Mated To My Mate's Worst Enemy (ARIA) novel Chapter 627

Chapter 627

ARIA

"That was—"

"Very reasonable," she said. "Your exact words, I believe. Or close to them."

"I was trying to—"

"To ensure adequate preparation time," she said. "Which I respect. Preparation is important. I, for instance, prepared three days ago when the window was optimal. And then the window closed. And then Hale activated the root. And here we are." She turned another page. "Three days."

"Ivory," Nina said.

"Nina," Ivory said pleasantly.

"He's injured," Nina said.

"I can see that," Ivory said. "He'll be fine for three days. The left side is significant but not critical. I can see it from here." She looked at the book. "I would have treated it three days ago if the removal had happened on schedule. The injury wouldn't have occurred if the removal had happened on schedule. But here we are."

"The moon goddess loves you," Jordan said, in the tone of a man accepting a fundamental truth of the universe.

"She really does," Ivory agreed.

"She's always right in the end," Jordan said.

"I usually am," Ivory said.

"Ivory," Kael said.

"Kael," she said.

They held this for a moment.

Silver, in my chest, said: *She's going to treat him.*

*I know,* I said.

*She's making the point first,* Silver said.

*I know,* I said.

*But she's going to treat him,* Silver said. *She's already looking at the injuries while she's looking at the book. She's been assessing since we came in.*

I looked at Ivory.

At the hand holding the book — the specific quality of someone who was performing reading while their attention was elsewhere. At the eyes, which had been doing the inventory since we walked in and had not stopped, which was doing the thing healers' eyes did when they were working even while the rest of them was doing something else.

She was going to treat him.

She was going to make the point first.

Then she was going to treat him.

"Fine," Kael said. "I accept the point."

Ivory turned a page.

"The point being," Kael said, "that you were right about the timing and I was wrong about the timing and the consequence is that we were in a field tonight instead of having resolved the root situation three days ago." He paused. "You were right. I accept it."

Ivory looked at the book.

"And?" she said.

"And I should have listened to your assessment," he said.

"And?" she said.

"And—" he stopped. "What's the and."

"Think about it," she said.

"Ivory—"

"Take your time," she said. "We have three days, after all."

The room held the specific tension of people who were watching a negotiation they couldn't participate in.

"I'm sorry," Kael said.

Ivory closed the book.

She stood up.

She put the bowl down and the blanket and she crossed the room to where Kael was standing with the injured left side and she looked at it with the full clinical attention that had been running since we arrived.

"Sit down," she said.

He sat.

She started working.

*Which means the anchor point is already weakened,* Silver said. *It's holding onto something that's partially dissolved. The failsafe is tied to the anchor breaking — but the anchor is already partially broken. The integration broke it. Without Ivory. Without the removal procedure. The integration has been doing it slowly for months.*

*Is that enough,* I said.

*I don't know,* Silver said. *But it changes the math. If the anchor is partially dissolved already, the power required to complete the break is less. And if the power required is less—*

*The cost might be less,* I said.

*The failsafe is tied to the breaking,* Silver said. *But the breaking is happening in stages. Not all at once. And a staged break might interact with the failsafe differently than a single full break.*

I stood in the clinic.

I looked at Ivory's hands.

At Kael.

At the root I could feel in the bond architecture — the specific quality of it that had changed in the attack, that I understood differently now than I had before.

*Can you articulate this,* Silver said. *Clearly enough for Ivory.*

I thought about it.

*Maybe,* I said.

*Is maybe enough,* Silver said.

*It has to be,* I said. *Because the three days are over.*

I looked at Ivory.

She looked up from Kael's injury.

Our eyes met across the clinic.

She knew.

I could see it in the specific quality of the assessment she ran on me — the complete clinical inventory, but not of injuries this time. Of me. Of the specific quality of someone who'd found something and was working out how to say it.

She knew I had something.

She wasn't going to ask tonight. Tonight was the treatment, the post-attack accounting, the practical management of what had just happened. But tomorrow.

Tomorrow she was going to ask.

And I needed to have the language for it by then.