Chapter 2

"You can sit over here Mrs. Peters." I said, guiding her to one of the waiting room seats.

"You're such a sweet child deary, just like your mother." She said, sitting down. "So kind helping that injured man in the alley."

"You saw that?"

"Of course I did, I was about to call out to you when you ran across the street, but I decided to wait and let you help him."

"Oh uh… please don't tell my father that I put myself in danger again."

"Of course I won't deary, we ladies have to have an adventure every now and then." She said, flashing me a crooked smile.

"Thank you." I said, waving goodbye before I headed upstairs to my father's office.

"There you are Lily." He said, setting his pen down.

"Hello papa." I said, going over and giving him a kiss on the forehead. "I'm sorry that I'm late, but I stopped to walk Mrs. Peters here." I wasn't entirely lying to him, but it wasn't exactly the full truth either.

"That's alright, I wonder what she's here for this time."

"I don't know, maybe I should have asked her when we walked here. She probably just likes the company." I said, pulling the bento boxes out and setting his in front of him then taking mine over to the table in his office.

"I suppose so, she didn't really have anyone after Mrs. Peters passed away. Just makes me thankful to have had you after your mother passed, but I don't mind sharing if she needs the company every now and then." He said, opening the box and digging into his lunch.

"Speaking of company." I said, starting to eat my own lunch. "Derick stopped by the house before work today."

"Oh, did he now?" He said, his mouth full of food.

"Swallow before you speak." I scolded, pointing a chopstick at him.

He complied, and I watched his Adams apple bob as he swallowed. "You know I've always liked that boy, he's a much smarter choice than some of the other men you've dated, and he's handsome too. I'd get some good-looking grand babies with that one, yes sire they'd be so cute."

"Dad!" I said, nearly choking on my food, my cheeks burning.

"Sorry, I was only joking." He said. "Though I may have been a bit serious about that last part."

"I shouldn't have made you lunch today, should've just let you eat food from the cafeteria."

"Noooo, I'm sorry sweetie. I'll stop joking about it, just please don't stop making me your delicious food, you know I love your cooking."

"I'm leaving." I said, slamming the lid down on my bento box.

"Wait before you go, I know it's your day off, but they really need your help downstairs."

"Ugh fine, I'll go check it out, but if it isn't something serious then I'm going home."

The hospital wing was in lowest level of the basement, so I made my way down the several long flights of stairs, then down the long hallway. The second I opened the door though I want to hurl from what was inside.

"Oh my god, what happened?" I said, taking a few staggering steps into the room.

There on the table lay a soldier, his body shredded, his insides showing. I could see his heart and it was barely beating.

"That's what we need your help with." The general standing next to him said.

"W-what do you mean?" I said, trying not to look at the dying man on the table.

"We need you to heal him enough so he can tell us who did this to him."

"You don't want me to heal him fully?"

"You can't fix this mess." He said, gesturing to the dying man.

"But I can, not completely, but enough so he can live."

"Did you not hear me, I said you can't, so that means you can't."

"But sir, I don't understand. I can save his life, but instead you just want him to only live long enough to give you information."

He grabbed me by the shirt collar. "I said that you can't, so that means you do what I tell you to. You follow my orders, got it you filthy mage."

"Y-yes sir." I said, terrified of what he might do if I didn't comply.

He set me down and I shakily turned towards the man on the table. I placed my hand on his head, the only part that was still intact, and started trying to heal him. This man may have been a higher rank than me, but I didn't care what he said, there was no way I'd let someone die when I could do something to save him. I just had to make it look like I did as he said, so while I healed him so he could speak I also covertly healed him so that he would be able to survive until I could heal him properly. As soon as I finished healing him the general shoved me out of the way, leaning in close to soldier so he could hear him.

"Now son, I want you to listen here, you need to tell me who it was that did this to you." The general said.

"T-they caught me off guard, t-they surrounded me, s-so many knives."

"Who was it that killed?" He said, obviously irritated.

"T-the… the."

"Spit it out boy!" He yelled.

"T-the grim reaper." He whispered before passing out.

I pushed passed the general, quickly checking his pulse. Before the general could notice his still beating heart I threw a white sheet over his body.

"Get out." I said quietly.

"What was that." He growled.

"I said get out!" I shouted.

"Who do you think you're talking to, I am a high-ranking officer, you have no right to speak to me that way you filthy-"

"Don't you dare say it." I said, glaring at him. "Who do I think I'm talking to? Who the hell do you think you're talking to?! I am a highly respected member of this branch and several others. You may think that practicing magic makes me somehow less than you, but my magic has saved more lives than an asshole like you can count on his fingers. And might I remind you that this is my office, that I didn't invite you into, so GET OUT!"

"I will not be treated like this by some tiny little girl."

"Well this little girl can kick your ass faster than you can say filthy mage." I said, pulling out my gun. "Now don't make me repeat myself again or else I'll leave you just shy of death and we'll see how you feel about my magic then. Now get out."

He glared at me as he back towards the door. "This isn't over." He huffed before rushing out the door.

As soon as the door shut, I ripped the sheet off and made sure his heart was still beating. Thankfully he was still alive, but barely. Quickly I started rummaging through all the books on my shelves, frantically searching for the one I needed. As soon as I found it, I flipped it open to the page I needed, scanning over what I needed. Once I gathered what I needed I started using them to draw the symbols the book listed on his body. I held my hands over his body and they glowed along with symbols as I cast the spell. It was one of the most powerful healing spells in my book collection, and it drained almost all of my mana. But it was worth it since it healed the majority of his injuries, it didn't take care of everything, but it was nothing I couldn't fix after some rest.

I leaned against the table after I was finished, gasping for breath, that had taken a lot out of me. But I couldn't rest for long, I waited until I caught my breath, then started gathering what I needed to give him stitches. Thankfully he was still unconscious as I carefully stitched up the many small gashes that still covered his body. Once I was done, I pulled up a chair and collapsed into it. I was glad I had saved him, but this was most likely going to cause me problems later.

He groaned in pain as he started to wake up. "Ugh… what's going on?" He grunted sleepily.

"Oh good you're awake, we need to get you out of here before someone comes to collect your corpse and finds out you're not dead."

"Corpse? Dead?!" He said, sitting up quickly, then wincing in pain and clutching at his stitches.

"Careful, I couldn't heal all of your injuries yet. Now we have to get out of here, I wasn't supposed to save you, but I did so I could get in big trouble if they find out."

"Thank you for saving me, but uh… are you apart of the mafia?"

"What?! No! Why would you think that?"

"Well the last thing I remember is being cornered by the grim reaper and his subordinates. I don't know how my cover was blown, but damn what they did hurt… Wait how am I even still alive, they shredded me pretty badly, so how is this possible." He said, inspecting his body.

"I told you, I healed you, that's why you're not dead. Although I'm not sure how you didn't realize that you were in less pain, but whatever." I said, going over to one of the cabinets and pulling out one of the spare uniforms I kept for the soldiers and handing it to him. "Here, put this on, and make sure you cover most of your hair with the hat."

"Okay." He said, standing up and putting the uniform on over his tattered clothes, pulling the hat down so it hid his face in shadow. "Thanks again for saving me, I'm indebted to you, although there's honestly no way I'll ever be able to make this up to you. I don't know what would have happened to my daughter if you hadn't saved me."

"You have a daughter?"

"Yes, I do, she's the light of my life. It hurts to think that I came so close to leaving her all alone. She's only five, and her mother has been gone awhile, so I'm all she has."

"You don't have to repay me, I'm happy to have saved you, and your daughter too."

"Thank you, if there's ever anything that you need help with feel free to call me."

"I will, thank you." I said, going over and gathering my stuff.

I started to feel dizzy from my lack of energy, and I staggered backwards a bit, dropping my stuff as I started to fall.

He caught me. "Are you alright miss?" He said, looking concerned.

"Ya I'm fine, I just used to much of my mana to heal you."

"Is that bad?"

"Ya, it makes me feel dizzy and sick if I use to much of my mana store."

"Will you be alright?"

"Ya, I just need some time to rest and recover, it shouldn't take too long."

"Here then, let me help you walk." He said, wrapping my arm around his shoulder to help me walk. "So where are we going to go once we leave?"

"I was thinking my house, you can lay low there for a while."

"That's fine with me, but what about my daughter, I have to pick her up from school."

"I can do that."

"I can't make you do that for me, besides the school just let a stranger pick her up."

"You could call them and let them know I'll be picking her up for you, and you could write a note to confirm it. I can also use my ID to show that I'm technically apart of the military, plus I don't mind picking her up."

"Oh alright, we should probably take the elevator up." He said, helping me out into the hallway.

We reached the elevator and he pressed the button to call it down, stepping inside once it reached us. He pressed the button for the first floor and we waited in silence until the doors swished open and we stepped out into the lobby of the office building.

"What happened to you deary?" I heard a familiar voice say, and I looked over to see Mrs. Peters sitting in the same spot I left her.

"Oh, it's you Mrs. Peters, I didn't know that you were still here. I just used a bit too much of mana, so I'm just a little dizzy."

"I thought that you were off today."

"They needed my help with something urgent that came up. They did feel bad for how drained the process left me, so they assigned this gentleman here to escort me home."

"Oh my, well safe travels deary, hopefully you'll recovery soon. And thank you for taking care of our sweet Lily." She said to him, and he tipped his hat.

"Thank you, Mrs. Peters, I hope you get home safe too."

She waved goodbye as we walked away, and I heaved a sigh of relief once we stepped outside.

"Why did you lie to that old woman?" He said.

"I can't tell her what actually happened, and besides I didn't really lie, I just left out the classified details."

"Oh, alright. So, I'm thinking I should probably know your name."

"Oh right, those are important. My name is Lily, what's yours?"

"My name is Tom, and I'm a lieutenant in the military ma'am." He said, teasingly giving me a small salute.

"Ma'am? I'm younger than you are." I said, giggling.

"You don't know that."

"You have a five-year-old daughter, and were married, I barely have a boyfriend."

"None of those things really define one's age."

"Okay, then how old are you?"

"I'm twenty-six. And yeah, I know we had a kid pretty young, but we got married when we were twenty, which isn't that uncommon these days."

"See, I told you that you were older that me, I'm only twenty."

"I still want to call you Ma'am though, because in my opinion your rank is higher than mine."

"That's silly, I don't have a rank because I'm not an officer. I'm just a simple nurse, here to patch up their wounds and send them back out as quickly as possible."

"But you save lives, I think that's much more important that taking them."

"We're here." I said, brushing off the conversation.

I unlocked the front door and led him inside, going over and grabbing a pen and a pad of paper. I handed it to him and he quickly scribbled out a note, then he borrowed my phone and called the school to let them know I'd be picking her up for him.

"Go ahead and make yourself at home." I said, gesturing around the room. "There's plenty of food in the fridge, and you can shower upstairs and change into some of my Dad's clothes if you want. I'll be back with her as soon as I can."

"Wait, you're leaving already, shouldn't you sit and rest for a bit?"

"I'm feeling better now, so I should pick her up from school before it gets to late."

"Alright, if that's what you want. Her name is Millie by the way."

"Okay, I'll be back soon, so just make yourself comfortable." I said, waving a little before stepping back out the front door and shutting it behind me.