CHAPTER 37

Crying was what woke me up. I looked around confused until I remembered where I was. I turned to Yelena, who was turning restlessly in her sleep. I managed to somehow climb over to her bed, which mine was pushed up against. Manoeuvring around the tubes that stuck out of her arms, I lay down beside her and pulled her small body against mine. She was too-warm with a fever and she was shivering. Slowly, I started rocking her and hummed a soft tune under my breath. It was a lullaby. One my mother had sung to me as a child. Step by step, Yelena calmed and she settled into my arms. And then her eyes opened.

Her scream echoed through the infirmary. I didn't move, just leaned in and whispered soft words into Yelena's ear. After a while, the screaming ceased and she began to rock back and forth in my arms. She reached up to pull the tubes out of her arms, but I stopped her, which resulted in more yelling.

"Yelena…" I coaxed her softly into looking my way. "Shh…" I held her close. "It's all right. Don't cry. It's only me. Shh… There are people on the way to help. You're out of that horrid place; they'll never hurt you again. I swear. I'll kill anyone who even thinks about laying a hand on you. I'm never letting you out of my sight again." I covered the top of her head and face with kisses. She had calmed and was now relaxed in my arms.

The nurses tore through the door, causing Yelena to jolt suddenly. A whimper managed to escape her lips before I could soothe her.

"What is going on here? How long has she been awake? Why didn't you call us right away?" The questions were already pouring out.

"She just woke up. Now be quiet. She's terrified. And I'm pretty sure she has a fever. Or maybe I have one…" I mused. "Either way, one of us needs something for a fever." When nobody moved, I snapped fingers to obtain attention. "Well, get to it," I ordered. The medical staff hurried to oblige. As soon as most had disappeared from the room, I allowed Yelena some breathing space. She closed her eyes briefly in concentration, but moved a little farther away. I could understand her discomfort with men—tortured as she had been—but the rejection still stung.

"How do you feel?" I asked her.

She opened her mouth to speak, but no sound came out. Tears accumulated in the corners of her eyes and leaked out onto her cheeks. She shrugged.

"You don't know? You have a fever. Are you going to take the medicine the healers give you?" I asked.

She nodded slowly. And then shook her head. And nodded again. She opened her mouth, but didn't say anything; she exploded into tears.

I reached out towards her. She jumped at my touch. "Shh… I'm not going to hurt you. You're safe with me." I rubbed her back slowly.

The nurse ran back into the room. She held a cup of water and pills. "Umm… For the fever." She handed them to me. "Take two each. I'll get you something to eat." She left, handing me the pills and drink.

And Yelena backed out of my arms, whimpering. "I promise, I won't hurt you," I told her. I reached out to her, but she didn't respond. She just continued backing away until she was out of reach. Until she fell off the bed. The tubes ripped out of her skin and she yelped. Little streams of blood pooled out of the places the tubes had been and dripped down her arms. New tears dripped down her face. She looked so lost and small.

Then her mouth opened and she whispered almost inaudibly, "He'll come back." The words were as quiet as a breath and, if I hadn't seen her lips move, I would have believed I was imagining things.

"What?" I asked. It was a rhetorical question, posed basically to myself, so she didn't answer. I didn't think she would have answered either way. "No, Yelena. He's gone. Forever. He'll never come back to hurt you. I promise," I reassured her. She didn't say anything once again. "Answer me," I pleaded.

She observed me. Then she put a finger to her lips—be quiet—and opened her mouth. "I can't," her words were even quieter than the first time. I had trouble catching them. "He will hear me. He will come and hurt me," she breathed on the same tone. Quieter than a mouse.

"Yelena," I murmured, shocked. "He will not touch you. Ever. I swear it on my soul. He will never lay a hand on you again," I vowed.

She shushed me by putting a finger to her lips. I pushed myself off the bed and onto the floor and ramped closer to her slowly. I stopped at a safe distance though. No need to frighten her. She whimpered and pressed against the wall in back of her even from where I was.

I was horrified. So much hurt had been inflicted on this poor soul. I moved closer and reached out slowly, once again asking permission to touch her. She let me and I placed the hand on the side of her neck. "Baby," I whispered. "What did they do to you, sweetheart?" I murmured. Yelena moved closer and I lay her against me. "They hurt you, love, didn't they? Shh…" I reassured when she shuddered with a supressed sob. I threaded my fingers through her hair and caressed her face. Yelena let out a contented purr. "Shh… That feels good now, doesn't it?" I murmured into her hair. "I won't hurt you. Shh… I'll keep you safe." She erupted into sobs. They shook her body all the while I held her, promising everything would be all right, that he would never come back and that I would keep her safe. When her weeping finally ceased, I was laying on the floor, my arms still tight around her. Yelena had passed out in utter exhaustion and I was grateful when the nurse came in and moved her to the bed. The damned lethargy wouldn't allow me to even sit so Ari and Janco had to haul me to my cot. I don't remember being placed in it so I must have fallen asleep on the way.

I woke up in a different room. It was still dark and I was shivering. I squinted in the darkness and realized that my sheets were on the floor. Why would they be on the floor? I had trained myself to be motionless while asleep. Then maybe someone had moved them. But, that too, led to a disappointment. I should have woken up if there were somebody in the room, or even in the doorway. I let it go. Whatever. I was tired. I reached down from my cot and wrapped the blanket back around me.

I was however unable to find sleep. I turned restlessly, but my mind wouldn't allow me to find refuge. Pointless questions ran through my mind about the infirmary's staff names, flashes of the morning my brothers had died, different orders that I had carried out for the Commander, memories of the time in Brazell's dungeon when Yelena sat in tears while she sobbed out her story, my daughter's face when she was born… There was absolutely no point to these thoughts and they stampeded through my mind, stopping me from sleeping. But what bothered me most was that I had the stinking feeling that somebody else could see every single thing that went through my mind. I felt vulnerable.

I wondered if my immunity was still intact. I doubted it. They had healed me with magic and… Yelena said that I had acquired it following a traumatic event: my brothers' death. Now, I had watched the woman I loved get raped. Was it possible that my mind had once again snapped and protected itself by lashing out with magical power? Maybe. I it wouldn't surprise me. The human mind was truly complex and amazing in itself. So many mechanisms it had in store to protect and defend.

My predicament carried on for several days. My little trip off the bed to comfort Yelena had cost me dearly and I had no hope of getting up. I was condemned to my bed and the only news I got of her was through a nurse, one of my seconds or Opal. Leif had disappeared from the picture completely. I had a bad feeling that he would resurface later, at the worst possible time.

This morning, I woke to screaming. I groaned and threw my pillow over my head. I had come to notice that screaming was a normal episode here in the hospital. I just hated when patients had their fits in the morning. I wasn't ready to get up yet. Crying out in frustration, I covered my ears with the pillow and tried, unsuccessfully, to block out the noise.

The door to my bedroom suddenly flew open and Janco ran in like a madman. "Valek," he screamed. Yes, why didn't he yell it even louder? Maybe some Sitian assassin would hear him and jump me while I was an easy target.

"What do you want?" I demanded. "I'm tired, I want to go back to sleep."

"It's Yelena," he said. Those two words were all it took. I was wide awake and propped myself up in my cot.

"What about her?" I asked worriedly. "Is she hurt? Does she need anything?"

My previous second in command shook his head. "She's having an… episode. That's what the healer called it. She's calling for you. The healer thinks she needs to be sedated."

"Sedated?" I demanded. "No. Get me over there. Yelena will be fine. Someone just needs to pull her out of the fog, talk to her." When Janco made to move, I snapped my fingers, adopting once again the I-am-in-command-and-you-have-to-do-as-I-say façade. "Get to it. I have to get over there."

Janco seemed to snap out of it. "Right," he said and shook his head. "Get you to Yelena." He moved to my bed and wheeled my down the hallway to my beloved's room. I was anxious to see her, not having been able to for the last few days.

She was on the floor, screaming bloody-murder and rocking back and forth in a fetal position. There was a nurse trying to approach her with a needle. I assumed she was going to jab and put her to sleep. "No," I cried out. "Don't. Let me talk to her," I demanded. Mustering all the strength I could manage, I propped myself up on the bed and dragged myself to the floor. Damned lethargy. I was so vulnerable. I slumped back against the leg of my cot, exhaustion taking over. I was more than conscious of everybody in the room watching me.

Yelena's scream was the only sound that could be heard in the room. I slowly reached towards her and touched her arm to get her attention. "Yelena," I coaxed. "Yelena, please stop screaming." Her shrieks lessened, although still present. However, the moment I stopped talking, they resumed.

"Keep talking to her. Tell her to focus on your voice and only your voice. She should be able to get out of the flashback that way," Janco told me. I frowned at him, but did as he said.

Talking Yelena gently by the shoulders, I talked to her, "Yelena. Listen to me. Concentrate on my voice. The things you see aren't real. I'm real. I'm here for you. Focus on my voice." I kept repeating until her screams stopped and she snapped out of her stupor.

For a moment, she sat motionless, and then silent tears flowed down her cheeks. Her shoulders shook underneath my hands and she seemed to take notice of the contact. She followed my arms all the way to my face and erupted into a new round of tears. She leaned against me, crying her heart out. Of course, Leif chose that moment to come in. As I predicted, at the worst possible time. He took one look at Yelena and me and started to scream obstinacies at me. Yelena practically jumped out of her skin at the sudden loudness and, with a little more force than necessary, climbed further into my arms. I grunted under her weight, hating that I was too weak to even properly cradle my girlfriend in my arms, but overcame the numb pain and held her close.

"Are you done?" I asked once he calmed down a little.

"Hell no," Yelena's brother said furiously. "I've just gotten started. First, you get her knocked up with a child that neither of you can take care of. Next, you leave her to wander around alone in a battlefield—which causes the enemy to capture her. And then she ends up being tortured and raped and God knows what else." I flinched involuntarily at his words. He was right… except for one detail.

"I got her out of there," I told him quietly.

"Yes, but if it weren't for you, she wouldn't have ended up in that place," he spat back at me. "I bet you enjoyed that, didn't you? You sick son of a bitch."

I saw red. A sudden adrenaline rush had me on my feet. I held Leif by the neck, suspended off the ground. "Don't you ever say that to me again," I threatened. "You can insult me all you want. But don't ever insult my mother again. Understand?" I shook him, further cutting off his air supply. I dropped him to the ground and a sudden wave of dizziness threw me down as well. The audience was speechless. What I didn't know, was it whether because I had almost killed him or because I was defending my mother.

Leif sat on the floor, dazed. "My mother was an innocent woman and she doesn't deserve any of your insults," I told him. He didn't seem to be listening to me, grasping at his throat again and again, trying to relieve it from the tension and pain I had inflicted. Good. He deserved it. Yelena was screaming again. Fuck. This was not turning out well. Not that I expected it to. Leif had gone too far. And my head was spinning from it. I groaned and supported my head with my hand. I definitely wouldn't be getting up for a while now. That so called 'adrenaline rush' didn't help at all. I tucked my legs up to my chest and put my head between my knees. That usually helped with dizziness, nausea and the likes.

After a moment, my vision rearranged itself from the dangerous tilt it was taking on. I swallowed slowly and looked around the room. Leif was glaring at me murderously and Janco was sitting on the floor with a shaking Yelena in his arms. He was whispering very softly in her ear, "It's just your imagination. A flashback. Listen to my voice. I'm here, what you're seeing isn't real. Calm down, sweetheart."

I shook my head in an attempt to clear it. I had just enough time to see Leif's fist as it swung my way. Reflexively, I caught it. And twisted until he was on the floor, writhing in pain. "How the hell did you do that?" Leif panted.

"Years and years of practice. I don't know how you keep forgetting how much training I've had. Maybe I've gone soft," I mused. My relationship with Yelena had opened me up to much too many people. I was going to have to change that—go back to the ruthless assassin image. It would take some effort, but I'm pretty sure I could pull it off. I'll start right away.

I let the cold steel mask I had constantly worn before Yelena come over my features. And kept it there. Slowly, using the bed for support, I stood on wobbly legs. I was going to have to fix that. A nurse reached out to aid me. I pushed her arm away violently. "Don't touch me," I snapped. She put her arm down. Ari looked at me with disappointment in his eyes—I thought you said you were leaving that part of yourself behind. I gave him a sharp look. He looked away almost immediately.

"You have no idea now lucky you are that I have no weapons on me right now. Trust me, it's a one-in-a-lifetime opportunity," I said to Leif. "If I were you, I would leave immediately and spare myself a gruesome death. I will not hesitate to kill you when I get my hands on a knife."

Leif stared at me, as if he couldn't believe what was happening. I grabbed him by the neck again and threw him to the ground by the door. "Scram," I ordered. Yelena's brother scrambled to his feet and ran from the room. My energy seemed to have returned, by some miracle. Something told me it was because of my lost immunity. It angered me.

I turned on the other occupants of the room. "Get out," I said in a cold voice. "I need to be alone." Eyes wide, the medics and nurses hurried out. Ari, Janco and Opal remained. They stared at me. Ari looked disappointed, Janco surprised and Opal—sad. My seconds left the room; Janco placed my beloved gently on the bed under my watchful gaze. The door shut. Opal continued to look at me. It was the look Yelena always used on me before I succumbed to anything she had asked for.

"Why are you looking at me like that?" I demanded. She didn't answer, just blinked once and continued her silent brooding. "Stop it," I told her, shooing her away with my hand. She reminded me of every single person I had let down. I wanted to get on my knees to grovel and beg for her forgiveness.

Opal took one step and wrapped her arms around my middle. She hugged me fiercely, sobbing quietly. I didn't react at first, standing there awkwardly in her embrace, but soon I wrapped my arms around her. I didn't know why she was crying and I was positive the old me would have untangled her from my body and sent her out the door, but, after seeing what had happened to Yelena, I didn't think I'd ever be able to let a girl cry.

"Why are you crying?" I asked. Still too sharply, but better than the tone I had been using previously.

She didn't answer my question, but started to reassure me, "It's going to be all right Valek. You know that, right?" she whispered, looking up at me. "You don't have to bury into yourself. You don't have to hide." She thought I was hiding. That the steel mask was a way for me to escape reality.

"You're wrong," I told her. I laughed bitterly at her stunned features. "You don't know me Opal," I said cruelly. "This face… It isn't a disguise. This is me. I'm not hiding. I'm just facing reality. This is a war. People die in a war. Assassins kill people." I shrugged. "No big deal. I've been doing this since… Since I was thirteen."

"Thirteen?" she whispered, moving away from me unconsciously.

I offered her a vicious smile. "You've never seen an assassin Opal. You're an innocent little girl in a shell of an adult woman. Please don't go around making assumptions about people you don't know. You're my sister and I love you, but if you had been anyone else, I can't guarantee you would be in one piece right now."

She stared at me in shock. "I'm sorry. I-I didn't know."

I pulled her close. "It's all right. Just don't get hurt, all right? I don't think I would be able to stop myself from killing the bastard who would dare put a hand on you."

Opal stiffened and pulled away. She didn't look at me when she started towards the door. She paused wither hand resting on the handle. "I'm not an innocent little girl, Valek. I have killed. You trained me yourself. Do remember that next time you make assumptions." The door clicked shut. I sighed.

Yelena was looking at me without speaking. Her green orbs sparkled as she gazed at me. It was the same look Opal had just given me. The kind of look only women seemed to manage and that made you feel all weird inside. You felt the need to confess for something you hadn't done, but had to take to the blame for. I groaned. "Stop looking at me like that." I went over and rested my hand over her eyes. Yelena's eyelashes brushed my skin as she shut her eyelids to the darkness.

I sat down by the bed and lay my cheek on the sheets, next to Yelena's face. She opened her eyes again. "I'm sorry," I whispered. "I don't know what I'm apologizing for—not that there aren't many things that I am responsible for—but… it's just the look you give me. It's like you know everything. Like you can see through me, see the faults I've been trying to cover up." I closed my eyes.

I sensed movement and felt something in my hair. I peered at Yelena. She wasn't focused on me anymore. Her fingers brushed through the messy locks of my hair. I closed my eyes and knelt as comfortably as I could on the floor next to her bed.

I could do this. I could go back to the way I was before. It would be better for everybody…

Thank you to all those who reviewed and to Just-Acting-Naturally, my beta and the girl who showed me the chips of which Canada has deprived me.

I promise that Yelena will start getting a lot better in the next chapter and you will finally see some real action.

Karl