All around me, there are horrible noises. Battle noises. People screaming, the squish of flesh as bodies batter against each other, the roar of dragons and howls of enraged wolves. I want to look, want to make sure that Jaxon and Macy and Flint and Eden and Xavier—that all my people—are okay.
But Mekhi’s eyes are wide and afraid in a way I’ve never seen from him before, and there’s no way I’m looking away, even for an instant. No way I’m leaving him alone in this for one single, solitary moment.
And so I lean down and whisper all kinds of things to him. Things that make no sense to me, let alone him, but that bind us together with their extreme lack of importance and their utter humanity at the same time.
Things like how much I like his locks, and how I think he and Eden would make a good couple, and how much I appreciated his friendship my first couple of weeks at Katmere. And also what my favorite vampire movie is—The Lost Boys, obviously—and why being a gargoyle is the strangest feeling in the world.
Finally, after what feels like hours but is probably only three or four minutes, I feel the heat under my hand start to dissipate. Mekhi’s eyes go wide, and suddenly he takes a long, deep breath for the first time since I landed beside him.
“You did it,” Hudson tells me, and there’s pride in his voice as well as something that sounds an awful lot like awe.
“I did it?” I repeat, a part of me unable to believe that this bizarre act might actually have worked.
“Take your hand away,” he says, and I do, astonished to see that where a gaping wound was only a few minutes ago, there is now only smooth, sleek stone.
“According to the books I’ve read on gargoyles, the stone patch-up won’t last forever,” Hudson continues as I reach down and pull Mekhi into a sitting position. “But it should last more than long enough for him to get himself to the infirmary to be looked at.”
I grin as I tell Mekhi what Hudson said, finally allowing myself to hug him now that I know my handiwork won’t fall apart in the next two minutes and take Mekhi with it.
But Mekhi shakes his head as soon as I mention getting him to the infirmary. “No way!” he grinds out in a voice that’s both lower and rustier than his usual tone. “I need to go with you. The plan—”
“Screw the plan,” I tell him as Jaxon finally shows up beside us. He’s a little bloody and a lot bruised, but he’s alive and in one piece and that’s good enough for me. “You’re going to the infirmary.”
“Damn straight he is,” Jaxon agrees. And so do the others as they gather around us, too.
And that’s when I look up and realize that despite insurmountable odds, we’ve won this round. The entire contingent of Circle guards is lying on the ground in various states of unconsciousness or injury, and every single one of my friends is still standing. Except Mekhi, obviously, but he’s alive and that’s more than good enough for me.
“We need to go,” Eden urges. “They won’t be down for long, and they’ve probably already called for help. If we have any chance of actually getting out of here, now is the time to go—before reinforcements show up.”
Her nose starts bleeding as she talks, and she wipes the blood away with the back of her hand.
“But we have to get Mekhi to the infirmary,” I protest. “We can’t leave him out here alone.”
“There’s no time,” he tells me. “I can hear them coming.”
“We all can,” Xavier agrees. “We’ve got to go, Grace.”
I turn to Jaxon. Surely he gets that we can’t just leave his best friend here in the middle of this mess. But he, too, is shaking his head. “We’re out of time, Grace. It’s now or never.”
I want to say never, but I know I can’t. Not now that we’re so close.
“I’m strong enough to fade because of you, Grace. Now, go.” And just like that, Mekhi’s gone, fading into the forest.
“Let’s go,” Flint says grimly, and then he’s shifting back into his dragon form. I shift back to human at the same time, and now, Jaxon doesn’t wait for me to climb on under my own power. Instead, he all but throws me on top of Flint and climbs on