Chapter 11: Night Shift

"Yes, you," I said. My voice came out shaky. "Apparently."

"No." He shook his head. "No. Nero, fine. Nero's an idiot. Hadrian, everybody saw that coming. Not me."

"Why not you?"

"Because I've been cruel to you for two years."

He said it flat.

The gold was still in his eyes.

He stepped around me, very carefully, without one inch of him touching one inch of me.

He opened the door.

"Pick up the gauze," he said, and walked out.

He didn't speak to me for three days.

On rounds he spoke to the space beside my head.

At home he ate dinner at the hospital.

The twins moved Titus from a hundred to one to twelve to one, and wouldn't tell me why.

"Professional secret," said one.

"Nero cried," said the other.

"I did not cry," Nero said from the couch. "I had something in my eye. It was Titus."

Friday at seven in the morning, I started a thirty-six-hour shift.

Titus was the attending in charge.

At four in the afternoon, the climbing tower on the parade ground came down.

Forty feet of timber and wet rope, with fourteen cadets on it in a timed drill.

We heard it from the ward. A long crack, then a roar, then screaming.

Then every pager on the floor went off at once.

The Guard brought them in on stretchers and doors and in each other's arms.

Broken legs. Broken arms. A crushed hand. A cadet with a beam across his back.

Wolves heal fast. That's the problem.

Bones knit crooked in an hour if nobody sets them.

Titus stood in the middle of the emergency bay and gave orders.

"Tenley. You've got beds one through seven. I've got eight through fourteen. Shout if you're drowning."

"I'm not going to drown."

"Shout anyway."

So we worked.

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