Page 90 of The Demon's Discovery
“I imagine he’ll be none too pleased if he heard?—”
The footsteps on the stone floor were heavy, the growl feral. “What are you doing to my mate?”
Chapter 36
Vassago
The sound of Greta’s pained shriek echoed through my bones. My fangs descended, and a harsh growl rumbled through my chest. Rylan glanced at me, and we increased our steady walk to a run as we passed the meetinghouse and turned into the infirmary.
“What are you doing to my mate?” I demanded, finding her prone and in pain while Calla and Lovette held her down, bent over her back. Rylan grabbed a fistful of my shirt, keeping me from rushing ahead.
“Think, brother,” he said calmly. “They wouldn’t?—”
“Helping her,” Lovette said with a grunt, falling back against her stool with a mass of thread in her grip.
Greta let out another noise, this one more a muffled sob. I blinked across the room to her, making Rylan swear as he looked at his empty hand. The women stiffened but didn’t stop what they were doing.
Calla pressed a cloth firmly against Greta’s skin, which was lit up inside like Ophelia had done. “All finished.” She gave me a tight smile. “See?” She removed the cloth and all that remained was a clean incision on each side of her spine. Where the stitches had been in her flesh was now normal muscle and bone.
“You did this to her while we weregone?” I demanded, tone icy as I looked between them. To their credit, neither flinched from my red eyes or fangs.
“There was no danger in performing the procedure without you here,” Lovette frowned and applied some loose gauze bandage.
“I’m alright,” Greta insisted. “It already feels better.”
Two tangled nests of wire sat on a metal tray. I smelled her blood and old rust. “Iron.”
Calla nodded. “Yes.”
My jaw clenched at how much discomfort that would have caused for her. Iron, imbedded in her skin when she was part fae? Closing up her wing ways so she couldn’t shift, heal, sleep properly… it was sadistic. That trickster had no idea what was coming to him. I would make his deathslow.
“We’ll want to check your wing function as soon as you feel up to it,” Lovette said, wiping her hands on a clean towel. “But it’s not urgent.”
“I just want to lie here a few minutes,” she muttered, but I saw her eyelids fluttering. “Thank you both.”
“Of course.”
I nodded to Lovette and sat on the edge of the bed after pulling up the sheet. “Do you want a blanket? Or your shirt?”
“I’m okay.”
“Alright.” I stroked her hair, the need to touch her driving hard on my nerves. I would much prefer to pull her up off the bed, to crush her to my chest, but she seemed comfortable.
“Are you hurt?” she asked, eyes wide as she looked at the state of me.
“No, Dragonfly. I’m fine.”
“Is it done? Are there more injured stone kin coming? There were some, earlier, but—” She stopped, interrupted by the sharp clang of something falling on the floor.
“Put me down, you insolent children! I’ll have you punished for this! Latrine duty for weeks on end, the worst patrols?—”
“They’re only trying to help you,” Rylan interrupted calmly.
“Who askedyou, archmage?” he barked, all too happy to redirect his rage.
“I’m here to help, General, but if you’d like me to leave…”
“I don’t care what you do,” Gaius groused.
