and I want him alive… and in pain.”

Mark grinned maliciously, “Yes, Elder.”

Chevalier carefully put a nightgown on her
and laid her arms on pillows before covering her with the warm down
blankets.

She gasped slightly at the movement and
mumbled, “I won’t tell you.”

He took her hand and
immediately picked up swirling gray colors of her dream starting.
She slept through the day and night as the Elders entertained Dain
and sent regular messages to the Council. Over the course of 12
hours, they brought her temperature back to normal and soon had the
room warm and comfortable.

Just after noon the
following day, she started to stir and spoke, her words slurred,
“Chev?”

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

“Hurts”

Anna handed over three pills and held a
glass of orange juice.

“Take these,” Chevalier
told her, and slid an arm under her shoulders. He gently pulled her
up to sitting and she took the pills, drinking all of the cold
juice. Once she was done he laid her back down. “Do you need
anything else?”

“Don’t leave.”

“I won’t, I promise… get some rest.”

Zohn growled, “I want to make sure he’s in
enough pain.”

“Don’t kill him,” Quinn reminded him.

“Oh I won’t,” Zohn said,
and disappeared from the room.

Chevalier was watching Alexis play with Dain
on the floor when Emily finally woke up.

“Always hurt,” she said,
and shifted slightly.

He looked over at her, “Here, take some pain
meds.”

He helped her lean up as
Zohn dug pain pills out of the bottle and handed them to Chevalier.
She took them with juice and Quinn stuffed pillows behind her, so
she could sit up a little. She looked around the room through
swollen eyes.

“I didn’t tell them anything,” she told
them, though her words were slurred because of her injured
mouth.

“You should have told them
and let us deal with it, instead of taking that,” Quinn said, and
sat down beside her on the bed.

“It wouldn’t have mattered
if I told them or not, they wanted revenge for Larry, Cody, and
Bruce.”

“What did they want to know?” Zohn asked,
pulling up a chair.

Emily cleared her throat,
“Um… they wanted to know where Cody and Larry are, and also where
the vampire’s main city is.”

“Can we get you anything?”

“I hurt a man on the beach…”

Chevalier nodded and lied,
“Yes, I killed him.”

“They told me they had a
package. I thought it was another gift… then I got hit with a
Taser.”

Quinn removed the extra
pillows when Emily began to drift off and her breathing slowed
down. Chevalier pulled the covers over her and glanced around the
room, safely locking away his growing fury.

“What is he saying?” Chevalier asked after a
few moments of silence.

Zohn shrugged, “He’s
trying to say he didn’t do any of the beating, that he was just
told to watch the cold storage, but I find it odd that he has a
pretty good cut on his neck, looks like fingernail
scratches.”

“When she feels better,
we’ll find out for sure.”

***

“How are you feeling?” Dr. Edwards
asked.

Emily was sitting up in bed, propped against
pillows with her arms resting in her lap, “Better, I guess.”

“What hurts the worst?”

“I think my kidney,” she
said. “Course… the V on my stomach doesn’t feel all that hot
either.”

“I would imagine not.
Nothing’s infected though, so keep doing what you’re
doing.”

“When can I get up and around?”

“It’s been a week… why
don’t you get out today, go for a nice walk, it’s gorgeous
outside,” Dr. Edwards suggested.

“Thank you for coming,”
Chevalier said, and shook the doctor’s hand before he
left.

Emily smiled, “I’m free.”

“Just take it easy and promise me you’ll
stay inside the cement wall.”

“I swear,” she said, and
swung her legs over the side of the bed. The dark bruises covering
her body were healed down to purplish yellow.

“I wish you would
reconsider coming back to the palace for a week.”

“I’m ok here, Chev. I
don’t want to leave the island, and I’ll be good and stay up
here.”

“Still…”

“I know you have an important trial, just
go, I’m ok.”

He kissed the top of her head lightly,
“Allen is staying, so is Jaron and Silas.”

“Tell Jaron and Silas to go back, no need to
keep them here bored.”

Chevalier grinned, “They
offered to stay. I think they want the V.E.S. to show
up.”

She frowned, “I’d rather them not.”

“Be nice to them, they really do want to
stay here.”

Emily nodded and watched
Chevalier walk slowly out of the room. She knew he didn’t want to
go, but also knew he didn’t have a choice.

“Margaret?” Emily called
out. The heku came in with a huge smile.

“Yes, Lady?”

“I need a new swim suit, just when you get a
second.”

Margaret’s eyes lit up, “Oh, right
away!”

Emily stood up slowly,
groaning with the pain in her body the movement caused. Every
muscle was bruised and sore, and her shoulders screamed with every
move.

“Mom?” Allen asked, appearing at her
side.

“It’s ok, just sore,” she
told him, and leaned against the bed post. “One of these days I’ll
quit getting beat up.”

Allen grinned, “I bet not.”

“Gee thanks… where’s Alex?”

“Downstairs with Dain.”

“What are you up to
today?” she asked, and grabbed some clothes from the
dresser.

“Just stuff. Dad said I
could patrol inside the cement walls with some of the
guards.”

Emily turned to him, “You really want to be
a guard, don’t you?”

“Yes, actually… I do.”

“What happened to medical school?”

“I got bored, and all I
really want to do is help protect the heku.”

Emily walked over and kissed his cheek, “Too
much like your Dad.”

“You say that like it’s a
bad thing,” Allen chuckled, and watched her disappear into the
bathroom.

“It is, do you know how much trouble your
Dad gets into?”

“Not nearly as much as you do.”

“Hey, behave,” Emily said, laughing, and
walked out.

“What are you doing
today?” Allen asked skeptically.

“For starters, I’m going into my
office.”

“The no heku aloud office…”

“Yes, and that includes you.”

Allen smiled, “That’s just because I’m the
only one on this island that would understand whatever it is you
use those computers for.”

“So true,” she said, and
tied her hair up. “Come swimming later with Dain and I.”

“No thanks… heku don’t swim.”

“Why is that?”

Allen shrugged, “I don’t
know… enjoy your office. I’m going to go talk to Captain
Lon.”

Emily followed him out,
and on the first-floor, she headed to her office and stopped at the
door, turning to her guards, “Alone time… why don’t you two go
watch Alex and Dain.”

Jaron glanced around, “You won’t leave your
office?”

“If I do, I’m sure you’ll
hear me,” she told him, and took a cup of coffee from a servant
before going into her office and shutting the door.

Emily sat down and flipped
on the six monitors. She knew Silas was messing around with her
computers, but also knew that’s how they found her. She reissued
the no heku rule and sat back to watch the logs of the V.E.S. flash
in front of her, reading each one carefully.

After a few hours, she got
up to stretch and moved over to a mirror on the wall. She studied
her face. The nose brace was still taped on, but her black eyes
were almost gone. Her bottom lip was swollen a bit and had a long
scab, but that was healing too. Her left cheek was puffy because of
the broken bone underneath and it was still showing a light purple
bruise. She had one bite on her neck, but the rest were hidden
beneath her clothes and all were fading with time.

“Ok, I can talk here,” she heard someone
whisper from the hallway. She got nosey and froze, listening
carefully.

“I don’t know. I can’t get
into the prison at my rank… if I had to guess though, Ossie is
probably dead. Her husband has been down there.”

Emily frowned. She wished
she knew the name of the V.E.S. member they brought back from the
boat.

“No, they sunk it.
Everyone on board but Ossie was killed.”

“Yeah, she’s up and around
again, so no time like the present to attack. How many are you
bringing?”

Emily shut her eyes and concentrated, making
sure to hear every word.

“That’s not enough, there
are over 1200 vampires on this island…. No, no… don’t underestimate
us. We can take out 10 humans a piece.”

“Yes. She’ll come help.
She can’t keep her nose out of anything,” the voice said, and
paused before speaking again. “I’ll try, but damn, if they find out
that I told you all when the bitch was going out of the walls… I’ll
be dead next.”

“Sure, sure, I’ll be
waiting, and I’ll make sure no one sounds the alarm in time to shut
those bloody bars at the pier... Ok… if you don’t hear from me
again, then consider it a go.”

As soon as he hung up,
Emily narrowed her eyes and heard him scream as his cell phone
crashed onto the floor. She heard heku from all over the palace run
toward the screams and the hallway outside of her office filled
with guards.

When she released him and
stepped out, all eyes turned to her. The heku on the ground was
panting and resting against the floor.

“Did you do that?” Jaron asked, turning to
her.

“Get him to the helicopter, he needs to talk
to Chevalier,” Emily said, glaring at the heku on the floor.

“Yes, Ma’am,” Jaron
growled, and grabbed the heku from the floor.

“Lock down the island until we get
back.”

Two of the Island Guards
ran off to follow her orders.

“Get back to your posts,”
Emily said, and watched the rest of the guards disappear. She
followed Jaron, Silas, and an Island Guard up to the helicopter.
Her personal pilot was just powering up Winchester 1 when Emily
crawled in. She sat on the plush couch while the guards held the
frantic prisoner on the floor, then she reached over and grabbed
some juice as they headed for the palace.

“Please… let me go… I don’t know why I’m
being taken to the palace,” he said.

“Shut up, Wade,” Jaron
hissed, and tweaked his arm painfully behind him.

The prisoner screamed and tried to catch his
breath, “She’s… wrong… I didn’t do… anything.”

Jaron brought his elbow
down onto the back of Wade’s neck, and he fell to the floor as a
loud crunching sound filled the helicopter, “I said… shut
up.”

***

“It may not work,” Quinn
said. “Plus… we don’t have room for any more horses to add members
of the Cavalry.”

“Unless they share horses,” Zohn said, deep
in thought.

“Not sure how well that’d go over, they’re
pretty protective of their horses.”

“True”

“I’m guessing she would
tell us to have the more experienced Cavalry train them though,”
Chevalier said. “I doubt she’d move here for the six weeks of horse
training.”

“Damn,” Kyle said, and
stood up. “We have a helicopter asking to land.”

“Maybe it’ll bring us
something to do,” Quinn said, and leaned his head back to stare at
the ceiling. “It’s been too quiet.”

Kyle grinned and disappeared up the stairs
to the roof.

Chevalier frowned and looked over at Quinn
when the helicopter got closer, “That’s Winchester 1.”

He nodded, still looking at the ceiling,
“She probably just came to get more of her stuff.”

“Yeah, true.”

“I’m surprised actually,”
Dustin said. “I figured she wouldn’t come out into public until her
wounds were completely healed.”

“I didn’t either,”
Chevalier said. “Must have left something important.”

Quinn finally looked up when there was a
scuffle outside of the trial room doors, “Hrm… then again, maybe
there’s a problem.”

The door flew open as
Jaron and Kyle roughly escorted one of the Island Coven Guards into
the trial room. Chevalier’s eyes grew wide when he saw Wade, one of
the castle guards, pushed to his knees before the Council. Wade
looked up at the Council, his eyes full of terror.