I shove at the arms I had welcomed only minutes before. “I need—”
“You need to sit here for a few more minutes. You’ve got a bump on your head the size of a racquetball and so many cuts and bruises that I don’t even know where to start with trying to heal you.”
“My parents were upstairs.”
“I know,” he tells me grimly. “Give me a few minutes to take care of you and then I’ll go check on them.”
He probes at a very tender spot on my scalp and I yelp, glare at him. He glares back. “That would be the racquetball. Now sit still and take it like a big girl.”
I grumble at him, but in the end, I acquiesce. Partly because I know I don’t have a choice in the matter and partly because I feel absolutely awful. I won’t be much help to anyone in this condition, so if Declan can help even a little bit, I’m willing to give him the few minutes he requested. As long as it’s a very few.
As the familiar tingle starts on my scalp, followed by an icy heat, I try to relax. To give myself over to it. It’s more difficult than usual because I’m freaking out about my family, but I know that the less I fight him, the faster this will go. All magic is like that. As in most things in life, it works best with compliance.
Seconds tick by with excruciating slowness, but in less than two minutes, I can feel the effects of what he’s done. My headache has dulled considerably and the dizziness is almost gone. Thank the goddess I have such a talented lover.
Once I realize the room is no longer spinning, I start to get up, only to settle right back down when he snarls at me. More heat. More tingles. Then finally a reluctant sound from Declan that I know instinctively means he’s willing to let me up.
He stands first, then helps me to my feet. I’m still feeling a little unsteady, but I do my best to mask it. He’s watching me for any sign that I’m in trouble and I don’t want to give it to him. If I do, I know that no matter how hard I argue, I’ll end up sidelined.
He doesn’t handle me being hurt very well at the best of times, and I can tell he’s barely hanging on to his control by a thread right now. If he had his way, he’d whisk me away from here, take me someplace where he could wrap me in cotton. And while I appreciate his concern, if I don’t get to my family soon, I’m going to completely lose my mind.
“Let’s take it slow,” he says, wrapping his arm around my waist as he leads me carefully through the rubble.
I don’t want to take it slow. I want to run screaming through what’s left of my house until I know everyone I love has escaped this living nightmare. But since my legs are barely supporting me now, I go along with him.
As we step into the foyer—or, should I say what once was the foyer—I’m stunned, horrified, by the piles of rubble that cover the marble floor in all directions. In some places the walls have caved in completely, giving me a perfect view of the outside woods that border my mother’s gardens in all directions. But not all the rubble is from the house’s exterior. I look up to where the third-floor landing used to be and realize there’s nothing there but a gigantic hole.
Mom. Dad. Tsura. Rachael. Jared. Their names run through my head like a mantra and I start scrabbling over the piles of debris, desperate to get to the back stairs. Desperate to get to them.
Declan is right behind me, moving aside piles of brick and stone and plaster with little more than a thought. I’m running by the time I hit the kitchen, end up plowing straight into my brother, Donovan, who is bleeding profusely from a head wound.
Stretched out on the floor beside him are Willow and two more of my sisters, Noora and Nadia. All three of them look shell-shocked, but at least I don’t see any blood—which is either a very good thing or a very bad one.
I choose to think positive as I grab onto Donovan and line his face up with my own. “Have you seen Mom or Dad?” I demand.
He squints at me as if trying to figure out what I’m saying, and I realize that all four of my siblings have blood coming out of their ears. They must have been closer to the explosion site than Declan and I were.
“Sit down,” I tell Donovan, clearly enunciating my words so that he can read my lips. I lead him over to the closest wall, prepare to sit him on the ground. But Declan has seized a few pieces of debris and—using transubstantiation—has fashioned them into a chair.
Donovan sits heavily, and before I can do anything more than stroke a hand through his hair on the uninjured side of his head, a small group of policemen bursts through the back door, a door that is currently hanging by only one hinge. They’re quickly followed by Witchcraft Investigations—I recognize them from their gray jackets and sour expressions—and two sets of paramedics.