Tricked

Chapter 21

Hospitals are buildings of death and give me the fantods. Unlike a field of heather and a benevolent sun shining upon me, they do not give me the sense that the day will bring me joy; they give me the sense that the day will be my last, and I will die cut off from nature. Consequently, when I woke up in the Flagstaff hospital, I couldn’t wait to get out.

Granuaile was there and restrained me with a hand on my chest.

“Lie back, sensei. You’re okay.”

“Oberon?” I asked, my voice tight.

“He’s okay too. Well, he’s not okay, but he’s alive, anyway. Most of his ribs were shattered on the right side and his shoulder too.”

The breath I’d been holding whooshed out of me in relief, and tears escaped from my eyes. “Thank the gods,” I said, choked up. “I didn’t want to lose him.”

“I know,” Granuaile said, and tears spilled down her face as well. “I didn’t want to lose him either.”

“What happened?” I asked. “I thought I was finished.” I’m sure Granuaile hadn’t seen any hint of the Dream on my face while I was unconscious. There had been no gods in the room with their fingers on a red button. Only a traitor.

“When you collapsed, Leif healed up your neck with his little vampire tricks.”

“What? How did he do that?” If it was a magical process, my amulet should have prevented him from doing anything to me. I checked to make sure my amulet was still around my neck, and of course it was. Perhaps the healing wasn’t magical but rather a radical biological process.

“I didn’t see exactly what he did. He squatted down next to you and his body blocked what he was doing — I was still in the hall with Oberon. But when he stood up, you weren’t bleeding anymore — in fact, your neck looked perfect.”

My fingers drifted up from my amulet and found no bandages, no scabs or puncture wounds.

“You were still out but not losing any more blood,” she added, “and that allowed us time to get you over here.”

“What about cops? That room was unholy.”

“Leif just charmed anyone who came by to forget about it. Then he called up some ghouls to take care of the remains. They were already in town. He summoned them from Phoenix right after he called Zdenik to say he’d found the world’s last Druid.”

“He told you all this?”

“Yes.” Her eyes drifted up, remembering. “He said he was dreadfully sorry that Oberon was hurt, and he hopes you’ll be able to forgive him someday.”

I shook my head. “That’s not going to happen.”

Granuaile nodded shortly to indicate she’d heard but then continued with the air of someone who had to recite their lines before they forgot them. “He also said you don’t have to worry about him doing this again. He’ll take care of the rest of the vampires by himself.”

“Good. I want nothing more to do with him. Wait.” She was blinking rapidly and seemed disoriented. “Did he charm you to make you say all that?”

My apprentice glanced down at my face, confusion in her eyes. “Say what?”

“That bastard! I’ll unbind him on sight, just like any other vampire.”

Granuaile looked as if she was going to say something more, but the scowl on my face must have made her reconsider. Before I could soften and ask her what she was going to say, a doctor wafted into the room like a cotton cloud cut in the shape of a lab coat, trailing two squat nurses in his wake. He had short, light brown hair and a pair of rimless glasses perched on his nose, over which he peered at me with what looked like suspicion.

“Ah, Mr. Collins. Feeling better, are we?”

I blinked at him, not recognizing my new name for a moment. “I’d like to go outside,” I finally said.

“Oh-ho!” he exclaimed, a false gaiety coloring his tone. He tried to chuckle companionably, but it didn’t endear him to me. “It’s far too soon for that.” The badge on his coat read O’Bryan. An unusual spelling for an Irish name. At another time and place I might have been interested in the history of it.

“We have to figure out what’s going on with you first,” the doctor said.

For the first time, I realized they had an IV in me, and little expensive boxes were beeping and compiling data on my vitals. I had no magic left whatsoever to speed my own healing, and a glance at the window indicated I was several floors above the earth. I was utterly at the mercy of the American health care system, and the thought made me shudder and the little expensive box beep faster. I clutched at Granuaile’s hand as she tried to back off and make room for the doctor.

“Whoa. Calm down. What was that?” O’Bryan said.

“Vitamin D deficiency. Get me outside,” I said.

“Miss, I’ll need you to excuse us for a moment,” one of the nurses said to Granuaile, and she tried to pull away again. I held on.

“She’s not going anywhere,” I grated, “unless it’s outside with me!”

Dr. O’Bryan flicked his eyes at the nurse, telling her to back off and let Granuaile stay where she was for now.

“Perhaps we can arrange a trip outside a bit later,” he said, “but I need to ask you some questions about your condition first, and we need to get you stabilized.”

“I’m stable and conscious, Doctor, and of sound mind. I’ll be checking out immediately. I refuse care. Get this IV out of my arm now.”

The doctor’s tone became patronizing. “Mr. Collins, we haven’t even established your insurance information or a proper check-in yet—”

“There is no insurance information. All bills will be paid by the law firm of Magnusson and Hauk in Tempe, phone number 480-555-8675. I will wait here long enough for you to call them and confirm that they are financially responsible for my bill, but that’s it. I’m out of here. Now, are you going to remove this IV or shall I?”

Granuaile proffered her cell phone to the doctor. “Here. You can call them.”

That got to him. Helpless patient in bed? He could ignore that. Granuaile in his face? He couldn’t hack it. He held up a defensive hand and annoyance tightened his voice as he said, “That’s not my priority right now.”

“It isn’t?” Granuaile replied, still holding the phone up. “You made it sound like insurance was the most important thing, or some kind of payment for your care. That’s fair, we understand, and we’re giving you what you need so you can take care of it and get us out of here. That way you can see patients who actually need you.”

“Just let me ask Mr. Collins here a couple of questions about his condition.”

“No questions are necessary, Doctor,” I said. “Again, I refuse your care. All that remains is for you to unhook me from this IV and all these monitors and settle the bill.”

O’Bryan was visibly irritated now. Doctors aren’t used to losing control of conversations in hospitals. If I had any juice left, I would have simply cast camouflage and walked out, but since I was completely drained, I had to play by their rules long enough to get out of there. If I simply yanked out the IV, he’d probably order me restrained, and the nurses looked burly enough to manage it in my weakened condition.

I already knew what he wanted to ask: How did you get to be so drained of blood when I can’t find where or how it got out? And if I allowed him to ask me that, there was a fairly decent chance I would scream, “AN EVIL FUCKING VAMPIRE SUCKED ME DRY!” and then the restraints would come out for sure, followed shortly by a trip to a padded cell and little cups of Jell-O spiked with Thorazine. I had to remain calm or I wouldn’t be able to help Oberon.

“Mr. Collins. You are in no condition to self-diagnose—”

I interrupted before he could go any further. “Granuaile, call Hal right now please and ask about the possibility of suing this man for continuing treatment after I have refused it.”

“Now, hold on, that’s just—”

“The American way,” I finished for him. “It’s no fun having lawyers on retainer unless you can use them on people. So what’s it gonna be, Doc? Do you want to call my lawyers and get paid, or should I call my lawyers and sue you?”

Abruptly, I was too much trouble to deal with. He clenched his fists and exhaled noisily, then turned to the nurses. “The patient has refused our care. Get him ready to check out.” He flicked his gaze to Granuaile and said, “Miss, if you will follow me and give me that payment information, we’ll settle the paperwork.”

“Certainly,” she said, and this time when she pulled away I let her go. The nurses loomed over me and began tearing off those monitor things and removing the IV. They didn’t speak to me. I didn’t rate bedside manners, because I’d gotten pissy with the doctor.

“Where are my clothes?” I said. After I asked the question, it occurred to me that perhaps I didn’t have any. I doubted they’d delivered me to the hospital soaked in blood, or else I would have had the police to deal with on top of the doctor. Still, the nurse on my right gestured to a small nightstand in the corner with a heinous plastic lamp on top of it. As soon as I was free of their tentacular monitoring apparatus, I sat up and swung my legs over the bedside. There I paused; I was still light-headed and weak from blood loss. No doubt they had pumped some replacement fluid in, but it wasn’t enough. No matter; I’d heal well enough once I could get outside and away from this clinical gray box of death.

I pushed myself forward and rose cautiously to my feet. A draft from the aft signaled that my dressing gown was open, but I didn’t care. The nurses could take shots with their camera phones and upload them to their Flickr stream for all I cared, just so long as my face wasn’t in it.

A wave of dizziness rolled over me when I took a step, but it was one of those gentle rocking swells and not a thirty-foot-tall fist of Poseidon. I could do this. I shuffled over carefully and leaned against the nightstand for support as I opened the drawer. Then I nearly fell over when Granuaile spoke from behind me.

“Nom nom nom!” she said.

I looked around for the cookies she must be referring to and then realized, belatedly, that the room was bereft of delicious baked goods. The only thing on display was my backside, and apparently she thought it looked tasty. I blushed and retrieved the folded set of clothes, then turned around so that the hospital gown could afford me a shred of modesty. The nurses exited silently and I asked Granuaile if the doctor was satisfied.

“He’s pissed and Hal wants you to call him, but, yeah, we’re clear to go. You need some help getting dressed?”

She knew I’d say no. Her mouth was quirked up to one side and she was quite clearly teasing me.

“I’ll manage, thanks,” I said. I held up the jeans. “Did you put these in here?”

“Yep. You’re welcome.”

“Thanks.” I pulled out a mostly white shirt with uncertain ambitions about achieving a pale green. It looked a bit more designer than I was used to. “Where’d you get this?”

“Flagstaff actually has some decent shops,” she said. “I noticed you liked henley shirts, so I found you one in ‘creamy dill.’ ”

“What? Are you making that up? Sounds like a salad dressing. A vaguely pornographic one.”

“It’s the fab new color, Atticus. All the Irish Druids will be wearing it today.” She grinned at me impishly.

I tossed my head significantly at the door and said, “I’ll be out in a couple of minutes.”

She spun on her heel, hands on hips, and sashayed slowly out of the room, allowing me to check her out too. I couldn’t figure out what she was up to. Didn’t we talk last night in Granny’s Closet about the need to stop flirting? Was she defying me? Or was this not flirting at all but an attempt to lighten my rather grim mood? I pushed the matter out of my mind, because I had to get to Oberon.

I leaned against the bed for support as I tugged on the pair of jeans, then pulled on my creamy-dill shirt with a small shudder. There was a pair of sandals for my feet. Once I slipped into these, I made my shaky way to the door, where Granuaile was waiting, beaming her best smile at the frowning nurses. I draped an arm around her shoulders.

“I’m not quite steady yet. Help me get out of here?”

“Sure, sensei.”

I was proud of myself. I only drifted to the left and stumbled twice on the way out. And I didn’t run my fingers through her hair even once.

Outside, a couple of trees and a decorative expanse of sod surrounded a sign that said FLAGSTAFF MEDICAL CENTER. The grass felt so good underneath my feet, cool and welcoming, and the touch of Gaia’s strength was soft and warm as it replenished me.

“Ahh.” A smile of relief spread across my face. “Granuaile, you have no idea how awful it is to be so cut off from the earth once you’re bound to it.”

“That was less than a day, Atticus. Surely you’ve gone longer than that.”

“Oh, yes. Prison sucked more than a little bit.”

“What? How did anyone ever manage to imprison you?”

“They caught me in a hospital like this, drained of magic. Aenghus Óg sent a succubus after me in Italy, and she nearly got me, because, you know, damn, she was fine. Long story short, I had to hack her up with Fragarach in a crowded plaza, and Italians, gods bless ’em, tend to object when people slice up hot women. I was already running low on the cobblestones, not enough juice left to cast camouflage, and then I had a mob after me and they beat me up pretty good. The polizia saved me from getting killed and took me to the hospital to heal up before they beat a confession out of me. They marched me from my hospital bed to their car and straight into a concrete cell.”

“Where was Fragarach during this time?”

“I let the polizia take it from me.”

“No way!”

“It was a calculated risk. They weren’t under the control of Aenghus Óg, like Fagles was, and the ironic thing about being locked away from the earth is that the Fae couldn’t find me. They had no idea where I was.”

“What about your necklace?”

“That was more troublesome. They did their best to take it, but it’s bound to me and not dependent on power to stay there. They cut the chain to try to remove it that way, but that didn’t work either; the amulet and the charms all remained around my neck. So I was a very suspicious lad. After about a week they took me out to this dusty courtyard to get some exercise, and once I got my shoes off that was all I needed. I filled up my bear charm and camouflaged myself, went ninja and stole back Fragarach from their evidence room, then walked out. Haven’t been back to Italy since.”

A mischievous grin played at the corners of Granuaile’s mouth. “What was your name at that time?”

“I am wanted there under the name of Luigi Fittipaldi. Very dangerous man but assumed to be much older now. This was back in the early seventies.”

“Did you wear those wingtip collars and everything?”

“Well, you know, I always try to blend in.…”

She laughed. “That’s fabulous. All recharged?”

“Yeah,” I said, and followed her to where the new SUV was parked. “Thank you, by the way, for watching over Oberon and me. I’m glad you weren’t hurt.”

“You’re welcome, sensei. We going straight to the vet’s?”

“No, we have a couple of stops to make first.”

We drove to the Winter Sun Trading Company on San Francisco Street to pick up some necessary herbs, and once I’d blended them and bound them properly, we scooted south of the railroad tracks to Macy’s European coffeehouse on Beaver Street to pick up some hot water for tea and one of their famous San Francisco cappuccinos. I made a large cup of modified Immortali-Tea for Oberon — altered to accelerate healing — and, after one more quick stop at a grocery store, we were ready to visit the vet.

Said vet appraised me accusingly, clearly thinking I must be at least partially responsible for Oberon’s condition. Her name was Dr. April Flores, and I wished we could have met under better circumstances. She was very sharp and I would have enjoyed talking to her about more pleasant things than wounded doggies.

“Your dog is lucky to be alive,” she said. “I haven’t seen trauma like this before. What was he doing attacking a bear anyway?”

I glanced at Granuaile and she shrugged apologetically. It was the best cover story she could come up with, but I thought it was at least somewhat plausible. Except that neither of us looked like we’d been attacked by a bear, so Oberon could hardly have been indulging a protective instinct. And encounters with bears in northern Arizona, while not unheard of, were rather infrequent. Dr. Flores was having trouble swallowing the story, and I didn’t blame her. But it was more believable than the truth.

“Dogs will be dogs,” I said, a meaningless phrase that nevertheless allowed me to avoid lying. I’m not normally averse to lying, but since Dr. Flores was a nice person who clearly loved animals, I was trying to avoid accumulating any more guilt ferrets.

Dr. Flores frowned, fully aware that I hadn’t answered her, but led us to a room in her clinic. “He won’t be able to move for some time. I have the bones set, but those will take a while to heal, especially his shoulder. He also has a punctured lung and a bruised spleen.”

She opened the door and I saw Oberon lying on a table on his left side. His exposed right side was shaved and bandaged; he looked awful. But he saw me and his tail began thumping against the table.

“Hi, buddy. Good to see you.” I entered the room and squatted down so I was eye level with him, putting a paper sack and the tea on the floor underneath his head, just beyond the edge of the table. His eyes followed my hands as they disappeared from his view and then came back up to scratch his head gently. Granuaile and the vet began to murmur behind me about recovery time, but I blocked them out and gave all my attention to Oberon.

Maybe a little something for you.

Former animal, now deceased.

You will have to judge for yourself.

I need to have you drink some tea first.

Maybe smellier than usual.

I snorted and then remembered I wasn’t alone in the room. I looked back at Granuaile and Dr. Flores. “May I have a few minutes with him, please?” I asked.

“Don’t move him,” the veterinarian said. Her eyes dropped down to the bag and added, “And no food.”

“Right,” I said, smiling in what I hoped was a reassuring manner. Granuaile smirked as she exited, knowing full well that I planned to ignore those instructions. Once they were gone, I searched for and found a bowl to pour the tea in.

I need you to drink this, Oberon, I said as I filled the bowl. All of it. It’s important. You’ll get better quicker. How do you feel?

He began to lap up the liquid.

I’m sorry, Oberon, but you have to drink it all.