I rested my hands on his scarred chest, and focusing on my fingertips, I called forth the warmth of my Phaetyn power. I closed my eyes, startled when I recognized the green glow near the blue energy of my Drae. I’d seen this vibrant color when I’d gone through the Drae transformation. I gathered the familiar force and directed the power through my hands and into Tyrrik’s body, wishing desperately for the blood to congeal and clot. I hiccupped and let my tears fall into his wound, willing his bronze skin to knit together and be whole once more and for the gaping hole in his chest to be gone. I poured my strength into the wound, willing it to heal.

I opened my eyes.

The wound had barely changed.

Tyrrik’s head lolled to the side as his wet breathing became shallow, and my small understanding of anatomy told me that his lung had to have been punctured.

How could I heal that? What did his lungs look like on the inside? I had no idea.

“Don’t you dare die, Tyrrik. I’m the only one who gets to kill you.” The jumble of my emotions for the Drae was irrelevant. I had to save him.

The jagged gash continued to ooze, my Phaetyn-wishing doing nothing.

The memory of our conversation in his room came back to me, followed by our moment in the prison when I’d kissed him. I leaned over him. His eyes were closed, the pallor of his skin a frightening shade of gray. His shallow breath only faint gasps as he clung to life. As I drew closer, the rest of the world fell away.

I brushed his dark hair from his cool brow, streaking his blood across his forehead. My tears dripped on his whiskered cheeks, his pale lips. His dying breath still smelled like the nectar he gave me. I closed my eyes and rested my forehead to his, the temperature of his skin warming beneath me. I let his breath, his skin, his presence fill me. And then, I pressed my lips to his.

His lips held the chill of morning air, and despite being soft, they were unmoving beneath mine.

I thought of the times he’d come to me as Tyr to give me food. To dress my wounds. To cover me in blankets. I breathed in through my nose and exhaled into his mouth, pushing my need for him into his lungs. I thought of the lapis-blue color dancing in his scales, the color that matched my own Drae. I thought of the secret gratified emotion as a wisp of power and breathed it into him.

I broke the kiss to let him exhale, but then covered his lips again.

Irdelron had beaten him with a whip dipped in Phaetyn blood when he didn’t kill me in the fields. My kiss, my will, had healed him then. I would do it again.

I pushed my healing energy into him, and as I did, my mind’s eye noticed a strange presence within him. I searched deeper, flinging out my Phaetyn senses like nets. There were golden droplets through Tyrrik’s body. There was light where there should only be dark. The gold was poisoning him, and I knew only one thing could poison a Drae—the spikes were coated with Phaetyn blood—Tyrrik was dying.

I systematically moved through his body, using my Phaetyn ability to sear away the gold drops. I worked, losing track of all time, until I eventually came to his heart. My lips quivered where they were pressed to his. His heart was covered in a golden film as though the droplets had converged there and grown into the organ like roots. I thought of my heart pumping blood through my body, the loud pounding in my chest, the roaring in my ears. I thought of my power in him and willed the healing force I barely understood to fill him, to replace what he’d lost all over the slick ground beneath us. I pushed the green energy into him, surrounded the film around his heart with the vibrant intensity, and squeezed the Phaetyn power as if it were the shell of a nut. The golden roots fractured and fizzled, loosening their grip as they broke into pieces.

With a gasp, I broke the kiss, my head spinning. Tyrrik’s head lolled to one side again.

Blinking to clear my vision, I listened to his thin heartbeat and willed it to match mine. He exhaled again, this time more breath than the last, and I could feel his heart beating against my palm.

Whatever Phaetyn reserves were within me, they were seriously depleted. I was scraping at the barrel, but I knew if one drop of the gold barrier stayed, Tyrrik was dead.

Steadying myself, I gently brought his head back to the center and sealed our lips again. Envisioning the blue flame deep within my core, I stoked the power of my Phaetyn energy and pushed, no gushed, this force into Tyrrik, bathing him inside and out with my healing force. Tyrrik was Drae, dark and warm like night; his heart had to reflect this. A sharp pain stabbed at my temples, but I doubled my efforts as I saw the golden beads dissolving and even held fast when Tyrrik arched off the ground. I burned away everything, every single piece of poisonous gold, until everything was dark and warm once more.

I slumped against Tyrrik. The sun beat down on us, and the cool mountain air had warmed at some point. I’d faded out, exhausted by the expenditure of energy. I huddled against Tyrrik, tears slipping down my cheeks into his clothing. How had that happened so fast? One moment we’d been flying, and the next, Tyrrik was nearly dead. I should have listened to him and not looked. I hadn’t known that seeing what those women did would snap me out of my Drae form. Had Tyrrik realized? Why didn’t he just tell me the risk?

The wound was still there but much smaller and no longer a hole all the way through him. The lesion still oozed blood but at a much slower pace.

I could barely keep my eyes open, and the thought of willing anything seemed insurmountable. But he wasn’t even conscious, and he was still bleeding. My mind raced for another option. I discarded trying more tears on the wound because there was something stronger . . . King Irdelron drank Phaetyn blood from his golden vial.

I picked up a stone, breaking the brittle shard so one side had a sharp edge. I sliced the rock through the meat of my palm and stared as blue-tinged blood dripped out. I pushed the gash to his chest, mixing our blood. His confidence that I couldn’t hurt him better be right. I waited, staring at the wound, hoping for a miracle. Was he getting better? The wound seemed smaller. I looked at my palm and swore. My palm had healed; Tyrrik had not.

I cut my palm deeper this time, squeezing the blood into his wound. My heart pounded in my ears as my blood oozed, and I dripped it into the deep erosion. I wiped at his blood with the bottom edge of my aketon, trying to see if anything was helping. I sobbed as the width and depth of the lesion waned. The tissue fused, the terrible, punctured injury melding together.

I swallowed the lump at the back of my throat. Tyrrik was still out of it, and he’d lost so much blood. How much blood could a Drae lose and still live?

I didn’t stop until Tyrrik’s skin had knit together into a pale line. I sagged against him, head pounding, vision blurry. Wavering, I lay my head on his chest, concentrating, and hiccupped again when I heard his heartbeat. The rate was steady but slow. His respirations weren’t wet anymore, and although they were slow, his breaths were deeper.

My lips trembled, and I heaved a sigh. Not dead. I closed my eyes and whispered, “Please be okay.”