Page 24 of The Last Heir of Elsewhere

The moment we stepped inside, Scion lowered me to the floor, looking slightly apologetic when I hissed in pain.

“Take off your shirt,” he demanded.

I shrank back. “No.”

He rolled his eyes. “This isn’t some ruse to get your clothing off, rebel, I need to see the wound.”

I felt my cheeks heat, and my mind flooded with the memory of looking down at his perfect, unscarred face as he said, “Take off your nightgown. I want to see you.” We both knew he hadn’t needed any ruse or trickery to get me naked only last week.

Praying he didn’t somehow know what I was thinking, my hands trembled as I reached up to try to undo the buttons at my throat, but found it was too painful to lift my arm. Tears blurred my vision, and a strangled cry escaped my lips. “I can’t.”

Scion lurched forward, as if pulled by invisible strings, and grabbed for my hand with trembling fingers. “I’ll do it.”

I nodded, closing my eyes so I didn’t have to look at him as he gripped the fabric of my tunic in both hands and tore it cleanly down the center as if it were tissue paper. The two even halves hung uselessly off my shoulders, and I shivered as the cold air hit the bare skin of my stomach and chest.

Scion’s expression was unreadable, as he leaned closer so he could inspect the wound. His breath skated over my bare skin and gooseflesh rose on my chest and arms, my nipples turning to hard peaks. I saw his eyes flick to them for the briefest second before he stepped back. “I need to pull the arrow out.”

“No!” I hissed, shrinking back from him. “The arrow itself is the only thing preventing me from bleeding to death.”

“I know,” he snapped. “But it is also the thing preventing my blood from healing you. I need to take it out, so the wound will close.”

I shook my head vigorously. “Absolutely not. Do you even understand how quickly I will die once it’s removed?”

He scowled. “You do not need to explain mortality to me, I’ve killed enough men to know far better than you how much blood you can lose before there’s no returning from it, and I daresay you’re past that point already.”

“So, what, you’re hoping to speed things along?”

He laughed without humor. “How many times must I save your life before you stop accusing me of trying to kill you?”

“I don’t know,” I replied, my blood heating. “Perhaps I wouldn’t think that if you didn’t blow so hot and cold. Do you hate me today, or is your other personality making an appearance? What are you even planning to do, if not simply let me bleed out?”

Scion’s silver eyes darkened, and slid to mine, then he smiled as he reached up and began unbuckling the breastplate of his obsidian armor, until it finally fell with a ground-shaking clang against the barn floor. Then, he did the same with his arm guards. “Press your back against the wall and brace yourself. The arrow will hurt when I pull it out, quite as much as it did going in.”

“Are you just going to ignore my question?” I seethed.

His tongue swept over his bottom lip and my eyes widened as he began to shift out of the heavy looking chain mail undershirt that covered everywhere on his body that was not protected by stone. “I’m not ignoring you, rebel, I’m simply unwilling to waste any more time arguing with you when I could simply show you how I intend to help.”

Scion straightened and stood shirtless in front of me, every inch of his muscled chest gleaming with sweat. My breath caught, and I swallowed, not entirely from nerves this time as he sauntered toward me. He put his hands on my shoulders, steering me to stand against the wall as he’d directed, then bent low over me, bracing one hand behind my head.

My heart pounded too fast, my breath catching. “Wait no! What are you going to do?”

His magnetic eyes darted over me, and then narrowed, like he was making up his mind. “It’s not what I’m going to do, rebel. It’s you.”

“Excuse me?”

Then, he tilted his head to the side, baring his neck to me, and raised an eyebrow. “I’m going to pull that arrow out, and you’re going to take my blood to heal yourself.”

I blinked at him, finally shocked into silence. He could not be serious, could he? “I…I can’t do that.”

“How else did you think you were going to survive this? You need far more than a taste from my wrist.”

“No. I’m not even sure my teeth will break your skin.”

He looked almost like he was suppressing a smile when he said: “Bite hard.”

I could think of nothing to say, because he was right. There was no other option, but that didn’t make me feel better about the idea. I might have thought this was one of those strange cultural differences between humans and Fae, simply impossible for me to understand, except that I knew it wasn’t. Bael had been perfectly clear that even to fairies, sharing blood was taboo, and Scion had never struck me as one to dabble in the gray areas of society. “You seem far too calm about this.”

He looked down at me, and as so often with Scion, I couldn’t read the expression behind his eyes. His arrogant, perfect features always hid whatever he was really thinking from me. “Not calm, rebel. Focused.”

---