“Wyvern,” Cerin stated, behind me. I glanced back to see him releasing necromantic energy from both palms. Hundreds of black tendrils slithered past my boots, making a sizzling noise as they went.

“What?” I asked, breathlessly.

“Two legs,” he said shortly, unsheathing his scythe, and running ahead.

Silas had already started shooting his arrows. The first few bounced harmlessly off of the wyvern's thick scales, so he began firing toward the soft spots of the creature. Between scales, through the wings. Nyx, Theron, and Cerin had the creature surrounded, engaging it with melee weapons. From around the corner ahead, dozens of skeletons and zombies came running and shambling, heeding Cerin's call, their hands all equipped with what weapons were closest. Almost humorously, some of the undead had chosen the broken weapons strewn across the floor, and were attempting to damage the wyvern with nothing but steel handles or half of a sword.

At least they were trying.

Creatius les fiers a nienda. Fire energy materialized over one palm. Sheel a mana. Life energy materialized over the other.

I hurried to the three friends engaged in melee. I could tell that the wyvern was angriest with Nyx, who had managed to stab the creature in the lower stomach, where its scales were weakest. So I directed my spells together toward her, allowing the two elements to mix before reaching the Alderi.

Zwip. Sssss. A magical shield encapsulated her, flames licking out from its energy. The wyvern hissed, the flames reflecting off of its white eyes with a glare. I had figured that the wyvern could use ice magic, given the evidence of it throughout its lair. I wanted to protect the others as much as I could from that.

The wyvern lifted its head. At first I thought it was to dodge Nyx's fire shield, but then I heard the rumbling. The scales on his throat rippled upward, and it curled its neck downward, stretching its jaws to the limits. As the ripple reached its head, the rumbling deepened, before it was released from the wyvern's mouth as a mist of pure ice.

Nyx was smart enough to know it had been preparing an attack, so she was in the midst of a somersault to the side to dodge it. Even still, the ending seconds of the spell hit its target, dimming the fire shield and weakening it. Nyx didn't let it faze her. As soon as she landed her dodge, she ducked back into melee range, striking in a flurry of moves so quick, her daggers were nothing more than blurs of silver.

Cerin was hacking away at the wyvern's side, just beneath its wing, over and over again with his scythe, and all while leeching energy from the creature with his left hand. He'd nicked a spot in the wyvern's hide where its scales were breaking from repeated trauma, pieces of the silver-blue falling off to the floor below. When the wyvern turned its head and snapped at him, I knew Cerin's methods were working. Repeating my first two spells, I gave Cerin a fire shield.

My energy reserves were running low. Both Cerin and I were pulling from the same sources. The exertion, the heat of the fire in the sconces. The necromancer was receiving an abundance of energy by leeching from the wyvern, but his spells would not utilize those reserves until all else had run out. So he was essentially taking energy from the environment just to recycle it into a form I could not utilize. I needed access to that energy, and knew Cerin had the ability to give it to me, as long as he knew the life spell. But to ask him now, in the midst of battle, would be to both inconvenience him when he was fighting so well, and to ask him to trust me with energy he had worked hard to get.

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So I didn't ask. And I did all that I thought of to do, which was to use what little precious energy I had to distractedly give Theron the same fire shield as he fought behind the creature's wing. The wyvern spat ice at a handful of Cerin's skeletons, and they all collapsed to the ground in a pile of mismatched bones. Perhaps the creature had learned that using ice against my fire shields was moot.

Then, Silas did both a wonderful and terrible thing. He fired his bow when the wyvern had slowed its tantrum for even a millisecond, and the arrow pierced one of its large, white eyes. The animal screeched, jerking the back half of its body to the side, as if in the midst of a panic. Along with the body, its tail was swiped across the floor as fast and as sharp as a whip. I heard a crack, and then a gut-wrenching scream, and then I saw Theron get thrown against a nearby gold pile.

Next, came the blood. Lots and lots of blood.

I dodged the wyvern's next jerk of panic and hurried to Theron's side. He was screaming, and the wyvern was screaming, and it was all combining in my head to create a backdrop to my thoughts that was nothing short of awful. Two tanned hands held at his thigh. Blood pooled around his legs. I was uncertain as to what, exactly, had been injured, until I realized that the two bright buckles on his thick pant armor were actually both of his tibias, bright white and broken cleanly through, the bones sticking straight out of both body and armor.

I was too shocked to really say anything. Theron had tears of pain rolling down his face and his normally calm eyes were sharp with panic. I tried to focus on my healer's training, back at the Seran University. Any who knew life magic were required to go through it. It dealt with anatomy, and wound treatment, and what to do in emergency situations like this.

I needed access to his legs, and I needed them free of their armor. The bone was stuck so cleanly through even his armor, however. To pull his pants down past his ankles would be to risk further agitating the wound and the bones.

I glanced up, toward Theron's sides. One of his swords was lying just some feet away. The other must have been dropped closer to the wyvern. I grabbed the sword near him, trying my best to ignore the battle raging on behind me. I peeled the armor off the skin below his knee, just enough so I could begin cutting it off with his own sword. I removed the armor from both of his knees down, being careful not to snag the leather on his broken bone.

Next, I held up one of the pieces of loose armor, toward Theron's face. “Bite this,” I said in a rush, watching as the ranger immediately followed my directions and did so.

One leg at a time. One at a time. He already had both legs lying as flat as they could be. Putting both hands on his left leg, I took a breath and twisted, snapping the broken bone back into alignment. Theron's screams were muffled by the leather between his teeth, but it didn't stop me from nearly peeing myself from hearing his pain and fearing further hurting him.

Putting both palms to his wound, I said the spell to boost his immunity. The last thing I needed was to put him back together just for him to die of infection later.

Finally, I began to heal him. Because the wound was so deep, I laid my hands flat over his skin, so I could feel the spell working and ensure the bone did not reform incorrectly. Heat escaped my palms, sinking deep into his wound and going to work. I closed my eyes to focus, trying to ignore the clash of metal and scale that continued to ring out from behind me.

Eventually, I felt the slight tug beneath my palms as the bone began to reconnect, the marrow slowly building between the two broken halves. I swayed over Theron's leg, feeling light-headed. This was a deep wound, and it was taking all the energy I had to heal him. For the first time ever, I felt a spell begin to drain my life, and I gave it permission to do so, keeping my hands close to the mercenary's skin.

If it weren't for me, Theron wouldn't be in the middle of the Cel Mountains right now, and he wouldn't have gone this far into a cave that I had suggested. He had no personal quest for which he was here. I did, and he was here for me. Failing this man was not an option.

I frowned as I felt another wave of intense fatigue, but I kept my eyes closed in focus, and continued to heal him anyway. The wound was reconnecting nerves and tissue beneath my palms. Theron's screams had faded, but he continued to breathe hard, his exhales echoing in the air between us.

I swayed over him again. A dull throbbing pumped through my head, heating me as if I had a fever.

Failing him is not an option.

Everything went black.