Total pages in book: 99
Estimated words: 93267 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 466(@200wpm)___ 373(@250wpm)___ 311(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 93267 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 466(@200wpm)___ 373(@250wpm)___ 311(@300wpm)
Gregori winced and briefly thought about shifting into his dragon so he could escape, but he couldn’t. It was time to face the music.
“Gregori, what were your symptoms and when did they start?” Sora inquired, turning his full attention on him.
Gregori glanced at his mate, but in the end, he couldn’t meet Salem’s gaze when he answered. “It started after I’d been here about a month. At first, I thought it was just homesickness, but I noticed one day when I was with the kids at the hospital that my magic was breaking down. There were times when I tried to call on it and nothing would happen. The first time, I got it working again after a few attempts. No big deal.”
“But…” Sora pressed.
Gregori’s gaze slid to Salem, who was looking pale and sickly, and he licked his lips before he continued. “It got worse. The ice magic was barely working, and it was becoming painful to force. It was harder to focus. My body ached…and…my dragon…it wasn’t responding to me anymore.”
“What?” Dimitri barked, and Gregori ducked his head down toward his shoulders.
“It was lethargic and apathetic. It seemed like it just didn’t care about anything.”
Dimitri stomped away, cursing in Russian. When he whirled back, he pointed a finger at him, his face twisted with pain and anger. “You were told to report in the moment you were having any kind of problems. Ha Na said you told her you were fine during your calls. No problems. You lied to her. To us!”
Sam jogged over and wrapped his arms around his mate, whispering reassurance in his ear to calm him down.
The one who had him worried right now was Sora.
The mage shut down the spell he’d been using and tucked his hands into the pockets of his puffy blue coat. “That settles it. You’re coming back to Brazil.”
“No!”
It was exactly what Gregori didn’t want. Terror seized his heart and squeezed it tight enough to crush it.
“You have no choice. Staying here is killing you. You can’t risk being away from your clan any longer. If you don’t accompany us back to Brazil in the next twenty-four hours, I’ll have no choice but to tell Rodrigo.”
Fuck. That was the other thing he didn’t want. His king could command him to return, and if he didn’t instantly obey, Rodrigo could kick him out of the clan.
But he didn’t want to disobey Rodrigo. He loved and respected his king. He’d follow Rodrigo to the ends of the earth and through hell itself if he commanded it.
Gregori dragged his eyes over to Salem at last to find his mate staring at him with an unreadable expression.
“Let’s go inside. We have a lot to discuss.”
And that sounded a hell of a lot worse than facing his pissed off king.
Salem felt wrecked.
This was bigger than Gregori hiding a cold or a lack of sleep. The dragon had driven himself nearly to the edge of death just in the name of staying close to his mate.
The relief he’d experienced at seeing a bright flush to Gregori’s cheeks and a twinkle to his dark eyes all faded as he listened to what he’d suffered. But it was more than that. It was clear things couldn’t continue as they were.
He waited until they were all gathered in his tiny apartment. Part of him didn’t want to do this in front of the others, but if he was lucky, they would help convince Gregori this was for the best.
“Gregori—”
“Don’t,” his mate said, cutting him off before he could continue. “I know your tone, and I don’t want to hear it.”
“You have to.” Salem shrugged out of his coat and tossed it down on the couch before turning to face where Gregori was pacing the tiny kitchen like a caged animal, a mutinous expression on his handsome face. “Staying here with me isn’t an option. You’re going to die if you remain here. You belong with your clan.”
“I belong with my mate.”
“Wait a minute!” Sam interjected, holding both of his hands up between them in a T as if he were an official calling a time out. “Are you saying you’re not going with us back to Brazil?”
Salem actually swallowed at his twin brother’s pissed expression. This was not the kind of help he’d been anticipating.
“I can’t.”
Sam lifted both of his hands in front of his face, curled his fingers, and shook them like he was shaking Salem. “I swear to fucking god. You’re one of the smartest men I know, but you can be such a fucking dumbass sometimes.”
Anger and guilt blasted through him. “Screw you! That’s no—!”
Sam stomped a step closer and flared his nostrils. “I know you talked to Sora about magic and medicine. Even asked him about being his apprentice. What’s your grand plan, huh? Go learn how to use magic and medicine together in Brazil for a couple of months and then come back here? Use magic on the kids? Be the only openly known mage-doctor in the world? Tell me how that’s going to work out. You would constantly have a line of people banging on your door. You wouldn’t have a life anymore. Just work. And you think those people are going to be happy with you only treating kids? Hell no. Adults are going to demand you use magic to fix them too.”