Chapter 342. Collateral Damage

Chapter 342: 342. Collateral Damage

Maisie

Beep. Beep. Beep.

My lashes fluttered and the light hurt my eyes as I opened them. A moan slipped out of me as I tried to move and found my limbs heavy, like I’d been hit by a moving truck.

From the sterile white walls and smell of disinfectant, I knew I was in a hospital. It triggered old memories, but I didn’t have the knee-jerking reaction I was used to when I thought I’d woken up paralyzed again in a hospital.

Soren tossing me out of the window must really have worked for my psyche.

My Lycan was decidedly silent and the violent humming in my veins had gone quiet. There was a dull ache in my head, but I couldn’t tell if it was from Soren’s blow or being knocked around by a demon.

My fingers twitched as I tried to get out of bed, and I paused at the soft, silky strands teasing my fingertips, and the warm hand laying heavily on mine.

I froze when I glanced down and found a red head resting close to resting against thigh.

"Mercer?" I croaked.

His head jerked up.

His green eyes were muddled and haunted. He looked like he hadn’t slept since I last saw him. A shadow of a beard teased his chin, and though it was a nice look on him, it also made him look older and exhausted. His hair was disheveled, like he’d been tugging his fingers through.

"How do you feel?" he asked, eyes searching.

"Like shit," I answered, and his shoulders untensed.

He awkwardly retracted his fingers from where they had been entwined around mine, and leaned back in his seat, putting some distance between us.

I shoved down the wave of sadness I felt at that.

Silence fell, and it was loud, eating up the space between us. "Quinn?" I asked, bracing myself for the worst.

Mercer shook his cuffs free of invisible lint. He did that when he was nervous. "Still unconscious. It’s nothing the doctors can help with. His aura is scrapped thin, and... he wasn’t entirely breathing when he was brought in. But he’s doing a lot better than he was six hours ago."

Six hours? I’d been out for that long?

His brows pinched together as he rubbed a needle mark in his wrist. "The transfusion seems to be working, though... very slowly."

Blood transfusion.

When I’d been half drained at the competition, I’d been thirsty, my body trying to replenish what it’d lost by taking from them.

I vaguely recalled being attached to an IV while I’d been sick, but I knew it wasn’t the blood itself that fixed me. It was the merging of our bodies and auras. I didn’t know how it worked, but being close to them had given back what was stripped from me.

I had to go see Quinn.

Mercer’s hand on my shoulder stopped me from moving. "You are still hurt," he whispered, leaning over to shift the pillows under my head, gently forcing me back against the softness. "There’s nothing you can do for him until you heal."

Eyes pricking with tears and soul drowning with guilt, I let him lay me back down and he lingered for a moment, faces inches away, dark green eyes holding mine.

I exhaled, a familiar, agonizing ache tightening my chest as his fingers brushed my cheek. My eye stung dully where he traced the path of a healing black eye.

"I’m sorry." His thumb trembled over my split lip. "This is all my fault."

The emotions heavy in his eyes were too much to bear while knowing that though he was right in front of me, we were now worlds apart.

With a shudder, I leaned away from his warm touch. The hurt that flashed across his face as he withdrew his hand felt like a knife twisting in my own chest. He sat back slowly in his chair.

That was when I noticed fresh bruises stark against his knuckles. He’d been in a fight.

"You’ve been... to the pits again?"

Mercer shifted, toying with the buttons on his cuffs. "Ah... no. Soren pulled a few strings." The corners of his ears reddened. "I’m banned for life."

Bitter relief flooded me. Good to know I wasn’t the only one Soren bullied when he felt like it. But that didn’t explain the bruises.

Following my gaze to the scraped skin, he said, "There was an incident. At the castle."

I wanted to ask, but my throat closed up. I didn’t know if it was my place anymore. I didn’t know what we were to each other anymore.

"Why are you here, Mercer?"

His eyes snapped to mine. He opened his mouth, closed it, his throat bobbing hard. He looked away. "I was in the area."

He was lying. He was dressed in a pristine official jacket, heavy with golden embroidery. He’d come straight from court, hours away from here.

"How are Jenny and Regina?" I asked, changing the topic.

"Jennifer had a concussion. Juliette and Regina are with her, waking her up every hour. They were here an hour ago to check on you." He frowned again, and I figured he wasn’t saying something that worried him.

"What is it?"

His eyes flicked to mine. "Why didn’t you say anything about Philip Gruer? Do you have any idea how dangerous he is?" He shook his head when I didn’t respond. "We have him held at the facility—"

"Held?" I echoed, jerking upright. "You took him back there? Where they had him in shackles?!"

His nostrils flared. "He is a convict. A criminal—"

"He is my friend!"

"—an dangerous fugitive. A murderer. The facility is as much mercy as we can give, considering what he did to you. The only reason he isn’t dead is because Jericho said you cared about him," he said, voice harsh like granite.

"That wasn’t him!" I cried. "He was possessed! He was as much a victim as I was!"

Mercer’s eyes were hard. "He tried to kill you," he said simply, like it was reason enough to have the man treated like an animal.