It was a nightmare.

I should’ve ridden with her.

I should’ve insisted on her riding with us instead of with Owen and Dallas. She could’ve fit in the back with Iris and Electra. But no. I’d let her go on ahead. I’d acted against my instincts.

And look where it got us.

“I can’t move it…!” Dallas grunted and strained as he tried to lift the dash from where it pinned Callie’s legs. She still hadn’t woken up, which frightened me worse than just about anything. While I didn’t want her to suffer in consciousness, just knowing she was capable of waking would’ve given me a great deal of comfort.

I was soaked to the skin, my rubber-soled canvas shoes hopelessly ill-suited to the task as I slipped and slid in the mud. I managed to climb in through the rear door and position myself behind Callie.

“Hold her head still,” Dallas grunted from in front of me. “If this wakes her, she might thrash and fight. You’ll want to keep her steady. If she’s injured, she’ll make it worse that way.”

“How would you know?” I asked, though that didn’t stop me from doing as he said. I placed a hand on either side of her head and held it in place as gently but firmly as I could.

“Just do.” He drew a deep breath through flared nostrils. “All right. I’m going to try again, and I’m giving it all I’ve got. You need to keep her still if you can, I wouldn’t want her to get hurt.”

“It’s a little late for that,” I whispered, touching my forehead to Callie’s ear. “I’m sorry, dearest.”

“Ready?” he grunted. When I murmured an affirmative, he took another deep breath. Then, the tendons bulging in his neck and his face red, he lifted. Metal screeched, plastic cracked.

I was watching him literally lift the dash from my sister’s legs, reshaping the steel and plastic though it protested mightily. I couldn’t help but watch in awe as he did it, knowing the dragons were strong was one thing, but watching it was quite another.

Once she was free, he pressed the lever beneath the seat and allowed it to slide back.

“Thank you,” I whispered.

He sat back, breathing heavily. “I still say she needs blood. My blood.”

“I still say you’re wrong, though it’s nice of you to offer.” I felt the need to add that. After all, he’d just done what would’ve been impossible for a mere human. Even I couldn’t reshape steel.

Then, with a start, Callie joined us. She gasped as she’d just woken up in an ice-cold loch, the sound tearing me apart.

“My legs!” she moaned, eyes half-lidded, trying to turn her head from side to side even as I held it still.

“Shh, shh, try to relax,” I begged, raising my voice to be heard over hers. “You can’t panic. It’ll only hurt worse.”

“It hurts!” she gasped. “Oh, please, it hurts…” Her pitiful whimpers tore at my heart.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” I kept whispering, looking down into her pain-filled eyes. There was nothing I could do, nothing I could say to make the pain stop.

“They’re both broken,” Dallas informed me, as though I needed to be informed. Even I could see they were broken, misshapen under the cotton sweatpants she wore. “We might have to set the bones.”

“What?” she shrieked before bursting into tears. “No, no! You can’t!”

I looked at Dallas. He looked at me.

“We’ll have to, sweetheart,” I tried to smile. “If we don’t, they won’t heal correctly. There’s nothing else we can do.”

“You don’t know how!” There was so much desperation in her eyes, in her voice, in the sweat which rolled down her face at the thought of even greater pain than that which she already suffered.

“You know I can help you with the pain, if you let me.” I held her head still and looked deep into her eyes. “Callie, hear me. Listen. I can help you, but you have to relax and allow me to do it. Will you?”

“Just make it stop…” she whispered. “I can’t move my arm, either.”

Damn. I hadn’t thought about that. Sure enough, it looked as though the right shoulder was dislocated, where it had struck the door. Or where the door had struck her, more like.

I fought to keep the strain out of my voice, since it wouldn’t help her if I showed how dismayed her condition left me. “All right. We’ll take care of that, too. Don’t you worry about it. Just relax. Breathe with me, will you? Can you do that?”

She chewed her lip, eyes darting back and forth.

“Calliope. Look at me. Listen to me. Can you relax and breathe? So I can help you?”

She nodded, chin quivering, eyes leaking tears onto my hands. I drew a deep breath and waited for her to follow suit. The fact that she could even do so told me her ribs were at least intact.

“Good girl,” I smiled as we exhaled together. Inhale. Exhale. Slowly, rhythmically.

For once, Dallas was smart enough to stay silent, allowing me to do what I needed to do without his interference. The more I could calm my sister, the more easily she could disconnect from the pain.

She began to loosen, the deep furrows in her brow smoothing out the more she relaxed. I allowed my consciousness to reach out to hers, imagining my energy wrapping itself around hers and absorbing the worst of the trauma.

I could see her fear there, could almost taste it. Tangy, metallic, like blood. I imagined myself loosening it like a knot, pulling this end and that end, unwinding it. Even the deafening rain and wind faded until it no longer existed. It was only the two of us and no one else.

She slowly fell into a trance, or something like it. I knew she was floating somewhere beyond us, in a place where there was no pain or fear or questions. Just peace. Only once I was certain she was in good shape did I remove my hands from her head and let out a shuddery breath.

Dallas didn’t speak until I sat up. “What did you do?” he whispered.

“She’s in a trance. Perfectly safe.” I looked around, readjusting to my surroundings.

“You all right?”

I nodded. “It’s like… coming out of deep sleep. I need a moment.”

“We’re going to have to set those bones, even if we don’t know how to do it.”

“I know that.” I couldn’t be angry. I couldn’t snap at him. Not when I was so foggy and tired. Now that the adrenaline rush was beginning to ebb, fatigue settled into my muscles and my mind.

“What did you do?” he asked again, watching as Callie slept.

She looked so peaceful, like there was no trouble whatsoever. Like she wasn’t broken and bruised and lost in the middle of a raging storm.

“It’s a lot to explain.”

“Does it look like I’m doing anything else at the moment?”

I snorted with soft laughter. “I went into her head and took it away.”

“Took what away?”

“The pain. The confusion. The fear. Fear is the worst, really, since it makes pain feel stronger. If your heart is racing, you’re unfocused. What’s going to slide in and take control of your attention? The pain, of course.”

“Of course,” he murmured. “What happens to you when you do this? You look spent.”

“I feel spent.”

“Do you take the pain on yourself? Do you feel it?”

“Yes and no. I don’t feel it in my legs or my shoulder or anywhere else. But I feel it here.” I tapped the side of my head. “Pressure, like a storm in my brain. It will subside.”

“You speak as though you know from experience.”

“I do.”

“You do this often?”

“Not often, but enough to know.” I stroked Callie’s hair, wondering what I could do about washing away the blood from the cut on her scalp. A superficial wound, nothing to be concerned with, but enough to make a mess of her hair and skin.

“Can any of the others do that? Is it something you’re all skilled in?”

I shook my head. “No. Just me. We all have something we’re best at.”

“I thought you were best at controlling others. I saw how you could freeze a person and release them at will.”

“We can all do that. I admit I’m better at it than some of the others, but I worked to develop my talent.”

“Because you wanted to control others?” He chuckled.

“Do you think that’s funny?” I asked with a wary, weary stare.

“I’m laughing at myself, since I would do the same thing. No question.” He looked around from his place behind the steering wheel, sighing. “I wish this would let up a bit so I could get a sense of how much further we need to go. We might be closer to the top than we thought, and closer to help.”

“Or we might be miles away.”

“Always positive. One thing I can count on from you.” He eyed me up and down. “I’d think if you were that cynical regarding our chances, you would jump at the opportunity to spare your sister further pain. There’s no telling how long it would take before we can get actual assistance, if we can at all.”

I looked away, then back to her. It would be so easy, wouldn’t it? To let him give her his blood somehow. She could heal.

She could also then carry dragon’s blood within her.

“Why don’t we let her decide what she wants when she wakes up?” he suggested.

“Yes. That’s a good idea.”

“You agreed awfully quickly.”

“Because it’s a good idea.”

“And not because you intend to keep her in this state so she won’t awaken?”

My head snapped around in surprise. “What?”

“So that’s what you were planning to do, is it?” He folded his thick arms. “I thought so.”

I blinked rapidly. “No. How could you say such a thing?”

“Stop lying, please. Now I understand you.”

“Oh, now you understand me?” My sister forgotten for the moment, I turned to face him. “Pray tell. How is that?”

One corner of his mouth twitched. “You really don’t know, then?”

“Know what? Why are you being so mysterious? Is this a joke to you?”

“Not at all. I do not find this a laughing matter. I merely find it amusing that you don’t understand what happened when you took on your sister’s pain, an admirable thing, that. Do not mistake me. But you made a slip up.”

“What slip up?” I hissed, as the storm in my head raged on. Didn’t he understand I could hardly think straight? Yet he insisted on playing word games with me, thinking he was so clever as he always did.

I would have sworn there was a gleam in his eye. “You were shielding yourself before now, weren’t you?”

I bit my tongue to keep from gasping.

My shield! I forgot my shield! It must have slipped or dissolved entirely when I turned my power toward Callie.

“I know how upset you are with yourself,” he continued while I panicked. “I can feel it now. I’ve been wondering all this time why I couldn’t understand you, the way I can understand everyone else. You’ve been a mystery to me all along. I could not comprehend your motivation behind testing me, nagging me, bringing your problems to me.”

“And now you understand?” I asked, rolling my eyes. “Pray tell, then, as you’re so clever and wise, which is precisely what you want me to think of you. What you want everyone to think of you.”

He frowned, but didn’t allow this to stop him. If anything, there was malice in his voice when he announced something which should have been wondrous, miraculous.

Or so I guessed, as I’d never experienced anything like what I was about to hear.

“No matter how you shielded yourself from me, something wouldn’t allow you to forget me. Isn’t that right?” he asked. “And now I see why. You’re my fated one.”