Wizard Squared by K.E. Mills

Author:K.E. Mills [Mills, K.E.]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: FIC009000
Publisher: Orbit
Published: 2010-06-30T22:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

The other Monk’s cries of anguish were unspeakable. Hands pressed to her face, Melissande turned away. “I can’t bear this,” she muttered to Reg on her shoulder, feeling like the worst kind of coward. “I can’t.”

“Come on, ducky,” said Reg. Her claws were close to drawing blood, she was clutching so tight. “It can’t go on much longer.”

No, it couldn’t. Because if their Monk didn’t break the shadbolt in the next few seconds the other Monk would surely die—or else go totally mad.

Hurry up, Monk. Hurry up. Saint Snodgrass, help him.

Still hiding behind her hands, she could hear Bibbie’s harsh, choked breathing. Poor Bibbie. She shouldn’t have stayed. This was too cruel.

And then the two Monks let out a blood-curdling yell. She spun around so hard and so fast that Reg nearly lost her perch. Swearing and flapping, the bird managed to hang on. Bibbie leaped for the sofa, her ivory-pale cheeks drenched with tears.

“Monk! Monk! Are you all right? Monk!”

Limp as an overcooked Yok Tok noodle, Monk slid all the way to the parlor carpet. His nose was bleeding, thick red splatters on his chin and his shirt. Eyes rolled up in his head he sprawled on the floor, looking entirely too close to dead for comfort. Only the rasping of air in his throat reassured them that he was actually alive.

“Monk, you idiot!” cried Bibbie, and hauled him into her lap. “Please, please, don’t just lie there. Say something!”

Monk made a nasty gargling sound without any words in it. Bibbie choked back a sob and held her wretched brother even tighter, heedless of the blood smearing from him onto her.

Reg chattered her beak. “You’d better check on the other one, ducky. And cross your fingers while you’re at it, because if the bugger’s dead we might never know what the devil’s going on.”

Reg was right. Of course. She was nearly always right. It was quite possibly her most aggravating trait. “Hop off, then,” she said, twitching her shoulder. “I’ll have no hope of giving him the kiss of life with you breathing down my neck giving me points for technique.”

Ordinarily that would’ve provoked a flood of sarcastic commentary, with bonus insults, but even Reg was flattened by this latest turn of events. The bird hopped to the sofa’s arm without so much as an inelegant snort.

Stepping over and around her Monk and Bibbie, Melissande perched on the edge of the sofa beside the other Monk. He looked utterly dreadful, so pale he was gray except for where he was splodged with blood. She couldn’t see him breathing. Trembling with nerves, heart racing, she snatched off her spectacles and held them over his slightly parted lips. Held her breath—held her breath—then let it out in a sickeningly relieved whoosh as his slow exhalation lightly fogged the lenses.

“Saint Snodgrass be praised,” she whispered, and leaned close. “Monk. Monk, can you hear me?”

The other Monk stirred, his stubby eyelashes fluttering. Beneath his closed eyelids his eyes moved from side to side, restless.

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