“Thank you, brother,” Daniel said, and clasped Jude’s hand before he could go.
“You’re welcome … brother.” Jude squeezed Daniel’s fingers and let go, turning to leave.
“His heart still deserves to be broken,” came Talbot’s voice. My vision snapped to where I’d left him writhing in the dust. He’d moved two paces to the right. His arm pulled back, and a silver-tipped spear flew at Daniel’s chest like a javelin.
My hands were tangled in Daniel’s robes. I couldn’t react fast enough. Jude shouted and threw himself in front of Daniel. His cry turned sharp as the spear pierced through his chest and out his back. He landed on his side, one arm extended out, the other lying limply on the shaft of the spear.
I struggled to free my arm and let go of Daniel, scrambling to Jude. I looked up as Talbot ran, hobbling and stumbling on his injured leg toward the burning field of cornstalks. The guardians let him pass—abiding the rules of the ceremony that was still technically going on—but before I looked away, I thought I saw someone in a green robe go after him.
“Jude!” I said, turning my full attention on him.
His pleading eyes looked up at me. He grabbed weakly at the spear shaft. The amount of blood that pumped out of his chest confirmed my worst fear—he’d been stabbed through at least one of his hearts.
With a silver-tipped spear.
One of the few blows that could kill an Urbat.
“Jude, no!”
He’d reacted before I could. He’d thrown himself in front of the spear. He’d saved Daniel’s life.
“Gracie,” he said. “Please.” He tried to place his hand on mine. His following words made no sound, but he mouthed them to me with that pleading look overtaking his eyes.
I shook my head and grabbed him up in my arms. His head lolled in my grasp. His eyes rolled back under their lids. I checked the pulse in his neck. He was unconscious, but not dead. Not yet. The pulse was almost too weak to detect. “No. Hold on, Jude. You’re going to be okay. You’re going to be okay.” I turned toward Daniel, who struggled to his knees. “I promised him that. I promised him everything was going to be okay. We have to do something. We have to heal him.”
I broke the shaft of the spear and yanked the spearhead out through his back. I pushed down and pressed my hands over the wound in his chest. Blood pooled under my fingers as I tried to concentrate whatever positive energy I could find into him.
“Help me,” I said to Daniel. “Help me. I can’t do this one alone.”
“Gracie, you can’t,” Daniel said, pulling at my arms. “You can’t heal silver.”
“But we can at least try,” I shouted at him, not letting him pull my blood-soaked hands from Jude’s chest. “Help me, damn it! We promised to help him.”
Daniel let go of my arms. He placed his hands over mine.
Tears flooded down my face, but I forced my mind to clear. I thought of every positive wonderful moment I’d ever shared with my brother. Building Ewok forts in the family room, climbing trees, sitting on a rock beside Grandpa Kramer’s pond with our fishing poles. Power poured from my fingertips, but it wasn’t enough. My mind centered on another memory. The one of Daniel and me holding Jude in his cell at the parish. How it felt when Jude said he wanted our help. How it felt to know my brother was finally coming home.
Power surged through my fingers into his chest. Exploding under my hands so forcefully it made me fall backward. I sat up and looked at Jude. He still lay there with a gaping, bloody wound in his chest.
“It’s not enough,” Daniel said. “You can’t heal silver. You can’t save him.”
Jude’s eyes flitted open. He extended a couple of fingers toward me, but he couldn’t lift his hand.
I caressed my fingers down Jude’s face. “Can you hear me? Can you try to transform into a wolf?”
Jude tried to speak, but no words came out. His head nodded ever so slightly.
“Then it is enough,” I said to Daniel.
Jude’s body began to twitch and convulse, trying to make the transformation. I placed my hands on his chest. “It’s going to be okay,” I said, and channeled my energy into him again, giving him enough strength to make the change.
Jude let out a gasp, and the transformation completed. His gray wolf form lay under my arms now. The gaping wound spilling blood into his fur.
“Close your eyes,” I told him.
The wolf’s violet eyes slid shut.
I picked up the broken spear, wrapping my fingers around the shaft. So much energy had drained out of me from trying to heal Jude, I could barely even lift my arm. Daniel clasped his hand over mine so we were both holding the spear.
“Together,” he said.
Hand in hand, we lifted the spearhead and plunged it deep into the bloody hole in the wolf’s chest. Its body convulsed and then lay still.
“I love you,” I whispered to Jude, and pulled the spear out.
I wrapped my arms around the wolf and counted my heartbeats. Thirty of them. Until the wolf melted away and it was my brother’s body that lay in my arms again.
In the end, this was my terrible gift—my savage grace. In order to cure Jude, I had to kill him. Some people I could heal; some people I could restore to life, but for others—like Jude—the only gift I had to give was death.
And in giving it, I’d freed his soul.
Everything was going to be okay.
I held Jude until I was sure he wasn’t coming back. I brushed his hair off his forehead and kissed the scar that was just above his left eyebrow. I laid his head on the ground. Daniel held his hand out to me as if he knew what I needed. He helped me stand, and we leaned our weight into each other for strength. Both injured, but still whole. Together, we stared out at the crowd that had gathered at the edge of the boundary line. Our friends stared back at us: the lost boys—all but Brent. Lisa with Baby James in her arms and Jarem at her side. Gabriel and the other Elders. The Etlu guardians of the ring.
Beyond our friends crowded the spectators—more witnesses who’d watched the hardest moments of my life played out in front of them.
Someone pounded his spear against the ground with three loud smacks, then every member of the Etlu Clan fell to one knee, one fist shoved to the ground and their heads bowed toward us. Some of the other spectators followed suit.
I looked up at Daniel. He squeezed my hand and answered the question I hadn’t asked out loud. “Yes,” he said. “It is finished.”