Scholar of Magic (Art of the Adept #3) - Michael G. Manning Page 0,109

you do that, Will?”

Will nodded, keeping his own eyes firmly shut. “Do you see Rob or Janice?”

“I can barely see anything, it’s so bright.”

“Close your eyes until it fades. It won’t hurt you like it does the vampires, but too much could damage your eyesight. I’ll create a safer light in a minute.” But Will had a different priority. First, he constructed another one of Ethelgren’s Illumination spells and stored it within himself. He wanted to be ready. By the time he had finished constructing it, the light from the first spell was fading out, and he put together a simple light spell that would allow Tiny to see.

Will got to his feet, but Tiny stayed seated, his chest heaving. “Can you get up?” Will asked.

“I think so,” said his friend. “But give me a minute.”

Will looked him over. Tiny’s mail appeared to be intact, and his helm was still on his head. There were deep scratches in the breastplate and backplate, but nothing had pierced it. There were a couple more lacerations across Tiny’s cheek, and Will could see that the capillaries around the wound had already turned black. What about me? he thought. He didn’t want to look. His overtunic and brigandine had been ripped away, and his chest and arms were bare. He knew without looking that he was covered in fang marks.

Will summoned two blood-cleanse potions from the limnthal and handed one to Tiny. “Drink it or we’ll become like them.”

Tiny nodded and downed the vial in a single gulp. Will did likewise, his eyes already scanning the gloom for Rob and Janice. He spotted Tailtiu immediately, lying ten feet away, discarded like a broken doll. He went and picked her up, then deposited her near Tiny.

She was dead, so the action made little sense, but he did it anyway. Then he moved outward, looking behind pallets and stacks of goods to see where Janice and Rob might have fallen. He was scared of what he might find. Walking along the center aisle, he spotted a crumpled figure in one of the cross-aisles. It was Janice, with two small mounds of ash on either side of her.

Her head was down and her knees up, while a faint keening sound came from her direction. “Janice, are you all right?” asked Will, knowing the question was foolish. None of them were all right. He summoned another potion from the limnthal and knelt beside her. “Drink this. It will stop the taint from claiming you.” Her head bobbed, and she took the potion with one hand, but she didn’t look up.

Scooting away, she turned her back to him before drinking the potion. She was hiding her face, but Will still saw some of the potion dribble down her neck. Drinking without a cheek and part of a lip was difficult at best. And I don’t have a regeneration potion for her. What would happen to her? The type of wound she had suffered would permanently maim her at best. Without quick medical treatment she might die from the blood loss, or later from an infection.

But would she be happy to survive such an injury? Will wasn’t sure how he would have felt in her position. “Can you walk?” he asked her. “I still have to find Rob.”

She nodded, clambering to her feet and keeping her head down so that her hair covered her ruined eye and cheek. Will led her back to Tiny, who was standing and looking around nervously. A smile lit his face when he saw Janice with Will, and Will felt his own heart break a second time.

Tiny couldn’t tell what was wrong with Janice, but she sheltered in his shadow, keeping her injury from view. Meanwhile, Will collected Tailtiu’s body, and together they made their way through the warehouse, moving toward the exit and searching for Rob at the same time.

They found no trace of him, just more piles of ash. Once they had finished a rough search of the area, they left, for none of them had the reserves to continue searching further.

And Janice. Janice needed proper treatment and the sooner the better. Blood trickled away from her face and soaked the front of her dress.