Zhang Xi doesn't heal Rhayne the way someone closes a cut.
She kneels beside us, lays one hand over her chest and the other below the right rib, where the arrow chose to leave its signature. Her fingers find points I can't see, but the skill isn't born from the fingers. It's born from the breath.
"Susanoo's Love."
Her energy enters Rhayne like water into a broken city. Like a current. A heavy, fluid force that runs beneath the skin and reorganizes what the arrow tore. Rhayne's chest arches against my lap, her mouth opening in a gasp that doesn't become a scream. The current crosses muscle, lung, rib, and OXI, pulling each thing back where it belongs.
I hold Rhayne by the shoulders without gripping too hard.
Zhang Xi keeps her face serene, but the sweat at the side of her shaved head gives away the cost.
"Her body seems to reject me," she says.
The healing isn't a pretty light. It's labor. A storm passing through someone without permission to destroy.
