Dara's Arc

Chapter 9 of 10

The cart carried them under the wall and out. Dara pedaled until her legs burned, Kael slumped against her side, Eli hunched over his blueprints in the back. When the rails ended, they climbed and ran. The old broadcast tower rose ahead, rusted and empty, its ladder bolted to the frame. Dara had made her studio in its loft a year ago. She helped Kael up the rungs one at a time. He was breathing wrong now, too fast, too shallow. She had freed the last musician in Blightmire. She might carry him home dead. Inside the loft, she laid Kael on the battered cot. Its patched blanket smelled of mildew. His skin had gone gray. He touched his own ribs and winced. "They kicked me," he said. "Weeks ago. It never healed right." Each word cost him air. Dara pressed her hand to his side and felt the heat under his shirt. Something was wrong deep in his chest. "Eli." She turned. "I need supplies. Anything." Eli set down his roll of blueprints. He crossed to a dented cabinet in the corner and pried it open. Inside sat a white case marked with a red cross, its shelves neat with rolled bandages, small bottles, and a strip of pills. "Left here before the towers emptied," he said. He did not soften it. "I can't fix a lung. I can slow the fever." He knelt by the cot and worked with steady hands. He cleaned the bruise, wrapped the ribs tight, and shook two pills from the strip. "For the pain and the swelling," he said. "He needs a real doctor. This buys days, not more." Dara lifted Kael's head. He swallowed the pills with a sip of water. His breathing eased, slow by slow. The gray in his face pulled back a little. She held his wrist and felt the pulse steady under her fingers. "You'll live," she said. It was half a question. Kael opened his eyes. "You're the trumpet," he whispered. "I heard you through the stone. I thought I made you up." A small breath, almost a laugh. "I want to play again. Before I can't." Dara held his hand until he slept. Then she stood and looked at Eli. He was rolling the strip of pills closed, counting what was left. "How many days?" she asked. "Four. Maybe five." He met her eyes. "After that the fever comes back and I have nothing for it." The loft went quiet but for Kael's breathing. She had gotten him out of the camp and out of the wall. He was alive on her cot. But alive was borrowed now, measured in a handful of pills. Dara looked at the sleeping musician she had climbed towers to save. To keep him, she would have to find a doctor in a city that wanted them both dead.