Between Burning Worlds (System Divine #2) - Jessica Brody Page 0,105

down the left side of her face was a river of twisted, angry red scars. When the woman smiled, though, it immediately put Chatine back at ease. It was a kind smile. A smile that seemed to chase the scars away. Or, at the very least, soothe their anger.

“Bonjour, Chatine.”

“Bonjour, pretty lady,” Chatine replied.

The woman chuckled. “You can call me Brigitte. It’s nice to see you awake.”

Chatine grinned. “It’s nice to be awake.”

“What do you think about trying to sit up and drink some water?” the woman asked.

Chatine was instantly filled with delight. “I think it’s the best idea in the world.”

Etienne laughed again. “Maman, how much did you give her?”

Brigitte waved the question away. “She’s post-op.”

Etienne scooped one hand under each of Chatine’s shoulders and gave her a push.

“Okay, up you go. Jeez, you weigh nothing. We need to put some meat on your bones.”

Chatine giggled again. “Meat on bones. That’s funny.” She turned and cupped one of Etienne’s cheeks with her hand and gazed deeply into his intense, dark eyes, feeling like she could easily get lost in them. “You’re funny. And very handsome.”

He cleared his throat. “Yup. Definitely the goldenroot talking.”

Brigitte brought a small cup of water to Chatine’s lips. Chatine sipped it slowly. It was cold and refreshing and so much cleaner than the water she drank back in the Frets or on Bastille. It tasted like it came straight from the sky.

“Not too much,” Brigitte warned, pulling the cup away.

Chatine licked her lips with a smacking sound as she glanced around the room. It wasn’t much bigger than her family’s old couchette back in the Frets. Except here, there were no rusting walls, no empty weed wine bottles strewn on the table, no cockroaches skittering across the floor. Instead, this room was neat and clean and cozily lit by tiny lights cupped into the ceiling. The whole space was bordered by shelves filled with what appeared to be various medical supplies, and, in the center of the room, a handful of neatly made cots sat side by side in a row. Cots just like the one Chatine was currently sitting on.

She tried to remember coming in here, but her mind was blank. The last thing she could remember was being on the ship. What was its name again? Margaret? Martha?

“Where am I?” she asked groggily as Etienne laid her back down.

Brigitte pressed two fingers to the inside of Chatine’s right wrist and tilted her head, as though listening for something. “You’re inside my treatment center.”

“How long have I been in here?”

Brigitte released Chatine’s hand and placed it back on the bed. “Almost a full day.”

Chatine startled, the fluffy, peaceful feeling running through her veins ebbing for just a second. “What!?”

“Shhh,” Brigitte said, gently rubbing Chatine’s shoulder. “Relax. Try not to let yourself get too worked up. My son here says you have a tendency to overreact.”

Chatine shot a look at Etienne who grinned back at her. She felt another strange inkling that this, too, should annoy her but it was as though the feeling was a slippery fish that she couldn’t keep grasped in her hand.

“Normally, procedures don’t require that much healing time, but in conjunction with the shrapnel in your leg—which I was thankfully able to remove—we had to increase your recovery period.”

Chatine could hear the woman speaking. She could pluck out words she understood as they floated by her. But she couldn’t seem to make sense of them.

The woman nodded to Chatine’s left arm. “I’ll continue to monitor you until you’re healthy enough to leave; in the meantime, we’ll just have to keep the incisions clean.”

Slowly, Chatine turned her head and let her gaze fall to the side. She knew the sight in front of her should have elicited some kind of strong reaction, but all she could feel in that moment was curiosity.

Running up and down the inside of her left wrist was a rectangle of red seams. Four neat lines, where her flesh had been pinched and sewn together with what looked like thread.

Had that been there before?

Chatine was almost certain it hadn’t. But her mind struggled to remember what used to be there. Something used to be there.

“You’ll have a scar, but it should heal nicely,” Brigitte said. “Skin removals are one of my specialties. In fact, I did two just this month.”

Skin removal?

And then suddenly, Chatine could see it. The faint shadow of a small, rectangular screen. The ghost of what used to be and was no more.

The fluffy