Jonmarc helped Tris to a chair and Soterius sprinted to join them. Kiara pushed her way through row of guards, her eyes wide, a borrowed sword ready in her grasp.' Jair joined them, still holding the torch. Esme ran to where Tris was sprawled in his chair. Across the room, Carina knelt next to Harrtuck.
"How badly are you hurt?" Esme asked.
"Nothing except that damned ankle. I don't think I'm bleeding."
As Esme began to remove Tris's boot from his injured leg, Jonmarc went to join Carina. Harrtuck lay in a pool of blood, with four deep slashes that went through his shoulder and upper back. Beneath the bloody gashes, Jonmarc glimpsed the white of bone.
"I can't do this alone," Carina said. "I'm losing him. I need your help." Her hands were covered with Harrtuck's blood; he was pale and his breathing ragged.
"I've always been the patient-I don't know how to help."
"Do you trust me?" Carina met Jonmarc's gaze.
"With my life."
"Drop your guard and let me draw strength from you."
Jonmarc hesitated, completely at a loss. If she can read my thoughts as she draws from me, what will she see? So many things in the past I'm not proud of, so much blood on my hands. If she can see where I've been, what I've done, will it change her mind? He looked at Harrtuck. "Take what you need," he said, closing his eyes. Tris and Gabriel told him he had better natural shielding against magic than most mortals. That had come in handy against mages or vayash moru who had tried to sway his thoughts. Now, he struggled to disarm those defenses. He focused on the familiar warmth of Carina's power, the touch he knew well from so many healings.
He gasped and swayed as she began to draw from him, trying to shut out the buzz of the conversation around him, the shouts of the guards and his own heightened senses that still hummed with the energy of battle. Harrtuck must be worse off than I thought. He remembered how Tris and Cam and Carroway had let Carina draw from them when she had done battle healings in the caravan. Carina had told him how many hours Tris and Sakwi had sustained her when he'd been brought back from the Nargi camp more dead than alive. Feeling the steady drain for the first time, he marveled at their resilience, humbled at the cost it had taken to heal him so many times.
He watched as Carina's touch knit together the sinews and skin of Harrtuck's back "more quickly than the most skilled surgeon, closing the gaping wounds until only scars remained. Joined in thought with Carina, he could feel the warmth of her healing. power as she strengthened Harrtuck's life force, bringing back the flickering thread until its glow was solid. Harrtuck was no longer in danger, although he was sure to feel the pain of bruises for days to come.