StelrLight

  “What just happened?” I asked, fused about the lights.

  “He was murdered.” Someone croaked. “Those lights don’t appear if you die from a trap, they only appear when someone directly caused your death.”

  As she finished speaking, a few cries filled the room. When I turo see what was going on, I caught sight of lights streaming off another person as they colpsed. It was only because I was looking in her dire that I noticed a girl nearby puffing up. The girl looked as though she was going through a cartoonish-style allergic rea. Unlike cartoons though, her skin cracked and bled as the skin stretched.

  The sight broke whatever had the group us spell as multiple people fled toward the door. I stayed where I was, unsure as to what to do. While I could run, I doubted that would do me any good. If this was a disease and I was ied, then I would be spreading the thing to people outside. If it oison, well I was dead anyway. I wasn’t the only oo stay where I was either.

  Still, the sounds of people beating against the door joihe cries that echoed through the room. “Why won’t it open?!” Someone cried while others wailed in fear. “LET ME OUT!” “I DON’T WANT TO DIE!”

  Still, the door stayed closed no matter what they did to it. One by one, I watched as lights flit from body after body as they dropped to the ground in various states of dead. One shriveled up as all of the water, and other bodily fluids, poured out of every opening. The gross brown-colored liquid caused quite a few of the panig people to slip and fall. A few heads bashed against the group.

  Even with my limited medical knowledge, I khat most of the falls were hal. Fuck, most of them should have only yielded a small bump. Whatever was affeg everyone made its presenown in a few victims by thinning their boheir heads practically spttered against the ground.

  Others rose from their fall only to start vomiting. At first, their stomachs released every bit of food it held, but the retg got worse, not better. I shivered as I watched one of the mech up an an. What an? I had no clue nor did I want to know.

  The sound of a familiar cry pulled my attention toward the first Oracle I had met. As my head turned, I found that most of the people who had remai the table were slumped over, dead or dying. While the sight was sad, my eyes tio move until I found the person who had cried out. Slumped ba her chair sat Philipa. Her ashen face helped her fear-filled eye pop out at me.

  As if the fact that it was someone I had watched die once, my mind tried to break out of the stupor and indifference I was in. Why was I just sitting here? Why was I watg people around me die and doing nothing to help some of them? Surely there was a way for me to get us out of the room or at least keep a few people alive until help came.

  I tried to work through my options but it was like wading through mud. My mind worked but each thought took a while to form and when it did it was as if it was made of mist, always trying to dissipate. Eventually, though, I mao get my feet under me as I worked my way toward a struggling Philipa.

  I shoved chairs out of my way as I pushed my body to move faster. Her breathing was ing fast and shallow as a trickle of foaming blood dribbled from the er of her mouth. All signs of blood in her lungs, or at least that was what I had once read in a book long ago. Whether it was right or not didn’t matter. All I knew was that she was struggling for air and the blood was likely making it hard for her to breathe.

  Finally, I got a hand on her. Mana flooded out of me as I forced as much of it as I could into my Emergency Healing spell. Sure the spell ate mana and was incredibly wasteful but what other choice did I have? Should I just let her die, again?

  Just as her breathing started to improve and the color returo her skin, someone smmed into me on their way to the ground. The heavy body smashed me into the table, pinnihere as he nded on my patient.

  Immediately Philipa released a spray of blood into the air as she let out of rattling cry of pain. Before I could so much as shove the idiot to the side or even stab him, bubbles of light flit out from Philipa’s body. She was gone. She had died a sed time and there had been nothing I could do about it.

  As if it had been waiting for this moment, a sharp pain stabbed through my heart. Whatever it was didn’t stay there either. Before I could recast my healing spell, the object grew ih. Growing from the top of my heart to the end of my spine. Every breath felt like fire as the object ground against most of the ans inside my chest.

  I was in enough pain that there was no ce I could focus enough to cast a spell. Which meant that all I could do was wait for whatever it was to kill me. Of course, the first face that popped into my head was the stupid alpha’s. It was his fault that I was here. That I was dying.

  The faces to flit ay mind’s eye were Barti’s and the girl’s. For a moment I wondered what they were up to. Were they still in the begiown or had they escaped with the rest of the non-humans we had freed? Maybe when I came back I would ask around. Surely someone would know the answer.

  It shouldn’t have surprised me, given the reminder of the starter town and all that had happehere, but the faces to pop up were those of Linda and her party. Well, all the ohat I had either killed or helped kill. Seeing them, I wondered what had happened after they died. Did Michael and the two guys respawn up here or did they e back with Linda, wherever that was?

  Then again, did it matter? I doubted I would see them again and even if I did I was fairly sure they wouldn’t hesitate to try and kill me. Hell, her father would probably be the only ohat wouldn’t kill me on sight. No, that creep would just try and bio him. Likely so that he could fuck me et me to do things for him. Either way, I hoped I would never see those five people ever again.

  As if it had been waiting for me to shove those images away, I found myself thinking of the wolf. Sure, he had been an asshole but how much of it had been his fault? I was sure that Linda and the rest of her party did quite a number on him in an effort to break him. Of course that didn’t excuse what he had done and the damage he had caused.

  Hell, I probably would never five him for the way he had treated me the first day we met. Why? Because I doubted that any of them had ordered him to do what he had done. After all, I was a dime a dozen in that tiny town. A nobody. If anything they simply took advantage of the situation to further their goals. Just my luck.

  Still, I didn’t push his image out of my mind as something about the wolf gave me pause. I almost wondered what would have happened if we had met under different circumstances. Maybe I wouldn’t kill him the ime we met – if we ever met that is.

  Ginger and Pendragon came . She was cradled against his body as his wings surrouhem both. I wondered how those two would have reacted in this situation. Would they have tried to bst their way through the door or would they have mao heal everyone? How would they reay death? Sure it wasn’t perma but the fact that it had happened uheir watd the manner in which it happehey would probably take it hard. Fug hell, the moment I came back I doubted those two would let me out of their sight for more than a few moments.

  Of course, that brought my mind to the one person who had entrusted my safety to his sister. The ohat had e to save me once already. In my mind, I saw Xander in not one image but in an endless stream of them. From the times that he ughed at my bad jokes to the times he and I had argued about how to cut a part out. An image of him covered in lubrit after a hose in his mae had broken nearly caused me to ugh. Let me tell you, ughing hurt. Still, I missed those days. Days where all I had to worry about was getting orders done.

  Not that I would ge everything that had happened so far. If anything, I wouldn’t ge any of it. I know this sounds stupid but even with what I now know, I wouldn’t kill Linda or her group any soohan I had. After all, without their trust how would I have ever freed those trapped below the city?

  Without warning, the spike ng through my chest took that moment to remihat it was there. Tiny barbs grew out in every dire. Blood bubbled out of my mouth as the barbs tore through everything fleshy.

  A loud booming sound reverberated through my body. Given how slow it was, I was sure that it was my heart as it tried to pump around the obstru. Tearing itself up as it tried to keep the blood flowing through my body. To be ho, it robably making the issue worse but what else could it do? If it stopped, I was dead. If it tinued, I was still dead, just not as fast – though I would be in a ton of pain.

  First came the tingliion of my limbs going numb. Then came the tiny bck spots as my vision started to narrow. Suddenly the banging, vibrating, sound that had filled my ears stopped as something nearby exploded. As quickly as it had disappeared, the sound was repced with a cacophony of pounding and voices as they yelled and screamed.

  For what and at who, I had no clue. All I knew was that someone was here to save those of us that they could. Still, I doubted many of us were able to be saved. I robably already toone and I was one of the st to be poisoned.

  What would death be like? I know that everyone who had died shivered at whatever they remembered. Even Linda and her group had told me that it was not an experiehey wished to repeat. But I guess it would be iable that I was going to experie.

  Uo keep my eyes open, I let them fall. They weren’t doing me any good anyway. Most of my body had gone numb and my sight was gone. Repced by darkness. Even my hearing was on the cusp of giving out as well. Well, that is if the fact that everything sounded far away was anything to go off of anyway. Still, I could almost swear that someone was calling my name, but that couldn’t be right, could it? No one knew where I was. Even if they did, I doubted that the guards would have let them into a room filled with the dead and dying. Those murdered by someone or something.

  Seeing nothing but pain and no way out, I finally gave in and gave up. Letting my hold on sciousness go. The darkness ed me up and weled me. It held me in its warm embrace as we both waited for whatever came .