*   *   *

She woke, headachy, her throat burning, her arm throbbing, when Riley bumped up the road to the villa.

When she got out, found her legs shaky, she wanted to crawl back into sleep.

“I need to clean up. You can start without me.”

Bran took her arm. “Sasha.”

She yanked free. “I can feel her on me. I need a shower.” Shaky or not, she got her legs moving, rushed straight into the house.

“Give her a little space,” Riley advised, giving the welcoming Apollo a quick rub. She glanced over toward Doyle as Annika jumped off the bike. “Look, we’ll get some food first, give her time to settle.” She looked down at her hands. “I want to clean up some myself.”

“Fine. We’ll all have a nice wash.”

“I’ll take mine down at the beach,” Sawyer decided.

“Oh, yes, a swim! I’ll go with you.”

“Great. Grab your suit.”

She looked blank. “My suit?”

“Bathing suit.”

“Oh, yes. I have one.” She dashed into the house, and Sawyer went up the terrace steps.

“What’s her story?” Doyle asked Bran.

“We’ve a lot of stories among us. If you’d wait a half hour. We’re a bloody mess, so we’ll do better cleaned up, and getting some food. There are two rooms left, and you can have your pick.”

“I’m a long way from staying.”

“That may be, but you’ve bat blood and guts and Christ only knows on you same as the rest of us. You can use the shower, do what you do after we talk. I’ll show you which rooms are left, and you use whichever you like.”

“I wouldn’t mind a shower.”

“Come inside, and you can have the two-penny tour along the way.”

“Hell of a house in a hell of a spot. Whose is it?”

“Friend of a friend of an uncle—of Riley’s. She’s connections.”

“Handy.”

“It has been. McCleary, is it? So your people are from Ireland?”

“Back a ways,” Doyle said as they started upstairs.

“Mine are still there—or most of them. Sligo.”

“Clare. I’m told.”

“Well, McCleary. Either of these two rooms are open to you.”

“This one’s fine.”

“Then it’s yours. Be at home, and if you’ll come down when you’re ready, we’ll put some food together and talk this through.”

He went into his own room, stripped down, and took a good look at his side. The cuts and slices on his arms didn’t bother him overmuch, but his side showed a maze of punctures and gashes from when a group of the bastards had swarmed him when he’d tried to get to Sasha.

Gone now, he thought. He’d burned them to cinders, but they’d gotten some pieces of him along the way. He moved to the dresser, brushed a hand over the drawer to release the locking spell he’d put on. He lifted out a case where he kept some potions and brews, took what he needed, locked up the rest again.

In the shower, he hissed as the water hit the wounds, then just braced his hands on the tile wall, and let those wounds run clean.

Once he’d washed, let the water beat most of the aches away, he got out of the shower, examined the wounds again, and laid the salve on thick. Immediately the raw edge of pain eased. He bandaged it as best he could, dressed, then went to face the music.

*   *   *

Sasha wept in the shower. The jag increased the headache, but she felt steadier purged of tears. She ran the water as hot as she could bear until it no longer felt as if spiders crawled over her skin. She scrubbed that skin, ignoring the pain when she hit cuts and scrapes, washed her hair. Scrubbed again, washed again.

And finally felt clean.

After wrapping herself in a towel, she wiped the mirror clear of fog, studied her face, traced the bruising at her neck.

She’d been weak, she thought, and couldn’t, wouldn’t be weak again. If she continued this—and she knew she would—she had to be smarter, stronger, more prepared. She wouldn’t cower back a second time while some demon goddess from hell tried to take her over.

She wouldn’t be used again or deceived again.

“People underestimate you because you underestimate yourself,” she told her reflection. “That stops now.”

She walked out of the bath, then stopped when she saw Bran at her open terrace doors, looking out.

“I need you to leave.”

He turned back, studied her as she stood, hair sleek and wet, her hand clutching the towel between her breasts. And insult and anger in her eyes.

“I have a salve.” He held up the small jar. “I can help with the wounds, and with the pain.”

“I don’t want—”

“Stop being a git. You’re not a stupid woman. You want to be pissed, be pissed,” he invited as his own temper clawed at him. “Stay pissed after I explain, that’s your choice to make, but now you’ll sit down and let me help.”

“You’re not in charge of me.”

“And thank the gods for that. But we’re all in this together, and I’ll do what I can to help the others in turn. But you took the brunt of it. Now sit down, and be pissed and smart.”

Refusing, she realized, was weak, was letting her hurt and disappointment cloud judgment. She needed to be strong and well to fight.

So she sat on the side of the bed.

He came over, set the salve down. And laid his hands gently on her head.

“That’s not—”

“Your head aches, that’s clear to see. She tried getting into your mind, didn’t she? And you’ve been crying. So your head hurts.” He brushed his thumbs over her temples, her forehead. “I’m not as good at this as others, but with you being an empath—”

“I’m not.”

“For Christ’s sake, woman, don’t argue with what I know.” Impatience snapped, a whiplash. “You block most out, but it’s there. Use it now, in a kind of reverse, and that will help me help you. Let me feel it, open up and let me feel. We’ll start with the headache, as you’ll think clearer then.”

Because he was right, because there’d been impatience rather than pity, she closed her eyes, offered her pain.

“There now,” he murmured, and his fingers stroked her brow, her skull, her temples. “It’s a dark gray cloud.” He ran his hands down, pressed thumbs into the base of her neck. “It’s whisking away as a breeze comes up. Cool and fresh. Feel it.”

She did, and the horrible, gripping pressure eased. “Yes, that’s better. That’s better,” she repeated, and nudged his hands aside. “Thank you.”

“You’ve cuts and scrapes and bruises, and a puncture or two. The salve alone will do for that, but this gash needs more. Annika did a fine—what do they call it?—field dressing. She’s an array of disparate talents. Let me feel it.

“Yes, it’s hot, and it throbs.” And would scar if he couldn’t fix it. It surprised him how the thought of that upset him. “But it’s clean. Nothing to fester here.”

“How do you know?”

“You know, and I can see what you know here. Help me cool it now, help me close it.”

She lost herself in his eyes. It occurred to her later he must have taken her into some light trance, but her feelings seemed to touch his, like fingertips, and the heat of her arm cooled.

“That’s good now, that’s fine. And the salve will do the rest right enough.”

A little dazed, she looked down to see the gash closed, and no more than a long scrape remaining.

“But, that’s—”

“Magick?” he suggested. “It’s healing, and you’re doing most of the work. What about your leg? You’re favoring the right one.”

“I don’t know. I must have twisted or turned my ankle in the cave. When the bats . . .”

“We won’t think of them now.” He crouched, skimmed his hands over her ankle, eased back when she flinched. “Tender, is it? We’ll fix it.”

She understood now, let him in. Imagined the swelling, the tendons and muscles while his fingers circled and stroked.

Then he rose. “Your throat, that’s the worst of it, and the hardest. She touched you.”

“She didn’t. Not physically.”

“And that’s the deepest wound, you see? Her power against ours. I think it will hurt to heal this, at first. You have to trust me.”