Temple Hill - Drew Karpyshyn [39]
Lhasha was already over the initial shock. These weren't the first dead bodies she had seen, though she wasn't used to seeing them in her bedroom.
"Are you hurt?" she asked, her heat sensitive vision picking up a trail of warmth running down Corin's arm. "You're bleeding."
Corin shrugged.
"It's not too bad. I just need to keep my hand on it."
Lhasha stepped in and quickly closed the door behind her. Fortunately most of the patrons were in the bar downstairs, so no one had responded to her little scream. With the door shut the room was plunged into near total darkness, and she was forced to rely on her innate ability to see the heat emanating from objects and creatures as she made her way to the oil lamp on the table. She struck the wick with her tinderbox and was momentarily blinded by the heat that sprang up from the lantern as her eyes made the switch back to viewing in the visible spectrum of light.
"There's another one behind the bed," Corin said by way of warning. "Pretty messy. You might not want to look."
Lhasha almost took a peek just to prove she wasn't squeamish, then reconsidered. The corpses in the doorway had more than filled her daily gore requirement. She patted the bed.
"Come here. Sit down and let me see your shoulder."
Corin came over slowly, keeping his good hand pressed firmly against the wound as he lowered himself into a sitting position on the mattress. Lhasha could see blood welling up from between his fingers. Physical confrontation was generally something she tried to avoid in her line of work, but she had managed to pick up a few medicinal skills from Fendel just in case.
"It's bad, Corin," she said matter-of-factly after taking a quick look. "I can tie it off for you, but we should get you to a healer."
She wrapped the wound several times, yanking the gauze tight before tying it off. Corin grunted softly and winced from the pain, but otherwise stayed silent.
"So are you going to tell me what happened, or leave me to guess?"
Corin's voice sounded groggy. The toll of the battle and the lost blood was showing.
"Not much to tell. I was in the room when they showed up. I knew they were here to kill you, so I killed them."
Lhasha gave him a curious look.
"What were you doing in my room?"
"It's a long story." Corin sighed wearily, then changed the subject. "We should leave right away. There could be more assassins coming."
"I doubt that," Lhasha replied, wiping the blood from Corin's wound off her hands with the edge of the already ruined bedspread. "I don't think they'd bother to send more than three of their crew to finish off little old me. Lucky thing they weren't expecting you."
Corin didn't reply right away, he seemed to be lost in thought-or letting his mind drift.
"When the assassins don't check in, the Masks will send someone to see why they didn't report. Well have to move. Soon." His words were slow, and slightly slurred. Lhasha briefly wondered if he had been drinking again, but she couldn't smell any alcohol on him.
She thought he was done speaking, he had paused for a long time, but eventually he continued, though it seemed an effort to do so.
"And as soon as Weedle sees these bodies, he's going to get the Maces in here. They might have given up looking for the fugitives who started the riot in the Fair, but I still don't want to run into them. Too many questions we don't need."
He had a point.
"All right, let me pack a few essentials," Lhasha said. "We can go stay with Fendel, at least for tonight."
Corin rose and took an unsteady step toward the door.
"Ill… get my things. My… sword and… other stuff."
"No," Lhasha said firmly, as if speaking to a child, "I'll get your things. You sit on that bed and don't move… you're bleeding bad enough as it is."
The fact that Corin didn't even argue merely confirmed how serious his injury was. His knees buckled and his body slumped back down, slouching forward as he sat on the edge of the mattress. He seemed about to topple over. Lhasha began to fear something more sinister than simple blood loss was slowing him down.