Hush now, child. Be still, be calm. The world will change at the new dawn. And when it does, you will see, just how you and I were meant to be.

Joclyn’s calm voice sang through the grey hospital, the song trapped in my head as I looked toward it, expecting to see her standing there.

Sometimes she was, sometimes she wasn’t. Today it was only the grey wall, the peeling paint, and splatters of blood. The image was a haunting vision against the song.

Slowly, I lifted myself from the hard floor, the residue of grime sticking to my skin.

“A když ano, uvidíte, jak jste vy a já měli být.” I sang along with her in Czech as the words began to repeat, the same calm tone in the melody seeping through me as I walked toward her, my body moving flawlessly as the door to the hall opened before me, the twisted delusions of my dream escorting me into my house beside the beach. My dreams had brought me here so many times before, but now it was practically unrecognizable.

It was the same as the hospital.

The wide granite tiles were now cracked and broken, the large ornate paintings peeling to reveal layers of dirt and smears of red. Chandeliers swayed from the ceiling, their dripping candles flickering over everything as they hung from strings and broken chains.

Still, she sang.

Through the rubble, through the broken heartbreak of my mind, she sang.

Her voice grew louder as I stepped through the carnage of my former mansion, tiptoeing around piles of furniture and partially burned window dressings.

“Svět se změní,” I sang, my voice off key from hers as I stepped down the stairs.

This simple motion would cause me extreme agony in life, but here it brought little more than the ripple of the impact of a foot against stone.

It was an amazing feeling, it was freedom, and even among the rubble I smiled; letting the comfort flow through me.

Heavy creaking echoed through the massive space as I made my way down the steps. For months, the sound had kept me upstairs, sure that this destruction of mind and soul was going to collapse around me.

It still could, I knew that, but it was worth the risk. If it meant true death, I would rather die here, surrounded by her voice, close to her touch, than in the prison of my reality.

“Změní v novém,” I sang louder, letting my voice rattle the already unsettled structure as I yelled alongside.

The creaks of a swaying foundation grew louder as I reached the door, the entire house heaving as I swung the burned wooden slab open to the bright sunshine and the long black hair of a beautiful woman, her voice carrying away.

“And when it does, you will see, just how you and I were meant to be,” her voice was sweet, it was calm, it moved in time with the waves, it traveled on the back of the wind.

I let it fill me as I stepped away from the house and onto the wide porch. The calm, perfect beach stretched before me, the terrors of mind and reality already fading away.

“I was worried you wouldn’t make it,” she whispered as she placed her hand in mine, her eyes soft.

“I will always make it to you,” I said, lightly tapping the tip of my finger against her nose.

She smiled at the action, even though my heart tightened at the promise I couldn’t keep.

“Come,” she pulled me away from the house as she began to run down the stone steps that led to the beach, the sound of the waves growing louder as they called to us.

Her laugh echoed with each step, the sound in time with the waves as she pulled me right into them, water splashing around our ankles.

The water was so cold against my skin that I briefly wondered where the sensation was coming from, if they had soaked me in acid again or if this was just in the dream. If this was just some unremembered piece of my memory.

“You are safe here,” Joclyn whispered as she stepped before me, the cold water rising to our knees as she took my hands. “Don’t go back there yet. Stay here with me.”

Her silver eyes sparkled with love and light as she looked at me, as she looked into me. It was not the first time she had given me that look, and every time I saw the rare treasure it took my breath away. There was something there that I knew I had forgotten, some memory that I knew it was pulling from.

Each time I grabbed for it, only to come up empty. After so many attempts, however, I no longer took the effort, I just let the love in her eyes swallow me up. I let it shield me from whatever horrors were waiting.

“Everyday forever, Můj navždy,” I whispered, brushing away her hair from her face as it blew in the wind, letting my hand linger against her neck, my finger circling the soft skin just below her mark. I could feel the line of rough skin, feel the bit of raised flesh, the texture sending a pleasurable ripple up my spine.

I knew better to ask about it, to ask why she was alive and why the bite from the Vilỳ hadn’t killed her. But I already knew the answer, or rather, I didn’t. The memory was still locked in my mind, along with all the other fragments that taunted me.

Joclyn. Ovailia. Sain. Wynifred. Talon. Ryland.

Everyone but me. This one piece of vital information was still blocked from me.

Of course, I had titles. King. Krul. My lord. My love.

I had heard these on repeat, but they felt wrong. As though they no longer belonged to me. As though they never did.

I had lost my name and was left only with formalities. I refused to accept that that was all I was.  

It may have been a serendipitous occurrence, however. With the exception of Joclyn and Ryland, every name had been spoken aloud as Nastya played with me. Precious names that dripped from me.

Unlucky for her, she couldn’t put a face to a name.

That, and based on what I had seen, I was pretty sure all of them were dead.

The thought was both joy and ice and I let it shiver through me once before dispelling it into the air as I pushed it away, leaving me only to get lost in the look in her eyes.

As much as I longed for my memories, I had these moments.

In many ways that was enough.

I leaned down to kiss her, her breath brushing against my lips, only to have the calm of my paradise shattered by a scream.

My body tensed at the noise, at the pain and tension that rippled through my bones and threatened to send me into the icy foam.

“My love,” Joclyn gasped, grabbing a hold of my towering frame just before I fell.

Her arms wrapped around me, somehow holding me above the waves as they flowed, the motion breathing right along with me as I inhaled their salty aroma.

I willed the fear away, I willed the pain of my body away. The relapse only held for a moment before the abrasive echo of the scream brought it right back.

“I am fine,” I growled, the reaction not one I would normally give her. Luckily, she didn’t respond, she only held me closer, assisting me to stand as the sound came again. The scream that lived inside my head accompanied by a loud creak as the house on the hill behind us began to give way.

“Stay with me,” she pleaded as she fell into me, wrapping her arms around my waist as she held herself close.

It was a touch I gratefully returned, holding her against me as I cemented the feel of her in my mind. I almost wasn’t fast enough.

The screams followed me out of my dreams, the same as they did every night, and every morning. Every moment someone walked into the hallway that we were all trapped in. The screams grew into roars as the sound of doors opening and closing began to sound. The heavy thunks grew closer as the screams did, the sound of trays being slammed onto the cement becoming clear.

It was the same ritual I had heard for the last two years that I had been locked in this place. The screams and sounds were so familiar that I didn’t even move anymore. I just lay there, focused on the comfort of the cold cement as the doors continued to slam. Closer and closer.

Arching my body toward the door I waited for mine to open, my heart swelling in need for the brief moment of contact I was about to receive.

Whimpers of joy from the child who was restrained next door replaced his screams before my own door was thrown wide, the only familiar face that existed in this dark place coming into view.

Kaye took one step in and slammed the tray onto the floor, the action sending brown peas rolling. I didn’t even look at the tray anymore, I looked right at her, at her brown eyes, at the way she nodded sadly. I returned to nod, her hand swiping over the ridge of the door frame as she grabbed the note I had left for her. I watched her leave, the low messy bun she had adopted about a year ago the last thing I saw before the door slammed between us, closing us off from each other, and me from the one good thing that existed here.

I didn’t move.

I lay still, my body pained from sleeping on the cold hard floor, and stared at the food, at the tray, and the little piece of paper that I could see tucked between the divots on the underside. The formed plastic tray was cracked and missing chunks around the edge, but it still made the perfect vehicle for note transport. It was all we had anyway.

Trying to focus past the wall of narcotics that I was always infested with, I slowly reached my unrestrained arm toward the tray. My fingers fumbled against the edge as I desperately tried to grab it. It was just far enough away I couldn’t reach it. I already knew they hadn’t given me enough line from my IV to shift closer.

As it was, I hadn’t been able to reach the toilet for the last few weeks, not that it worked.

I sighed and rolled over, listening as the sobs of the little boy next door picked back up, the kid calling for his mother as he had since the first day I had been put here. Somehow, the sounds of his cries had become comforting, familiar. I was sure he felt the same way. The way he called for her, the way he spoke to her from time to time.

Sighing, I lifted my arm, the heavy thing wrapped in layers of gauze and bound with a locked brace to keep me away from the IV. The filthy tube trailed from my hand, winding over the floor and through the air until it reached the machines and bags and everything else they used to control and monitor me.

Too high to reach.

Too risky to try.

“A little length next time, would be good,” I said, turning toward the camera in the opposite corner, the thing there more to make sure I didn’t mess up their systems. They couldn’t take the risk of giving me full use of my mind and magic after all.

At least they still thought it was working. Shifting my weight, I turned toward the tray, but only the fractured edge hit my fingertips.

Fine. I would have to call this practice.

I pushed myself a little farther toward the tray, letting my magic swell as the tray shifted, the tiny surge of energy bringing the try right to me. Perfect.

I waited for an alarm, or footsteps, or a rush of cold in my IV but nothing happened. They either weren’t watching me, or the motion was subtle enough they had missed it.

Didn't matter to me. I had my food, and more importantly. The letter.

Keeping my back to the camera, I huddled over the tray as I poked at the old meat, stomach turning at the once green peas and equally as discolored carrots.

Luckily, I didn’t get as sick as many of the others in this prison, but thanks to the IV, I also didn’t need to eat as much.

The smell of the meat didn’t twist my stomach as much, so I elected to devour that, taking slow bites as I pulled the letter out from underneath the tray.

It had only taken her a few months to get the transfer to the north wing that she wanted. Meaning that it was almost a year and a half ago that I received the first letter from her, her loopy writing smeared on a folded square of toilet paper. It was just a few words left for me after I had stared in confusion at the girl who had brought me my food:

I got the job.

Now, we communicated on scraps of paper, every inch covered as we passed them back and forth, the things becoming more and more priceless as the SSU moved into poverty, the tyrannical government close to falling.

At least, that’s what Kaye’s notes had said for the last few months, signs of the end where clearly printed for her, especially now that she could freely go outside of the hospital.

But for me, eating rotten meat under the tiny sliver of light let in by the window, it didn’t seem like things were close to getting better.

In fact, they were only getting worse.

Nastya’s sessions were more brutal, her own magic just as much of a weapon as the machine she loved so much.

As much as I questioned, as much as I watched, I couldn’t figure out where her power had come from. Perhaps she had simply stolen it from me.

So, the brutality continued, sometimes knocking me out for days or weeks before I would return to consciousness.

I began to cut the meat as the note unfolded of its own accord. My magic moving in a thick sludge as it accomplished the task.

Chrlič declared eradicated. Western border has fallen.

My hands began to shake as I read the words, the steak forgotten as my power flared, the paper turning over in desperation to see more. There had to be more.

“What?” I whispered in Czech as if the single syllable would be magically answered at my demand. There was nothing else.

Nothing more.

I placed the meat in my mouth and immediately spit it out, the taste a million times worse than I expected.

I couldn’t eat that, I shouldn’t eat that. And yet….

Looking from the note to the unrecognizable slab of meat, I knew there was no choice. I could feel that in the way my heart was thundering in hope. If they were falling, if it was finally happening, I needed strength.

Forcing down the grey square, I attempted to get my mind from the sludge I was eating and instead attempted to bring my magic up to the surface, using all my strength to break past the barricade of medicated drudgery I had been fighting.

With each chew I changed the color of the paper, with each bite I focused my mind and folded it into a new shape, with each swallow I let it hover above the ground, shifting and swimming as it danced. The paper danced and moved, swirling through the air as I swallowed the last bite, the stale meat sitting uncomfortably in my gut.

As the paper fell to the floor, I pushed it to flatten, watching the creases in the paper disappear as those same words winked up at me.

Western border has fallen.

I had planned to tell her of a memory from the day before, of the tiny village near that house I always dreamed of. Perhaps another clue, yes, but it did not lead to freedom like this would. That news was no longer important.

My heart thundered as I stared at the words, my slow mind struggling to find a way to phrase the questions that buzzed through me in a way that anyone who would find the paper may not understand.

When do we escape was not going to cut it.

Sighing, I popped one of the carrots in my mouth without thinking, the sour rancid flavor turning my stomach. I was barely keeping the meat down, this was not going to help. Spitting the formerly orange blob across the room toward the filthy toilet I pushed the tray away, finally realizing how I needed to phrase it.

Placing my fingertip on the paper, I pushed my magic into it, the power twisting and moving the ink into something different.

When can we visit her?

It was enough, and I knew she would get it. I smiled at the anticipation the news brought to me, the idea of being able to hold Joclyn seeming impossible after everything. The dream for the future mixed with the dreams of every night, with the few precious memories I had and I sighed. Folding the paper back up, I prepared to send it across the floor and into the door frame, tucking it away so Kaye and I could talk.

The paper never made it. It fell to the floor as a rush of cold moved through my veins, the faint blue fluid filling the clear IV tube.

I stiffened at the sensation, unable to move as I stared at the paper, the incriminating thing out on the open, my magic frozen enough I couldn’t even nudge it.

The cold grew and I knew the paper was not the worst of my problems.

They never took me to her this early.

Something was happening.

A full thought couldn’t even break past the numbness that was overtaking me. The world was becoming nothing as I fell forward into what was left of my food, slumping into carrots and peas and some sauce that I had purposefully ignored. I tried to move away from it, but I couldn’t shift.

I couldn’t move.

The floor began to vibrate as I lay there, the sounds of boots pounding against my skull a second before the doors swung open and the screams began. The heavy metal thing slammed against the supporting wall as at least ten soldiers rushed in, flanked by someone I hadn’t seen more than just behind glass for the last few years.

Commander Domor.

I tried to speak his name, but I only gurgled and drooled against the floor. The disgust on the man’s face making his disdain for me clear.

“Take the machine with him,” he commanded the soldiers, pointing to the box that I was attached to. “Get him in the truck. Your leader is waiting.”

The soldiers burst into action as the man sniffed, covering his nose with a handkerchief in an attempt to cover the foul smell.

The image made me laugh, he created this, the least he could do is smell it.

Commander Domor stepped outside the room as the soldiers lifted me from the floor, two of them dragging me by the arms as the others flanked our sides with their massive guns drawn and ready.

The other prisoners screams silenced at seeing the weapons aimed at them, but only because it wasn’t normal.

Nothing about this was normal. Instead of going left as I always did, the soldiers dragged me right, back through the double doors that had led to a more hospitable home so many years before.

Instead of the clean hospital wing, however, the place had become just as run down. Men and woman lay on stretchers and curled up on the floor, crying and screaming as they pled for some kind of assistance.

The tops of my feet scraped against the floor as we walked through them, the desperate people reaching toward us, grabbing at clothes and feet as if even I could help them.

“Get back filth!” The soldiers demanded, bullets flying as they fired above their heads, threatening them to get back, not caring if they hit them, or killed them.

Screams followed the gunfire and the soldiers began to run, my feet sliding over the slick floor, carpet and then cement before I saw sunlight, true sunlight for the first time in more than ten years.

Although the light from my dreams had been filled with this same warmth, it hadn't seeped into me like this did. It hadn’t infected me.

Attempting to turn toward the sun, to feel it on my face for the first time, my head flopped to the side. But instead of the sun, I say Kaye.

Her, her mother, and a few other nurses that I didn’t recognize filled one of the military vehicles that sat before the massive building. Medical equipment, guns, the electronic machine they had used to torture me for so long, it all went into the back of one of the buggies.

And I went into the back of another.

The soldiers threw me into the covered bed of a truck, arms and legs tangling as I went end over end into the hard metal corner of the thing. The perfectly timed steps of the soldiers faded as they marched away, leaving only Commander Domor and I as he jumped into the darkened back of the truck, pulling a pair of metal handcuffs from his pocket.

“Just in case all of that lovely medicine wears off before we get to our new home, eh?” He sneered as he locked my free wrist into the cuff, attaching me to one of the many large rings that lined the bed vehicle. “We wouldn’t want to lose our most valuable weapon now would we.”

He laughed again as he clicked the cuff tighter, the metal ring pressing uncomfortably against my joints.

My fingers began to tingle at the pressure of the cuff before he ever left the truck, the bed rocking as he jumped through the fabric opening. The flap shifted as he left, letting in one strip of beautiful sun before I was left in the dark again. Unable to move, I heaved in air, desperate to calm the panic that was rising in me. However, the emotion only grew as the silence was broken by the sound of gunfire in the distance, the sounds of screams not far behind. Bursts of gunfire accelerated before a massive explosion rocked the ground, truck and limbs shaking under the impact.

The screams swelled, footsteps following as the sound of the bombing continued.

“It is not going where you want to go!” A voice yelled in heavy Ukrainian as the engine of the truck roared to life, sending everything rattling.

“We need him. Nothing works without him.”

Kaye.

She was close, right outside the truck, inches from me.

I needed to get to her. I fought through the drugs, through the fog, and tried to yell, to scream, anything to get her attention. Nothing happened, not even a grunt. I just lay hopelessly against the metal ridges of the truck bed, staring at the cloth of the opening as it flapped in the wind, revealing moments of the chaos outside.

“Meet me at the UK Republics Embassy in Germany,” her voice was even closer.

My heart sped up the proximity, the pulse quickening further as I tried to yell, only to have any effort blocked as another bomb fell, this one right beside us. I attempted to move, to scuttle away and escape the truck, or the war, or whatever it was that was coming. I didn't move an inch, no matter how much work I put into it. I was trapped in the hell the drugs had brought.

The truck roared to life, as the earth continued to shake and we began to move, several people beginning to jump in the back with me.

“No, no!” One of the soldiers screamed, the first two who had loaded obviously sent to guard me. “This is a private transport!”

From where I lay tangled on the floor, I could only see their feet. The two soldiers boots stood strong before a few others rushed in, three muffled shots sounding loud as the soldiers dropped to the ground, blood pouring from their vacant faces.

“Get in,” I heard Kaye shout before someone walked right past me, slamming their fist into the heavy metal that separated truck and cab in a rhythmic four pulse beat. “Let’s move!”

She yelled just as the truck took off, roaring to life and speeding away as more guns and more bombs began to rattle the world.

The bombs continued on either side of us as the truck sped along. Each bomb burst through me, a heavy flood of anxiety jerking muscles and heart until the soft touch of fingers against mine took it all away. Kaye’s fingers wound through mine as she leaned down, coming into focus in the dark.

“We really must stop meeting like this,” she teased, giving my hands a squeeze before they left, moving to cut the large cuff that kept the IV hidden off my arm.

As she began to work, the cold in my veins began to fade, the grogginess no longer growing as it had been. My mind began to move, the subtle current of my magic moving back into my fingers. I sighed at the release, attempting to convey my thanks as my tired body settled into the ridged floor of the truck bed. Thankfully, Kaye, patted my arm in understanding, moving back to cut the lock that kept the brace against my arm.

“I tried to flush your system earlier, so I am not sure how long it will take for everything to come back.” She said, her focus still on the massive brace on my arm. “Do you feel anything yet?”

I could only moan in response.

“Good,” She whispered, carefully moving my head into a position that was thankfully more comfortable. “Just rest, it will get better.”

“Who is that?” Someone asked in Ukrainian, the voice gruff as we hit a large pothole, the jerk of the vehicle sending everyone jumping.

“Our ticket out of here,” she whispered as she began to remove the IV, her motions rough.

“That’s him?” The same man asked, his severe face flashing into view as another bomb hit, the truck filling with light as it rocked. “He is the one you have been going on about for months..?”

“They have drugged him, Andriey!” Kaye snapped, her face looking even angrier from where I lay below her. “If I can get the drugs out of his system then we might have a chance.”

“A chance to what?” Another question, this time from a woman, the faceless voice hissing through the dark. “The man cannot even sit on his own.”

“Do you wish to abandon this plan?” Kaye hissed, another bomb swallowing her words as everyone shook and shrieked. “We will not get another chance to escape. And the new regimen… we do not know what will await us.”

“Yet you will trust Nastya’s puppet,” the man again, his voice growing louder as he shifted toward me. “This man cannot even speak.”

“I am not a puppet. I was a king.” I attempted to sound as powerful as I knew I could be, but the words only came out slurred and as mussed as I had grown used to.

I wasn’t sure if the lack of pronunciation was from the drugs or from spending three years in a torture chamber, however. I preferred to think it was the former.

Either way, the response caused the man to jerk, and although I still could not push myself up to look him in the eye, I turned the best I could, staring him down.

“They drugged me and chained me in the back of the truck.” I hissed, the clarity of my words slowly returning. “They do not do that to puppets.”

The man glowered at me before leaning back, his eyes still spelling danger. I looked from him to the others, each one either matching my determined scowl with their own, or looking away awkwardly.

There were about ten of them crammed into the small space, and all of them were looking between Kaye and I, two in the corner whispering something as they did so.

“Who are these people?” I was suddenly realizing that with all the months Kaye and I had passed notes, I didn’t know that much about what she had been doing.

“Workers from the hospital, some of the villagers from nearby.” She spoke offhandedly as she peeked out of the jeep again. “They have been working with me. Working against the SSU.”

The look she fixed me with was more determined than I had seen, the fight in her finally coming into its own now.

“Are you a rebel leader?” I asked, the phrasing fitting the powerful woman.

She chuckled at the question, but she was the only one, everyone else smiled in response, their own sense of respect coloring their faces.

“What did you think I meant when I said I was fighting back?” she teased, but I could already tell the others did not agree with that sentiment.

The admission made me smile. She was right, she had told me, and it suited her.

“What do you need me to do?” My voice was becoming clearer as I was, the spinning fading as the sound of bombs and guns did.

“As much as you can,” Kaye said, loading a few guns as she peeked out of the fabric that covered the truck. “And don’t give me lip. I know what you can do, Jan.”

“That’s not my name,” I taunted slowly pushing myself to sit.

My arms shook under the effort, my brutalized and weakened body struggling to operate. It didn’t matter, I had lived with this fog for years, I would push past it. I was powerful, and not just in my dreams.  

“Well, let me know when you figure it out,” Kaye whispered, helping me to sit up and lean against the truck.

The truck rattled and shook from the uneven road as Kaye handed me a water bottle, the rickety movements sending cold droplets splashing over the dirty cotton bottoms I had been wearing for the last few years. I grabbed the water greedily, splashing it over my chin as I drank.

“I don’t know how much I can do,” I said between gulps, desperate for air and water as I slowly felt myself return to normal, even though I knew it would be days before whatever they had been giving me worked its way out. “I don’t know…”

“You have more control now than you did when you saved me from the Chrlič,” Kaye chastised, interrupting me with one look. “You probably have more control even with the drugs.”

She looked at me intently, nodding to my hands before fixing me with a stare that only made the magic inside of me buzz more, ready to show her.

Returning the glare, I sagged against the truck, lifting my hands as the magic pulsed deeper, the strength of the surges becoming frightening.

As the drugs began to fade, as my magic began to fight it, it was no longer the sludge that I grown used to, it was the livewire I had only felt in my memories.

Looking from her to my hands, I swallowed, my throat unbelievably dry given the amount of water I had just consumed. The magic roared and rocked just under my skin, surprisingly staying restrained. I had felt less and caused an explosion before. Now, it remained locked in place, until with one thought I sent sparks flying between my fingers.

Electric spines in the brightest gold jumped between my fingertips, the eruption sending the others in the truck into a panic. They yelled in Ukrainian as they began to scuttle and move, but I couldn’t look away from my hands, I couldn’t look away from the magic I was now controlling, my command of it focused down to the minute detail.

“Calm,” Kaye snapped, her voice obviously not directed at me. “You must stay calm.”

The light grew brighter as I willed it to, the light molding and shifting into a smooth bubble that floated just above my hand, making everything glow.

The truck rattled as another bomb dropped, the entire bed sifting abruptly to the side. We could clearly hear the driver shout something in Ukrainian, his panic shifting through the wall. In the bed of the truck, however, there was only calm.

Everyone stared at the light as I lifted it higher, letting it hover to the top of the canvas. It grew brighter as another bomb dropped, the light exploding in a thousand multicolored lights.

A soft scream echoed over the tent, before a sprinkling of laughter followed, the man who had been so gruff and angry before commenting about how beautiful it was.

“It is,” I said, watching the color as another memory tried to move to the surface, something about the way the lights danced seeming familiar.

My hands flew to my lips as the lights fell. The awe turned to screams as the sound of a bomb shook everything and the vehicle soared through the air, the massive machine turning end over end as everything became a tangle of limbs.

I heard the impact before I felt it. Before the hard ridge of the truck bed dug into me, before my mouth filled with dirt and blood. Arms and legs tangled as my screams joined the others, my already pained body rippling with further agony.

It didn’t last, however. The magic that was once sludge soared through me, following the aches and breaks and swelling around them, swelling inside of them. Healing me.

I clearly felt a bone snap as the truck came to a landing, a few of us rolling out and over the rubble of what I was sure used to be a city.

Large sections of cement buildings were scattered everywhere. Broken furniture, bloodied clothing, and the haunted face of a child's toy were littered over the ground. I looked right into the blue eyes of the doll as my magic throbbed, my jaw clamped as the pain lessened. The vacant eyes of the doll, its face cracked and chipped from the battle it had seen, felt familiar. Not as though I had seen it before, but as though it was a mirror into me.

“Jan!” I heard Kaye yell from somewhere behind me, but I didn’t turn, I wasn’t sure I could quite yet. Although the pain was little more than a dull roar now, I didn’t trust it enough. I could barely move before the accident, trying now that I had been thrown from a truck seemed like I could be asking too much.

“Jan,” she said again, her voice was closer now, the sound of rock and stone shifting just behind me as she stumbled over to my side, her hands rough as she began to turn me over.

“Are you okay?” I asked as she came into focus, my body flopping to the side as she moved me.

“I was going to ask the same of you,” she said, each word a struggle, although, the corner of her mouth pulled up a bit. “I’ve been worse. I have also been better.”

The smile didn’t hit her eyes and my heart dropped, a fear moving to my toes as I reached for her, glad when she took my hand.

“Don’t be scared,” I whispered, the words sounding ridiculous with the quick tap of gunfire began in the distance.

Kaye looked at me curiously as I clenched her hand tightly, holding it in a vice as I let my magic swell in my hand before pushing it through me and into her.

The magic was different than the accidental healing from all those years ago. It was a flood of heat, and her eyes widened at the sensation, gasping as she tried to shift herself away from me.

“Does it hurt?” I asked in alarm.

“No,” she clarified, her eyes wide as she stared at me and my hand. “It’s just… warm.”

“Good, let me know if it becomes too much.”

I let more of it move into her, although I wasn’t sure how much was needed, I wanted to be careful. I had never controlled this, after all, I didn’t know what was required.

Closing my eyes, I focused the same as I had done in the dream, glad when the magic began to move through her, relaying what felt like whispers of information back to me. Tiny cuts, abrasions, a fractured rib, a bone in her ankle seemed to be out of place. I saw each of them, I felt each of them. My magic pooled around them as she sat before me, her eyes growing wider as one after another they healed, even the cut on the skin above where I held her began to knit itself back together.

“Jan,” she gasped, eyes wide in shock.

With a sigh, I released her, falling back against the rubble, the world filled with gunfire as those who had been in the back of the truck slowly made their way over to us.

I watched them move, blood pouring from head wounds, sheltering dislocated shoulders, and I swallowed. I wasn’t sure I could heal them all, I was honestly amazed I had been able to control it enough to heal Kaye. Besides, I was sure their reaction to whatever had happened would not be as calm as the powerful woman before me.

“I’ve never seen it heal that fast,” She sighed, still looking at the dried blood that had poured over her arm from where a cut had previously been.

I looked from her to the others in her team, the closest man now within earshot, and chose to smile in answer, a response that thoroughly infuriated Kaye.

She fixed me with a look that made me both flinch and smile, before she turned away hastily, rushing toward the others on her team.

Only the rumblings of their quick Ukrainian was audible as I lay among rock and steel, listening to the gunfire as it moved closer. It sounded like it was just on the other side of the pile of rubble we had sequestered ourselves against. Their conversation stopped at the sound, Kaye rushing past me until she reached the gentle rise of what was once a building, army-crawling over the last of the rubble to look at what was coming.

“There are a few rebels there,” she hissed to me and the few others who had joined us. “But they may not hold the line for long.

“Who are they fighting?” One of the older men asked with a groan. The sound of his voice and blood covered arm made it clear he was in pain.

“The SSU. Although I know we passed a depot for The Kyō not far back.” Kaye responded as she checked the weapons I had seen her loading before, throwing one to the side when she determined the barrel was no longer safe.

I had heard The Kyō mentioned once by Kaye, years before everything changed. Even without hearing more I could already tell that this ominous group could easily be more powerful than the SSU.

Judging by the way everyone tensed, they weren’t handing out daisies, either.

“Both the SSU and the republic in one fight,” a woman said as she too began to check her weapons, her voice gruff and angry. “Igor picked a hell of a spot to dump us out.”

“Where is he, anyway?” the pained man asked over the gunfire, looking from Kaye to the wreckage of the truck that lay about twenty feet behind us. It was only then that I realized how far I had been thrown. No wonder my body was all beat up. It was amazing that I only broke one bone.

“He didn’t make it.” Kaye didn’t look at anyone. “Andriey didn’t either. I can’t find Yana.”

The man swore loudly and threw his gun to the ground while the woman crossed herself and mumbled an old familiar prayer. The other six that stood with us did the same, the same prayer roaring over me and blending with the gunfire in a twisted worship that made my spine twist.

“So we are surrounded,” the man said, his voice still hard from his outburst. “By both the SSU and those republic zealots.”

I looked to Kaye in question but she only shook her head, there was only one thing I needed to know, and the man had already made that clear.

“How far are we from the border?” he asked as the others finally emerged from their prayer.

Kaye pulled out the same rectangular phone I had seen so many times before, tapping the screen as she brought it to life. The once pristine thing was now dented in several places, the bright screen cracked and flickering. She held it close to her face in an attempt to see and carefully begin hitting the screen. She moved quickly, the screen continuing to flicker before it went out altogether. Two quick taps and it flared back to life, a small sigh escaping her lips.

“It’s two miles that way,” she sighed, pointing the direction of the fighting. “If we can make it through that, that’s close enough we can make it.”

Everyone began to nod, the same determination coloring each of their faces. I was sure they had set out from the hospital ready to fight. No escape would be without damage or battle, but their eyes made it clear they hadn’t expected this.

They had already fought. Now, it was just survival. Now it was just two miles to freedom.

I would make sure they made it.

“Now,” Kaye said, cocking her small firearm. “Who can walk?”

I wanted to say that the question was for everyone, but she was looking right at me.

“I can do more than walk,” I said, shifting myself to sitting as my body ached from so many years of ill use. None of that mattered now.

“I think I can fly.”