“I’m not going to fuck you on a stairwell when there’s a perfectly good bed I can take you to,” Cam deadpans.
Maybe he forgot about the stack of mats in the Combat classroom. Although those were more comfortable than stairs, I guess.
Still, I can’t help but tease him a little. “Are you sure? Where’s your sense of adventure?”
“Hey! I think I found it,” Asher calls, gesturing to a corner door at the end of a short hallway.
Right next to a janitor’s closet. How romantic.
Cam jimmies the lock open and pushes on the door. It groans slightly as it swings open, and he has to put his shoulder into it. Asher was right—I don’t think anybody’s been in here in a while. Dust stirs up as we enter, but there are windows placed along the spiraling staircase, so it’s not as creepy as it could be. Hopefully the light has kept the spiders at bay.
“Damn. Guess maybe the janitorial staff decided to take a pass on this one,” Cam jokes. Then he starts up the stairs.
Out of the three of us, he’s the most energetic, so he gets ahead quickly. Asher and I hurry after him, taking the spiraling stone steps two at a time.
“Slow down!” I call up, laughing. “Jesus, if you’re that eager to get this over with so we can get back to the room and have se—”
My voice breaks off and my stomach flips when Cam lets out an ear-splitting scream of pain.
“Cam!”
The word is wrenched out of me as my blood turns to water. Asher is hot on my heels as I bolt up the steps, yelling at the top of my lungs.
There’s a crashing sound, and then I’m nearly knocked backward as Cam falls into me. Asher braces his hands on either side of the wall and holds with all his might as I crash into him, saving all three of us from toppling down the winding staircase.
“Oh, God, no. Cam, Cam, Cam,” I chant in a panic, grabbing him. He’s sweating, groaning in pain, and before he even says it, I know what’s happened—I’ve seen it twice now.
“It’s gone.” His blue eyes are wide with pain and shock. He looks panicked. No, terrified. “It’s gone. Fuck, Sin, it’s gone… My magic’s gone.”
Chapter 21
Cam’s in a huge amount of pain.
He can’t stand. He can barely speak coherently. His large, muscled body is shaking from head to toe, and it breaks my heart and makes my stomach churn with fear to see him like this.
I don’t want to move him, but how else will we get him help? Neither Asher nor I have the training to heal him or stop the pain, and Asher’s not leaving me and Cam alone to go get the healers—and like fuck am I leaving the two of them alone.
Someone could still be up in this tower.
The only solution is to carry Cam.
I’m shaking almost as bad as the blond mage as Asher picks up his top half, arms hooked under his shoulders, and I take his legs. That way Cam can still see my face.
“It’s okay,” I tell him, lying with everything I have as we carry him out of the tower and head toward the infirmary. “You’re going to be okay. We’re getting you help, just concentrate on me, it’s okay.”
It reminds me of when Maddy would get awful nightmares after Mom died. While Mom was sick, my little sister was fine, fine, fine, brave and smiling—but then as soon as she was gone, Mads just crumbled. She used to dream all the time about losing me, usually to something awful, which is how we ended up sharing one big bed. It was just easier, since I always ended up holding her and rocking her back to sleep.
Now it’s the same but worse, because this isn’t a nightmare. It’s real, and inescapable. Cam’s magic—a part of him, a part of his damn soul—is just gone, ripped away.
I can’t even imagine what that feels like.
Asher doesn’t say anything, but his face is pale and his eyes are darting around as we carry Cam across campus, and I know he’s thinking the same thing I am.
We’re practically alone out here. Sure, there are students, faculty, and staff still on campus—but with so many people gone for the holidays, it’s only a skeleton crew left. There’s nobody nearby. Nobody that can help us if whoever attacked Cam chooses to attack Asher and me too.