Free Serpent's Storm by Amber Benson Page B

Water from the dislodged pipes spewed from underneath the busted sinks, flooding the floor and pooling in red eddies where Jarvis lay propped up against the base of one of the toilets. A ragged gash in the side of Jarvis’s head gaped open, revealing the pulpy-red tissue that lay just beneath the faun’s skin.
    “Jarvis?” I said, speaking his name again, but this time without a trace of anger in my voice. Now the anger had been replaced by worry. I knew a normal human would’ve been dead ten times over from a blow of that magnitude, but Jarvis was an immortal, thank God. Still, the gash on his head was pretty gross, and I felt terrible knowing how badly his head was gonna hurt once I roused him.
    Ignoring the mess around me, I navigated my way through the torrent of water to where the unconscious faun lay, and knelt down beside him, turning his head so I could get a better look at the wound. I noticed a fleck of blue-gray metal protruding from the gash and plucked it from the abraded skin, tossing it across the room. This action caused Jarvis to stir beneath me.
    “Mistress Calliope?”
    His voice was weak, but firm.
    “Are you okay?” I asked as he lifted his chin and gave me a snaggle-toothed grin. I inhaled sharply at the sight of his three front teeth, each of which had been cracked in half, the stumps remaining stubbornly fixed in his upper gums.
    “Been better,” Jarvis lisped, keeping his tongue away from the jagged edges of his ruined teeth. He coughed, and the spittle that came up was a shade of pink that did not bode well for the faun. The way he winced when he coughed—or even when he drew a breath, for that matter—informed me he probably had a few busted ribs and other internal injuries, too.
    “What happened?” I asked as he slid his hand into mine. His pulse was thready under my fingers, but at least I could still feel it.
    He tried to shake his head, but the effort was too great. Instead, he swallowed back another cough and closed his eyes for a moment to conserve his energy. While I waited for his answer, I looked around the room, trying to figure out my next move. We couldn’t stay in this bathroom forever, but I wasn’t good enough with magic to open a wormhole and get us out of there.
    “The Ender of Death,” Jarvis said finally, opening his eyes. “He came in to call up a wormhole. Caught me by surprise. I tried to stop him, but—”
    “I know,” I said, squeezing Jarvis’s hand. “He got me out in the hall.”
    Suddenly, Jarvis’s eyes flew open and he looked hard at me, his eyeballs nearly popping out of their sockets.
    “Calliope,” he said, gripping my hand so hard I thought he was going to squeeze off my wrist. “What have you done?”
    I stared at Jarvis, aghast. Not because his words had penetrated my consciousness, but because something else—something exceedingly strange—had caught my eye. At first, I had assumed it was a trick of the light. Yet the more I looked, the more I began to believe that the gash on Jarvis’s head was knitting itself back together right before my eyes . He may have been immortal, but I’d never seen anyone, immortal or not, heal this quickly. Amazed by what I was witnessing, it took me a second to process Jarvis’s words. When they finally did penetrate my thick skull, I immediately picked up on his disapproving tone.
    “Hey, wait a minute,” I said, confused. “What did you mean by ‘What have you done?’ I didn’t do anything—”
    In response, the faun reached up and probed the gash on the side of his head with his fingers.
    “My head wound,” Jarvis said, ignoring my outrage, “is healing, is it not?”
    I nodded.
    “Why do you suppose it’s doing this?” Jarvis continued.
    “I don’t know.” I shrugged, not sure what the faun was driving at. “Why?”
    Instead of answering my question, Jarvis merely shook his head then closed his eyes again, exhaustion overtaking his features.
    “Tell me why it’s doing that,” I