I thought again, desperately trying to dig out the memory. There was nothing, though. Only that he’d been someone familiar.

“I knew him . . .” That pleasant drowsiness was growing stronger. I wished it would hurry up.

“There,” said Hugh. “All bandaged up. Help me move her so I can look at her ribs.”

That was not fun, and the discomfort of the three of them turning me over—no matter how gentle they tried to be—was enough to momentarily break me out of the drug’s soothing embrace. They managed to flip me over, putting moderate pressure on my back when I rested back against the bed, but allowing Hugh to examine the rest of me. He poked and prodded and had me take deep breaths. His final analysis was that I had a couple of broken ribs and a lot of bruising and pain that would just go away with time.

“Great,” I said. I was so loopy by that point that I didn’t even know if I was being sarcastic or not.

Cody was still unable to give up my benefactor. “But who was here?”

“The man . . .” I said.

“You aren’t going to get anything else out of her,” said Hugh wearily. “Not for a while. She’s going to be in Dreamland any minute now.”

“Dreamland. The man . . .” I repeated. Suddenly, I giggled. “The man in the dream . . .”

I saw them exchange pitying looks, just before my eyelids drooped closed. They thought I was talking nonsense. None of them knew about the story of the man in the dream, of that alluring and improbable alternate life that Nyx had shown me.

But as I drifted off to Dreamland, it wasn’t Nyx’s vision I saw. It was more of that same, painless black . . . at least, it was until I got jolted by a million volts of electricity.

I let out a small cry of surprise, my eyes popping open. It felt like hundreds of icy needles were dancing along my body, piercing every nerve. The room’s details, as well as my friends, came to me in sharp, crystalline detail. No more fuzziness. Turning my head slightly, I saw a fourth person.

Mei.

She stood beside my bed, face blank and emotionless, arms crossed across her black silk blouse. “What happened?” I asked. My words were still thick, but my speech capabilities had improved by leaps and bounds.

“I healed you,” she said flatly. “Inasmuch as I can. You’re still going to hurt.”

Demons, though once angels, didn’t possess that power to heal that their heavenly counterparts had. They could do it in small bursts, however, and in expanding my senses to assess my body, I could feel how she’d gotten rid of the worst of my pain. I still ached in some places, and even bandaged, my back still stung. I no longer wanted to die, however, so that was definitely an improvement.

“Thank you,” I said.