Rosemary and Rue
Page 55

“What’s the matter? You ain’t never seen a cab driver before?”
“It’s been a while,” I said, using his elbow to pull myself out of the car. I tasted the balance of his blood automatically as I rose, and relaxed. Bridge Troll. They’re big, placid, dependable people, and they take their responsibilities—even ones as small as walking a woman to her front door in order to get paid—seriously.
We didn’t talk as he helped me up the path toward my apartment. I came to a sudden stop when the door came into view, almost stumbling.
“Hey, lady, careful,” he said, big hand going to my shoulder to steady me. He eyed my porch with suspicion. “That guy a friend of yours?”
“Yeah,” I said, relief washing over me. “He is.”
For the second time in less than a week, there was someone waiting on my doorstep. Devin looked up when he heard our voices, and then jumped to his feet, almost running toward us.
“Toby!” Ignoring the cabbie entirely, he put his hands on my shoulders, yanking me toward him. I hissed as he hit the poultice, world briefly whiting out from the pain. “Oh, root and branch, Julie said it was bad, but I had no idea . . .”
“Julie?” I said, as the cabbie said, startled, “Toby?”
Devin and I both turned to stare at him. That was all right; he was staring at me.
“Toby?” he repeated. “As in October Daye?”
“Sadly, yeah,” I said, blinking as confusion won out over the pain in my thigh and shoulder. “Do I know you?”
“No, but you helped my baby sister outta a tight spot once, about seventeen years ago.” He grinned, showing teeth that not even an illusion could make look like anything but chunks of craggy stone. “You forget what I said about the upholstery, you hear? I don’t want your money. There’s a Bannick I know, he’ll do it almost free anyhow. You need a cab, you just call and ask for Danny. ’S the least I can do.” He paused before adding, almost shyly, “ ’S good to see you’re back in business. This Kingdom needs more folks like you.” Then he was gone, heading rapidly back down the path, leaving me to lean on Devin and stare be musedly after him.
“That was weird,” I said finally.
“I don’t really care about weird.” Devin’s tone was sharp. “I care about getting you inside and taking a look at those wounds. What did you do, Toby?”
“Oh, the usual,” I said, letting him lead me toward my front door. “Wrecked my car. Got shot. Twice, actually. With iron bullets. Lost a lot of blood. Lily managed to give a lot of it back to me, but that was before I got shot the second time . . .” The world was spinning. I leaned on Devin’s hands. That was a familiar feeling: being dizzy with blood loss and leaning on Devin.
“When you decide to go back to work, you don’t screw around, do you?”
I didn’t have an answer for that. Instead, I stumbled, and Devin picked me up, carrying me into my apartment. That seemed wrong somehow. Frowning, I asked, “Didn’t I lock the door?”
“Hush. You locked it, but I’m the one who taught you how to pick locks, remember?” He put me down on the couch. “Get your pants off.”
“Always the romantic, aren’t you?” I pulled the gun out of my waistband, leaning over to put it on the coffee table. The last thing I needed to do was shoot myself.
“After Julie called, I thought heroic measures might be required.” Devin picked up a large black box, shaking it in my direction. “I brought the first aid kit.”
Devin’s line of work wasn’t exactly gentle, and it didn’t attract healers. Consequentially, he had a lot of experience with healing potions, charms, salves, and anything else that could patch a body back together faster than nature could manage on its own. Healing potions take their toll, but when you’re hard up enough to need them, it always seems like a fair trade.
Normally, I would’ve been eyeing the box with unalloyed delight. This time, however, there was a little problem. “Iron bullets, Devin,” I said, closing my eyes. “You’re not gonna have a charm that can handle iron poisoning.”
“Maybe not, but I can at least take care of the blood loss and the flesh wounds,” he said. I felt his fingers un-snapping the buckle of my jeans as he knelt. “You won’t do anyone any good if you’re dead.”
“That’s debatable,” I said, and went limp, letting him work.
Devin hissed as he peeled my jeans back. “What were you planning to do about this? Wish it away?”
“I dunno. Think it would work?”
“Not unless you’ve got a Djinn hiding in your closet.” I smelled the sharp, antiseptic tang of disinfectant, and felt him starting to wipe the blood off.
“Not last time I checked.” Opening my eyes, I looked down.
It wasn’t all that bad at first glance. The bullet had passed cleanly through, leaving a small, almost tidy hole on the front of my thigh. The damage was worse around the exit wound; I couldn’t see it, but I could feel the ragged edges of the muscles there scraping against each other. As Devin wiped away the blood, thin red-and-white lines became visible, radiating out from the wound like the heralds of infection. That was the real danger. Not the blood loss, not the injury; the iron.
“Have you tried to spin an illusion since you were shot?” Devin asked, head still bent as he worked at my leg.
“I cast a confusion spell on the girl working the gate,” I offered, starting to feel faintly nauseated by the sight of so much blood. How much blood is in a body, anyway? And how much of that could I afford to lose?
“And after the second time?”
I hesitated. Tybalt had pushed me toward the cab, and my hair was down, covering my ears . . . “No,” I confessed, eyes going wide. “Maeve’s teeth, Devin, I just took a taxi without an illusion on! What if the driver had been human?”
“He would’ve thought you were a comic book geek on your way home from a convention,” Devin said, briskly. “People ignore more than you give them credit for. Can you try weaving an illusion? Just a little one? I want to see if you can do it.”
“Sure,” I said, and raked the fingers of my left hand through the air, intending to gather a handful of shadows to work with. I caught nothing. My magic, always reluctant to answer my commands, didn’t even stir.