Page 82 of Gemini Hunted
Now Zephyr’s arrogant face turns wary. His thumb stops stroking my lower back (which, admittedly, I’ve rather enjoyed) and his voice becomes grudging.
“If your beautiful head is now clear enough, Vasili Romanov,” he says stiffly, “I’d advise you to summon your demon.”
Chapter Seventeen
Zara
“There’s no need to worry, my dear,” Lucius says for at least the third time, “and certainly no need to weep. Not over me, in any event. I’m quite well.”
“Bull.Shit,” I tell my headmaster through a flood of belated tears. Once my dragon queen Hulk-smashed a few of those hyenas, zapped a bunch more with our lightning, then bullied the rest into flight, I swear, it’s like someone turned on a faucet.
Since I shifted back to human, I haven’t stopped crying.
“Language, Ms. Gemini.” As Lucius limps slowly across the ruined cavern, even though he’s naked and caked in rock dust with an arm wrapped around my waist for support, the guy manages a wheezy chuckle. “I ought to assign… detention.”
Well alrighty then.
If my headmaster feels recovered enough from his horrific injuries to joke (or even impose actual discipline, which is when he’s at his most yummy), the least I can do is meet him halfway.
I wipe away my tears, tighten my own arm around his waist (carefully avoiding his injuries) to take as much of his weight as he’ll let me carry, and say hopefully, “Detention with you in the crypt?”
“Try not to sound so delighted, you minx. You’re supposed to live in terror of your headmaster’s displeasure.” This time, his chuckle ends in a breathy gasp.
Damn it.
He’s putting too much weight on his half-healed leg.
The one a hyena savaged in its powerful jaws while Lucius was down.
Shifter or no, I’m fucking glad I Hulk-smashed that mangy hyena to a bloody pulp, for real. My inner dragon snarls in agreement.
“Slow down a little, Lucius,” I urge, shifting more of his weight onto my equally naked body, and trying to keep the growl of my lightning voice out of it. “Your injuries—”
“Are healing rather swiftly. One of the advantages of being a purebred shifter. Not to mention having received a mating bite, laced with fast-healing biochemicals, from another shifter.”
Oh, right.
Given all the shit going down in this Dean’s Challenge, I’ve briefly forgotten that Vasili and Lucius once swapped mating bites. Lucius bit Vasili, way back in the first season of our soap opera romance, to trigger his recessives and bring on his first shift, so Vasili could rise to my dragon’s first mating flight. V bit Lucius because he’s V—and Lucius’ alpha. (Without asking, which was a big crisis at the time, but also very V.)
Anyway. I’m extra glad for it now.
Lucius and I might both be naked, barefoot, and covered in rock dust. But my headmaster’s voice is getting stronger and his steps more certain by the minute. Those awful gashes in his belly and flanks from multiple hyena bites are already healing.
“One thing to be thankful for, anyway.” I let out a sigh, eyeing the wreck around us. “God knows, we need one.”
Here’s another plus. Since the ceiling’s half gone, there’s plenty of light to see by.
But there’s also a major minus.
Half those pillars I wiped out when I shifted seem to have fallen across the tunnel where Neo and Mal and Jae (and hopefully V) have vanished.
I can’t see or hear or smell any of the others, literally none of them. Which is concerning as fuck. The outraged roars of Max’s dragon and Xhev’s nails-on-chalkboard screech went quiet a while ago, my nerves are so jangled I’m not even sure when.
Plus I’m picking up zilch in the telepathy department, which is not a good sign.
As for the Horn of Ceres and that sex demon we’ve entrusted with our prize? I eye the still black water of the reservoir with deep disquiet.
“Hold on a sec, Teach, okay? Just catch your breath. Think healing thoughts.” Gently I prop Lucius against one of the pillars that’s still standing. “I gotta check on something. I mean someone.”
