Inside the healer's clinic, the moment the door closed, I expected silence.
Nope.
My expectations died the same way my elite squad did—swiftly and without mercy.
The healers moved with precision and urgency, treating Jin and me like we were fragile royal porcelain instead of half-dead soldiers. Warm cloths, gentle hands, whispered instructions. I hadn't been cared for this delicately since my mother patched my scraped knees at age five.
They cleaned our wounds with something that smelled like mint and burned like a dragon's sneeze. Applied thick salves that eased the pain to a dull throb.
Bandaged my torso, treated Jin's ruined eye with remarkable skill.
Then—
"Take this," Madam Florence said, pressing a small vial to my lips. "It's an anti-bi-yo-tiks and ass-pi-rin, Lady Seraphine's invention. No idea what it actually means, but it's a miracle in a bottle."
