IRONMOON TRILOGY

Mara Vale had worked enough night shifts to know when a patient was going to die before the doctor said it aloud. The man on the stretcher had lost too much blood. His jeans were soaked from the waist down, one boot was missing, and four deep cuts ran across his stomach. The paramedic pressing gauze against the wounds had blood up to both wrists. “What happened?” Mara asked as she caught the side rail and helped guide the stretcher through the emergency-room doors. “Found behind a gas station on Route Nine,” the paramedic said. His name was Luis, and he had brought Mara enough difficult cases over the years that neither of them wasted time on polite greetings. “A truck driver called it in. He said an animal got to him.” Mara looked at the wounds. “What kind of animal?” “No idea. The driver didn’t see it.” The man on the stretcher moved his head and tried to speak. Blood covered his cracked lips. “Save your breath,” Mara told him. She leaned close enough for him to hear her without raising her voice. “You’re at St. Gabriel’s Hospital. We’re taking care of you.” His eyes opened. They were pale gray and filled with a fear that had nothing to do with the people around him. “Lock the doors,” he whispered. Mara walked beside the stretcher as Luis pushed it toward Trauma Two. “The doors are locked. You’re safe inside the hospital.” The man caught her wrist. His grip surprised her. A patient that close to death should not have been able to hold anyone with that much force. Luis reached for his hand. “Sir, let the nurse go.” The man pulled Mara closer and stared at her name badge. “Mara Vale,” he said. “Yes, that’s my name.” She kept her voice level even as his fingers pressed into her skin. “I need you to release my wrist so I can help you.” He shook his head. “They found the first key.” Dr. Patel came through the trauma-room doors while tying the strings of a plastic gown behind his back. “What do we have?” “Male, maybe late thirties,” Luis said. “Unidentified, severe blood loss from multiple wounds across the abdomen and left thigh. Pressure has slowed it, but we couldn’t stop it.” “Sir, let go of her,” Dr. Patel ordered. The patient ignored him. He kept his eyes on Mara, and his fingers tightened until pain moved up her arm. “The moon is open,” he said. “You need to run.” Mara placed her free hand over his. “I will listen to everything you have to say after we stop the bleeding. Let me do my job.” For a moment, she thought he understood her. His grip eased, then his body jerked hard enough to shake the stretcher. “Get him on the bed,” Dr. Patel said. Luis pulled the man’s hand away from Mara while two orderlies moved him across. Mara stepped back, checked her wrist, and found four red marks where his fingers had been. “You all right?” Luis asked. “I’m fine. Help me cut the rest of his clothes.” Dr. Patel stood at the patient’s head. “Sir, can you tell me your name?” The man fought against the oxygen mask Mara placed over his mouth. “Leave it on,” she said. “You need oxygen.” He turned his head toward her. “It knows you.” “What knows me?” His answer disappeared under the noise of the monitor as his heart rate climbed. Dr. Patel started giving orders. “Two large-bore IVs. CBC, metabolic panel, coagulation studies, type and cross six units. Call the blood bank and get surgery down here.” Mara reached for the trauma shears and cut through the patient’s shirt. The cloth had stuck to his skin, so she worked around the wounds and lifted it away in pieces. The room went quiet for half a second. The cuts did not end at his stomach. They crossed his ribs and continued around his left side, where skin and muscle had been torn open. There were bite marks near his shoulder, each one wider than Mara’s hand. Luis stared down at them. “That wasn’t a dog.” “Keep working,” Dr. Patel said. Mara pushed an IV into the patient’s arm. His veins were difficult to find, and his skin felt cold under her gloves. “Call security,” he said through the mask. “They’re already in the building,” Mara told him. “No. Call him.” “Who?” “The black wolf.” Dr. Patel looked at Mara over the patient’s chest. “Confusion from blood loss.” She gave a small nod and secured the IV, although she had seen confused patients before. They mixed up names, forgot where they were, and reached for people who had died years ago. This man spoke as if every word mattered. The automatic doors opened, and Nurse Kelly Brooks hurried in with two units of blood in a cooler. “What attacked him?” Kelly asked as she set the cooler on the counter. “We don’t know yet,” Mara said. Kelly saw the bite on his shoulder and stopped moving. “That thing could still be outside.” “Then let security worry about it,” Dr. Patel replied. “I need the blood hung now.” Kelly checked the label with Mara, and together they started the first unit. The patient’s eyes stayed on Mara while everyone worked around him. “Why do you keep looking at me?” she asked. He lifted a shaking hand toward the chain around his neck. Mara caught his wrist before he pulled out the IV. “What do you need?” “Take it.” She found a flat metal disk beneath his torn shirt. It was dark with blood, and a crescent had been cut into the center. “Who gave this to you?” “Your mother.” Mara’s hand stopped. Kelly glanced at her. “What did he say?” Mara released the chain. “He’s confused.” The patient grabbed it again. “Nadine said I had to find you.” Mara looked down at him. “How do you know that name?” Dr. Patel raised his voice. “Mara, I need another pressure bag.” She opened the cabinet beside the bed, pulled one out, and passed it to him. “Mara?” Kelly asked quietly. “I heard him.” “Wasn’t Nadine your mother’s name?” “Yes.” Mara checked the blood line even though it was running properly. “She died when I was a child.” The answer had been part of her life for so long that she could give it without thinking. Her mother had left home one evening and driven north. Three days later, police found her car at the bottom of a ravine. There had been enough blood inside the car for everyone to assume she was dead, even though they never recovered a body. Mara had been thirteen. She had spent one year waiting for Nadine to walk through the door, another year hating her, and the years after that refusing to talk about her at all. The patient began to cough beneath the oxygen mask. Mara leaned down and saw blood gathering at the corner of his mouth. “Turn him,” she said. Luis helped her roll him onto his side while Dr. Patel listened to his chest. “His left lung is filling,” Dr. Patel said. “We need a chest tube.” The door opened again, and a security officer stepped into the room. “Sorry to interrupt, but we need to know where this man came from.” “Behind the gas station on Route Nine,” Luis told him. The officer looked at the patient. “Did he have anyone with him?” “No,” Luis said. “Why?” “We got a call from county dispatch. They found another body about a mile away.” Kelly’s face changed. “Same kind of wounds?” “Worse.” Dr. Patel pointed toward the door. “Take it outside. We’re trying to save him.” The officer nodded. “When he can answer questions, call us.” “He may not get the chance,” Mara said. The patient heard her. His eyes moved to her face again. “Don’t let them take me,” he whispered. “No one is taking you anywhere except surgery.” “They will smell the blood.” Mara held the oxygen mask in place when he tried to push it aside. “Who will?” His eyes moved toward the trauma-room doors. Every monitor in the room went dark. The overhead lights shut off a moment later. Kelly swore under her breath. The emergency lights came on, filling the room with a weak red glow. “Backup power should have started already,” Dr. Patel said. Mara reached for the portable light kept in the emergency drawer and switched it on. “Luis, hold this over the bed.” The patient began pulling at the leads on his chest. “Stop,” Mara said as she caught his hands. “The power will come back.” “They’re here.” A heavy crash came from the hall. Kelly turned toward the doors. “What was that?” Another crash followed. Someone shouted, and running footsteps moved past the trauma room. The security officer reached for the radio clipped to his shoulder. “Control, report.” Only static answered him. He stepped into the hall. “Stay in here and keep the doors closed.” Mara heard Dr. Patel let out a tired breath. “Perfect. We have no power, surgery is upstairs, and our patient is bleeding out.” “Battery on the monitor is working,” Kelly said. “We have a few minutes.” “Then use them.” Mara checked the blood bag. It was emptying fast, but the patient’s pressure continued to fall. He reached for her again. This time, he held her hand instead of her wrist. “Listen to me,” he said. “I’m listening.” “Three girls lived.” Mara thought of Elara and Sloane before she could stop herself. They had met in the hospital after the bus crash, three frightened girls placed in beds along the same wall. Mara remembered Elara crying because she had lost one shoe. She remembered Sloane refusing to answer any questions until someone found her father. She remembered smoke, broken glass, and waking up with no idea how she had left the bus. “What three girls?” Mara asked. The man gave her a look that made the question feel useless. “The first under stone,” he said. “The second under ash. The third under water.” “What does that mean?” His gaze dropped to her palm. “He marked all of you.” Mara pulled her hand away. “Who marked us?” The patient tried to sit up. His body barely left the bed before he fell back. Dr. Patel pressed two fingers to the man’s neck. “Pressure’s dropping. Mara, start the second unit.” She changed the bag while Kelly called surgery again from the wall phone. The line was dead. “I’m going upstairs,” Luis said. “Take the west stairs,” Kelly told him. “The elevators won’t work during the outage.” Luis handed the light to the security officer, who had returned without explanation, then hurried out. The officer closed the doors behind him. “There’s some kind of animal in the ambulance bay.” Dr. Patel looked up. “Inside the building?” “I don’t know. A driver saw something cross the entrance before the lights went out. We’re locking down this wing.” Kelly gripped the edge of the counter. “An animal didn’t cut the power.” “No, but somebody might have.” The officer checked the hall through the narrow window in the door. “Keep this room closed.” Mara returned to the patient. “You said they were here. Who are they?” The man’s chest rose with a weak breath. “Red hands.” “Is that a person?” “A promise.” “To whom?” He did not answer. The heart monitor gave a warning alarm. Dr. Patel checked his pulse and called for epinephrine. Mara passed him the syringe, then moved to the side of the bed when the man’s heart rate dropped again. “Stay with me,” she told the patient. “You came all this way to find me, so you can stay long enough to tell me why.” His mouth moved under the mask. Mara bent closer. “Say it again.” “Rowan Thorne.” She straightened. Kelly noticed. “You know him?” Mara did, although she wished she could have said otherwise. Rowan had first walked into the emergency room six months earlier with a knife wound in his side and no interest in explaining how it got there. He had refused pain medicine, watched every door in the room, and left before the police arrived. Since then, Mara had seen him in the hospital café twice, across the street from her apartment once, and at a charity event where he had claimed their meetings were only chance. He was also the reason she had stopped going to the small coffee shop near work. A man who appeared that often without making any effort to know her was either hiding something or waiting for something. “How do you know Rowan?” Mara asked. The patient’s gray eyes settled on her again. “He was supposed to tell you.” “Tell me what?” His fingers closed around the metal disk on his chest. He pulled hard, breaking the chain, then shoved the disk into her palm. The edge cut her skin. Mara tried to drop it, but his hand closed over hers. “Find the black wolf,” he said. “Before the others find your friends.” The monitor alarm became one long tone. “Start compressions,” Dr. Patel ordered. Mara pulled her hand free, set the disk on the tray, and climbed onto the small step beside the bed. She placed both hands in the center of the man’s chest and pushed down while Dr. Patel prepared the defibrillator. “One, two, three, four,” Kelly counted as she squeezed air into the patient’s lungs. Mara kept going. His ribs shifted under her hands, but she did not stop. Sweat gathered at the back of her neck while the emergency lights stayed red and the locked room filled with the sound of counting. “Clear,” Dr. Patel said. Mara stepped back. The shock lifted the patient’s chest from the bed. Nothing changed. They gave him another dose of medication, continued compressions, and shocked him again. After the third attempt, Dr. Patel checked the clock on his watch. “Time of death, eleven forty-seven.” Kelly turned off the monitor. No one spoke for several seconds. Mara removed her gloves and dropped them into the waste bin. Her hands felt stiff, and blood from the small cut had spread across her left palm. Kelly touched her arm. “Go wash that before you do anything else.” Mara nodded. She reached for the metal disk because it belonged with the man’s other property. The moment her fingers touched it, heat drove through her palm. She cried out and dropped it on the floor. “What happened?” Kelly asked. Mara opened her hand. The cut was gone. In its place, a thin crescent curved across her skin, dark at first, then red, as if a light had switched on beneath it. Dr. Patel stepped closer. “Did that come from the metal?” Mara could not answer. The mark burned deeper, and something moved beyond the closed trauma-room doors. The security officer lifted his radio. “Who’s there?” A low growl came from the hall. It was followed by another from farther away, then a third from somewhere near the ambulance entrance. The patient’s final words returned to Mara as the mark in her palm grew brighter. Find the black wolf. The trauma-room doors bent inward beneath a hard blow. Kelly grabbed Mara’s arm. “What is outside?” Mara stared at the doors while another impact shook the frame. “I don’t know,” she said, closing her hand around the burning mark.