Page 10 of Dark Princess: Shadows

"I felt no pain."

"Close your eyes." Merlin waited for Negal to comply before doing it again.

"Well?" Negal asked. "What are you waiting for?"

The doctor chuckled. "It works. The question is, for how long? I need two minutes to take the tracker out, and it will take a few minutes longer for Gertrude to staple the wound."

The door to the dressing room opened, and Dagor walked in wearing blue hospital booties and a hospital gown that he was clutching in the back. "This thing is so drafty." Noticing Negal sitting in a chair and holding his finger up, he frowned. "What are you doing?"

"Testing the anesthetic for you."

Dagor shifted his gaze to Aru. "What, no whiskey?"

"It seems that the anesthetic is working," Merlin answered for him. "No booze needed."

"Oh well." Dagor climbed onto the hospital bed, flashing everyone as his gown parted in the back. "I'm ready to be liberated from the tracker, Doc."

"One more moment." Merlin used his tool to prod Negal's finger again. "Still numb?"

Negal nodded.

"Excellent." Merlin put the tool aside. "Now, I want everyone except for Gertrude to get out." He shooed them away by waving both hands.

Reluctantly, Aru left together with Negal, who was still holding his finger up. "You can put it down, you know," he told his friend.

Negal shook his head. "I will when the feeling returns." He opened his mouth, exposing his elongated fangs. "Who needs surgical tools when I have these, right?"

He nicked the finger on one of his fangs. "Damn, it is still numb. Why isn't my body rejecting whatever Merlin injected me with?"

It was indeed odd and a little ridiculous. Perhaps Negal was just clowning around to reduce the tension.

The procedure itself was nothing, but what followed would significantly impact their lives, and Aru had been a ball of stress lately.

"I don't know." He opened the door to the waiting room. "Maybe it doesn't recognize it as something that needs to be repelled."

Kian greeted them with a raised brow. "Why are you bleeding?"

Negal looked at his finger, licked the drop of blood that had welled over the wound he'd made, and then showed it to Kian. "It's not bleeding anymore. I just wanted to check if the numbing was still working. Surprisingly, it still is."

"Interesting," Kian murmured. "Evidently, your healing speed is not much faster than ours."

Aru knew that it was, but he was tired of discussing the subject. "Is the trafficker ready to receive the tracker?"

Kian nodded. "He's heavily sedated. We don't want him panicking, although given what he did, we should let him suffer both the fear and the pain. He doesn't deserve our mercy."

As the minutes crawled by, Aru started pacing the small waiting room while Negal and Kian passed the time scrolling on their phones.

When the door finally opened and Merlin emerged with a tray and a tiny object on top of it, Kian rose to his feet.

"How did it go?"

"It took some digging, but the anesthetic held on for most of it, and Dagor only had to suffer through the suturing. He's resting now." He headed toward the room where the trafficker was waiting. "Extraction was successful. Now, on to the implanting. Cross your fingers, gentlemen."

"That's odd," Negal said when Merlin closed the door behind him. "How come my finger is still numb?"

Kian shrugged. "Maybe he gave you a very strong dose. Bite it again."

"Nah." Negal finally put his hand down. "I'm glad that I'm so susceptible to the anesthetic. When Merlin removes my tracker, I won't feel a thing."

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