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“Don’t crowd them!” Eda barked, her eyes still stinging from the sudden flash of light. “Are you two okay?”
Luz and Hunter sprawled on the floor, stunned into silence. She couldn’t tell if they were injured or just dazed; she didn’t see any blood but that didn’t mean they weren’t hurt-
The little red bird fluttered anxiously around Hunter, chirping and pecking lightly at his cheek, and suddenly his eyes shot wide, all the color draining from his already pale face. “He knows,” he rasped. “He knows we were in there.” His chest heaved. “I can’t…I can’t go back!”
“Kid, breathe,” Eda warned, but when she held out a hand to help him up he flinched like a spooked animal. He scrambled shakily to his feet, gasping for air in panicked gulps, and clawed at the clasp at his neck. The cloak dropped from his shoulders, but it tangled around his legs before he could bolt out the door and he hit the ground hard.
Luz lunged for him. “Hunter!” she cried. “Don’t run away, please, it’s going to be okay!”
He tried to push himself up from the floor. “It’s not, it’s not okay, it’s not safe,” he said, pressing his hand against his chest as if he was trying to keep his heart from breaking through his ribs. Blood slowly dripped from his hairline. “Nowhere’s…nowhere’s safe, he knows-“
“For fuck’s sake, kid, take a break,” Eda said. She crouched down to get a better look at him. “This is probably the safest place you can be right now. Just take a fucking breath.”
“It’s going to be okay, I swear,” Luz said, rubbing his back. “We’ll…we’ll figure this out.”
Hunter pressed his hands over his eyes, air breaking from his lungs in ragged sobs. “I don’t know what to do, I don’t know what to do…”
“Well, right now you’re having a panic attack, that’s what you’re doing, so I’m gonna need you to chill,” Eda said. “Come on. Get it together.” Hunter choked on a gasp and gagged. “Shit. Luz, back up.”
“But-“
“Trust me, back up.” Eda thrust out an arm and gently shoved a startled Luz away, just in time for Hunter to double over and puke down the front of his shirt. Luz let out a startled little yelp and scrambled back. “Jesus Christ. Okay, kid. You’re okay.”
“Eda-“ Luz started to say, her voice wobbling.
Eda flapped a hand at her. “Go…go do something else, okay? Take King and…I don’t know, get some water or get cleaned up or something,” she said.
“I want to help,” Luz said. “What can I-“
Hunter heaved again, still gasping. The little red bird fluttered around him and twittered in distress. “I’ve got him, Luz, don’t worry about it,” Eda said. “King?”
“I’m on it, I’m on it,” he said, and when he grabbed Luz’s hand she finally allowed him to lead her out of the room.
Eda sank down to sit cross legged on the floor. “I’d get you something to hurl in, but I think that ship has sailed,” she said dryly. At least there hadn’t seemed to have been much in his stomach, he’d mostly brought up bile- although that did raise some other concerns. She rubbed his back, wincing at the knobs of his spine jutting out against his tight muscles. “Listen…Hunter. It’s Hunter, right? If you don’t breathe I think your palisman is going to have an aneurysm. Try to get some air in your lungs.”
“I’m trying,” he wheezed, pressing his fist into his solar plexus as if he could manually get his respiratory system to cooperate. “I’m try-“
Eda shushed him, rubbing his back in a slow steady rhythm. The bird tucked itself between his neck and his shoulder, cooing as it rubbed the top of its soft little head against his cheek. Slowly Hunter stopped coughing and gasping, his breathing slowing down but still ragged at the edges.
“There you go,” Eda said softly. “You got it. All you have to do is breathe.”
He’d gone so pale that the scar on his jaw was a vivid carnation pink. “I don’t know where to go,” he said, staring blankly at the floor with wide shell-shocked eyes. “I can’t…I can’t go back, but there’s nowhere else-“
His shoulders hunched as the air seized in his lungs. “You got any family anywhere?” Eda said. “Parents, or like…an estranged cousin or something?”
Hunter shook his head. “Just my uncle,” he said, and then he shuddered, as if just the thought of Belos made him nauseous.
Eda sighed heavily. “Aw, hell, what’s another teenager running around this place,” she said, half to herself as she pinched the bridge of her nose. “You might as well stay here. At least until you’re not puking your guts up. And besides, I think Luz would pitch a fit if I didn’t let you stay.”
“I can’t-“
“Sure you can,” she said. She brushed an untidy lock of blond hair back from his forehead and winced. “Jesus, you clonked yourself bad when you hit the floor. You don’t do anything halfway, do you?”
Hunter stared at the floor, his hands limp in his lap. “I’m sorry,” he mumbled.
“You can make it up to me later,” Eda said, pushing herself up from the floor. “For now, take off the barf shirt, I’ll find you something else to wear.”
There wasn’t much between her wardrobe and Luz’s that would work for a teenage boy, but she was bound to have something in the stash of human crap she’d amassed. Eventually she dug out a shirt with a strange red monster on it and figured it would do.
“Here,” she said, holding it out. “Put this on.”
Hunter was still slumped over, legs splayed out like an abandoned doll, his bird nipping lovingly at his ear. “What…what’s that?” he said, scrunching up his nose.
“Human shit,” she said, flapping the shirt at him. “And it’s not covered in vomit. Come on, you’re gross.”
He glanced down at his stained shirt, blinking in astonishment as if he’d just now realized he’d been sick, and pried it off carefully. Eda froze. His exposed skin was riddled with blanched old scars and fresh purpled bruises. In some spots she could tell when he’d been injured when he was younger and smaller and softer and the scar had stretched with his skin as he’d grown.
“Thank you for the…shirt,” he said, avoiding her eyes as he held out his hand.
She tossed it to him. “You’ve been through the wringer, haven’t you?” she said.
“Training,” he said tersely. “Since I was born. It’s all…all I’ve ever known.”
His shoulders dropped again, his eyes getting that dazed faded look. “Oh, nope, fuck that,” Eda said. “Put that on and let’s get you off the floor, okay?”
He obeyed, but his legs wobbled as he tried to push himself up. She took him by the elbow and helped him up, guiding him over to the couch. “I’m gonna have to get the full report from you and Luz eventually, but for now I need you to just not move for a while,” she said as she sat down next to him. She pushed his hair back from his temple and frowned. “That’s already swelling. Gross.”
He clasped his hands together and stared at his scraped knuckles. “I apologize for causing a scene,” he said in a low voice.
“A scene? Ha, this is nothing,” Eda said. “You shoulda seen me in my partying days. Now that, that was a scene.”
Luz poked her head into the room. “Am I allowed back in yet, Eda?” she said.
“Yeah, yeah, come on.”
“I made some tea,” Luz said. She frowned at the cup in her hands. “At least…it’s the closest thing I could find to tea. But that’s what my mom makes for me whenever I get sick to my stomach.”
Hunter blushed up to his hairline. “Oh, uh…yeah, you saw that, didn’t you?”
“Yeah, but it’s fine, everybody pukes sometimes,” Luz said cheerfully.
“Luz, can you grab something to clean up and bandage up that cut?” Eda said. “He stopped bleeding but I’m tired of looking at it.”
“Oh! Yeah! On it!”
Luz pressed the mug into Hunter’s hands and zipped away, clearly pleased to have a task to do. “She really is always like that, isn’t she?” he said.
“This is kind of subdued for her, actually,” Eda said. She tilted the cup towards her. “Hopefully that’s safe to drink. I don’t always trust Luz in the kitchen.” She folded her arms. “Okay, you don’t have to be so freaked out around me. I don’t bite. Much.”
Hunter frowned, but attempted to relax back against the arm of the couch. It wasn’t much of a change. His little bird chirped at him, a tiny reprimand, and nudged at the side of his neck until Hunter finally petted the top of its head.
“What’s your palisman called?”
Hunter kept petting the bird. “Flapjack,” he said in a small voice.
Eda smiled. “Maybe you’re not all that bad, Golden Guard,” she teased. “Palismans are great judges of character, he wouldn’t be so attached to you if you sucked.”
She’d hoped it might make him laugh a little, or even smile, but Hunter’s mouth tugged down as he stroked Flapjack’s soft feathers. “I don’t think I’m the Golden Guard anymore,” he said. “I don’t know who I am anymore. Or what I am.”
“What do you mean by that?”
But before he could answer her Luz careened into the room. “Is this it?” she said breathlessly, thrusting a potion bottle into her hand. “I took an educated guess.”
Eda took it and swirled the contents. “Yeah, that’ll work,” she said. Luz handed her a clean rag. “This might sting a little, kid. Sorry about that.”
Hunter shrugged. “Are you feeling any better?” Luz asked as she perched on the opposite arm of the couch. “You look awful, no offense.” She paused. “Are you wearing a Lightning McQueen shirt?”
“What’s a Lightning McQueen?” Eda asked.
Luz pointed. “The car.”
“What’s a car?” Hunter said, tugging on the hem of his shirt to get a better look.
“Oh, god, okay, so a car-“
“Hold off on the human shit for a second, Luz,” Eda said. She pressed the damp rag against the bloody scrape on Hunter’s temple and he hissed through his teeth. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you. Hold still.”
Luz hugged her knees to her chest. “Eda, he can stay with us, right?” she said.
Eda cleaned the blood away from Hunter’s face, wincing as the antiseptic bubbled up and he tried to squirm away. “Fuck it, why not,” she sighed. “Might as well have three kids. I got a weird little dragon toddler, a hyperactive human girl, and a sad but bad boy. And whatever Hooty is.”
Hunter scowled. “I’m not sad.”
“Hate to break it to you, kid, but half an hour ago you were sobbing so hard you yakked all over my floor. Seems pretty damn sad to me,” Eda said. She dabbed the last of the blood away from his temple. “Okay, that looks a lot better. I don’t think it’ll scar, at least. You have enough of those already.”
“I can’t…you don’t have to take me in,” Hunter said stiffly. “I can figure this out. I’m sure there’s…there’s someplace I can go…”
“It’s not safe, Hunter,” Luz said, resting her chin on her knees. “This is the safest place you could be. With us. After what happened…”
“Yeah, what did happen?” Eda said. Luz and Hunter exchanged a look. “Spill. You gotta tell me what’s going on.”
“You…you might not believe us,” Hunter said, staring down at his knees.
Eda grabbed his hand and squeezed hard. “Try me, kid.”