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“She doesn’t have the strength,” the man said as he slid from his horse’s back.
I frowned at him, wondering why he was dismounting until he circled around to my side of the cart and held up his hands as if he intended to help me down. I turned wide eyes on Amara.
He gestured for me to hurry. “You take my horse. He’s a strong one, and he can gallop a bit longer, but he’ll go faster with only one of us.”
“You want me to go on alone?” I asked, my fear rising even higher.
“Follow the road into the village,” he said. “You can’t miss it.” He swallowed. “Or her.”
I looked at Amara again, and she indicated for me to climb down.
“Amara,” I whispered.
She held my eyes in her gaze, which was strong and calm. “You can do this, Delphine. And if you can’t, that’s not your fault. From the sound of it, you’re this girl’s only hope, so you certainly can’t do any harm. You have to at least try.”
I swallowed hard. “I have to try.” Parroting her words let me pretend I could also mimic her strength.
Accepting the help of the villager, I scrambled inelegantly down from the cart and raced around to the saddled horse, who was breathing heavily and tossing his mane.
The stranger followed me and before I could ask for help mounting, he put both hands around my waist and threw me up into the saddle. I gathered the reins and paused for a moment to look at Amara.
She nodded. “Go, Delphine. We’ll follow as fast as we can.”
I took a deep breath, leaned low over the horse’s neck and kicked my heels into his flank.
ChapterEight
The horse shot off faster than I expected, and I had to grab handfuls of his mane to keep my seat. I wasn’t an elegant rider, but my childhood around farm horses had made me a functional one, and since my activation my skills had improved. I was more in tune with the animal beneath me now, able to sense the shifts in his muscles and adjust my own position accordingly.
Even so, we flew down the road at a breathless pace, and I wondered if the horse had picked up that I was scared. He was responding by racing home, unaware he was carrying me closer to the source of my fear.
My heart pounded in my ears, and it took all my self-restraint not to use my ability to slow it down. I knew better than to try that, though. Amara hadn’t known the safety lectures usually given to new healers, but Hayes had been quick to fill in where she had lacked.
Within an impossibly short time, the outlying buildings of the village came into view. As promised, the main road ran straight through the center of the village, and at this hour it was clear enough that I barely had to check my pace.
But as we neared what looked like a central square, the edges of a small crowd came into view. I frantically pulled back on the reins, and the horse responded instantly.
The sound of our arrival caught the attention of those nearest us, and their curious gazes fixed on me. Someone recognized the horse and set up a shout, and within moments everyone had deduced the meaning of an unfamiliar person riding a horse that had just left town in search of a healer.
By the time I slid down from the saddle, hands were reaching for me, propelling me through the press of people. I barely had time to ready myself for an unknown situation before I was thrust into the small space at the center of the crowd.
For a second, all I could see was blood. The red seemed to be everywhere, coating everything, and my vision swam, a roaring sound filling my head. But I was prepared for it. Pushing my power through my own body, I ruthlessly suppressed the reaction, washing it away.
Fear was still left in its wake, however. There was so much blood. Too much blood.
I forced myself to push the fear away as well, using my own determination instead of my power this time. Focusing on what mattered, I tried to assess the situation.
A young girl—not more than twelve—lay on the paved street near a small fountain. Mercifully, she had passed out because I had never seen a leg mangled as badly as her left one. I could only imagine how bad the pain had been while she was conscious. Had she had a run in with her father’s farm equipment? If so, he must have carried her all the way into town. No wonder she had lost consciousness.
It took me another second to take in the older woman kneeling beside the girl. For a moment, I thought it might be the mother, but she was too old.
The woman looked up at me with wild eyes. “I can’t get it to stop,” she gasped out. “It won’t stop.”
Her hands and clothes were coated in the red, her face almost as ashen as the girl’s. She kept her eyes trained on me, and I saw the moisture in them.
“All I could do was help her sleep.” The tears welled enough to fall from her eyes.
I drew a shuddering breath, trying to make sense of the situation. That this older, experienced healer was looking to an eighteen-year-old with such desperation, her face pleading for help, told me more about the situation than I wanted to know.
