“Russel!” Lola ran the rest of the way to him, a spike of fear jabbing her in the back of her mind when she saw him suddenly collapse. When she got there, she looked him all over, trying to make sure he was still alive and breathing. “Talk to me.”

She made sure to keep him as still as possible while she checked him over. The ghouls had done a number on him. Several long and deep gashes were all over his chest, arms, legs, and most likely his back too. That was also where the ghoul had stuck its talon-claw in so she knew of at least one horrendous wound.

His eyes fluttered weakly. His breathing was shallow.

Heal, damnit! Lola’s mind screamed.

“Why aren’t you healing?” she asked out loud.

The cuts and slashes he sustained actually did look like they were closing but the edges were a nasty, dark color and a viscous, slime-like substance was mixed in with the blood coming from them. It wasn’t hard for her to guess what that was.

Poison.

How do you get poison out? What should I do? I don’t know. I don’t know how to help him.

These were the thoughts whirling through her head, seizing up her ability to function and do anything at all. She needed to be decisive. She needed to be quick. Being stuck in a perpetual loop of asking herself what to do would only assure his death. She looked around, trying to find something that might help. Her eyes landed on the small creek Serk had drank from.

Water.

Surely that would help. She could flush out each of his wounds and get rid of the poison. Then his ability to heal should take over, right?

She had no real idea that would actually work but it felt like something solid to grasp on to so she went with it. She got up, raced over to the packs they had left on the ground, and scrambled through hers for the water skin she had inside. It was less than half full so she ran to the creek and dipped it in, letting more of the precious liquid race inside. When the skin was full and bloated, she ran to Russel and started flushing out each of his wounds. The poison was thick and stubbornly refused to leave but she didn’t give up. She pressed on the skin a bit harder and a more forceful stream shot out. That did the trick. The poison started to flow off his skin and out of the wounds. She repeated the process with each one, racing back and forth between Russel and the creek several times before she managed to clean them all.

Everything else in those dire moments fell away. Her surroundings. The corpses of the ghouls. Their putrid stink. All the sounds of animal life inside the forest. All of it. Nothing else remained except for Russel and her need to help him.

It took her well over twenty minutes until she was sure all of the poison was gone. She was sure some had made its way into his bloodstream but she also thought his natural werewolf nature would take care of that without her aid. Already she could see wounds closing much faster than before. It gave her hope. It gave her a reason to believe he would pull out of it.

So she waited.

As she did, she applied more water and even forced him to drink some. It overflowed and poured down the sides of his face at first and then he instinctively started to gulp it down. His eyes moved rapidly underneath their closed lids. She hoped he would come out of it soon. Her heart was beating so fast she could barely breathe.

“Russel,” she whispered.

He still wasn’t responding.