Page 138 of Myth of Dragons (Dragon Tails 4)

“Will you allow me to see your Sorin, Ere?” Sai asked.

“I do not know what I can do, but I have an idea. It won’t hurt to try.”

Ere huffed a rough, watery sigh as his face contorted with a brief flash of pain before he forcibly smoothed his expression out.

“Sure. I’m willing to try anything at this point. He’s been like this for three weeks already. I don’t know what else to do.”

Thus, Ere led him to his Mate’s bedside. They both leaned over the unconscious, barely breathing warrior.

For, a warrior he clearly was, as Sai immediately saw.

Scarred and bearded, with chiseled, supremely masculine features. While this Sorin didn’t exactly look like the Sol Sai recalled, he had a similar aura. In that he was primally male. Strong. Beautiful.

Sai could see why Ere loved him so. Even unconscious and prone, the male radiated a palpable power, an irresistible magnetism. It was a crime against nature that such strength and light should be so subdued and constrained. That someone so strong should be made so weak, and clearly suffering untold torment.

“May I?” Sai asked, looking into Ere’s worried eyes as they filled with fragile hope.

The man nodded. Gave his consent without knowing what Sai might do.

He simply trusted.

They were brothers, after all. It was a bond Sai would forever cherish and protect.

He leaned down to the unconscious warrior, hesitated for one brief moment, before he covered Sorin’s mouth with his own.

A few indrawn gasps could be heard around the chamber, but Sai paid them no heed.

He focused instead on transferring his breath, mixed with Brigid’s magic, into Sorin’s lifeless body. As if he were giving him air beneath the seas. Fanning the flames of life.

Suddenly, Sorin’s chest heaved with a deep, inflating breath, before it depressed again in a long exhale.

Ere clasped the male’s hand in both his own from the other side of the bed, his features uncontrolled for once, fear and worry mingled with a painfully vulnerable flicker of hope.

Sai leaned back and smoothed his fingers across Sorin’s brow.

“He…he looks better,” Ere whispered, as if he was afraid to speak too loudly, lest he break the spell that helped to heal his Mate.

And then he frowned.

“But…he’s not waking up.”

Sai shook his head.

“Whatever prison your Mate is trapped in—and itisa prison—I have only given his soul some reprieve from the torture. Some breathing space, perhaps. I am not able to free him. I don’t know if anyone can free him but himself.”

He didn’t add that he knew this from his own experience.

A white-haired woman came close to the bed as well, the strands of her hair lifting and inserting their needle-like ends into Sorin’s pores.

Sai stepped back a little and watched in fascination as she assessed the warrior’s vitals. She must be a healer, he deduced. But he had never met anyone like her before.

“He is much better, Ere,” the woman said in a lilting accent.

“I do not sense the mental and emotional agony that he suffered before. His soul seems soothed for the time being. And his body is already stronger because of it.”

“How long do you think this reprieve will last?” Ere asked.

“I do not know. But your…brother,” the woman smiled in gratitude at Sai, “has definitely bought us some more time.”

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