Chapter 14

When someone asks you if you do any dangerous sports, saying ‘sometimes I disagree with my woman’ is not a good answer. At least not if your woman is in the room with you.

-Note to self

Nikolai

His eyes flared, but he didn’t look alarmed.

He looked reserved.

Almost expectant.

And…defeated.

I looked over at my brother to see him holding his sword in his hand, flexing and un-flexing his hands as he did so.

Merrick’s eyes didn’t miss that, either.

In fact, they followed the movements.

Hope flared in his eyes.

He wanted us to kill him…why?

Then I started to look at him.

He hadn’t been hooked up to a heart monitor since the first couple of days we’d had him here…and those he’d spent unconscious.

As soon as he’d woken up, he’d been taken off everything but the IV that was still running antibiotics through his veins…antibiotics that he shouldn’t need.

Because he was a bonded dragon rider.

Everyone who was a bonded dragon rider had powers, and Merrick wouldn’t have them if he wasn’t bonded to one.

But…where was his dragon?

Why, in the time that he’d been with us, had neither my brother, nor I, thought of that?

“Hook his heartbeat up to the monitor,” I ordered my mate.

She did, taking three sticky pads from a drawer beside the bed, and placing them on Merrick’s chest before hooking up some wires from the monitor to them.

The moment the wires were in place, I got a good look at Merrick’s racing heartbeat.

And by racing, I mean, it was flying. It was way too fast.

“Keifer,” I said to my brother. “Where’s Merrick’s dragon?”

Keifer’s brows furrowed, and then his eyes widened.

Merrick’s heartbeat picked up once more.

And something like pleading came into his eyes.

“That would’ve normally been one of the first things I would’ve asked…,” Keifer trailed off, and his brows furrowed.

Merrick’s eyes closed in relief, and I finally understood.

He couldn’t talk about it. Not just about who he was and whom he worked for, but about everything.

“Get Ian in here,” I ordered.

I’d known that the majority of the men were behind us.

All but Ian, anyway.

I heard, more than saw, Alaric leave.

He walked with heavy footsteps compared to everyone else.

Maybe it was because his feet were bigger than everyone else’s. Hell, I didn’t know. But I always knew when it was him coming.

“Everyone else out,” Keifer ordered gruffly.

The room emptied of everyone except for Blythe, Brooklyn, Keifer and me.

Oh, and the man in the bed who couldn’t move.

He was there to stay.

“Ian can heal him…and search whatever he has in his mind,” Keifer trailed off when he saw the look of pure panic in his eyes.

“We won’t hurt you,” Keifer growled in frustration.

That was a lie.

We would if the end game was near.

Ian’s prodding was coarse at the best of times. He could do healing, as long as it was something on the outside of the body, just fine. The intricate stuff tended to be a little rougher on the person on the receiving end of his gift.

Ian showed up long moments later with the cold clinging to him.

A rush of wind followed in his wake, and I shivered when the cold hit me.

Blythe scooted closer to me to allow Ian to pass her, and she stayed when we watched in horror as Ian slapped his hand down on Merrick’s chest, and then proceeded to exorcise him.

Or, at least, that was what it looked like.

Merrick’s body bowed up off the hospital bed like his chest was connected to a string.

“How much do you want healed?” Ian growled.

Keifer looked at Merrick with dispassionate eyes.

“Just enough to see what’s going on in his head. Then we’ll see about healing him completely once we know more of why he’s done what he’s done,” Keifer ordered.

Those were the words of a true leader.

It was more than obvious that Blythe was surprised by the callousness as was Brooklyn, though, they were both trying to hide it.

I knew my woman, though.

Knew what she looked like body-wise when she was pissed, and man, was she pissed.

Ian rocked back on his feet long moments later and Merrick’s body fell onto the bed with a hard thud.

My body tensed at remembering all the injuries he had, but the harder I looked at the man, the more amazed I became.

I’d known that Ian was a healer. He’d told me himself.

However, I’d never actually seen him do it.

The worst wounds on Merrick’s chest and neck were now lightly pink, showing almost perfect healing.

His breathing was deeper, and his heartbeat was steadier.

“What’d you find?” I asked when Ian never turned around.

The veins on Ian’s arms stood out in stark relief as he fisted his hands.

Then he turned, and the pain in his eyes was obvious.

“You okay?” Brooklyn checked, taking a few steps forward.

Ian held out his hand to stop her.

“Don’t,” he ordered.

She blinked, freezing.

“You’re hurting!”

Blythe stepped forward as well, and it was only then that Keifer and I stopped them before they could move any further forward.

“Ian takes the pain onto himself,” I explained. “And it hurts him to be touched for a while after. Give him a little bit.”

She shrank back at the mere mention of him taking on the pain.

He’d done that for Brooklyn, and she would’ve never let him do it had she known that he was going to have her pain.

That wasn’t right.

And it wasn’t right to ask of him, either.

“What kind of effect does it have on you?” she asked.

His jaw clenched.

“The same thing it would have on the person I take the pain from. Takes about an hour to push out of me,” he answered through gritted teeth.

“What’d you find out?” Keifer asked.

Ian’s eyes narrowed.

“His dragon is being held hostage, as well as about five other people at the same compound Nikolai took Brooklyn from,” Ian said, panting lightly once he was through.

I gasped.

“Who else does he have?” he asked.

His eyes slid away from me, and he gave a look to Keifer that clearly said, ‘Not here.’

I was about to ask what was going on when Merrick’s back bowed again and he started seizing.

“Put him to sleep!” Ian said urgently. “Give him a sedative.”

Blythe ran for the med cart while Brooklyn ran to raise the bed rails on his bed.

It wouldn’t do to have Merrick falling and breaking a bone after he was just healed.

“What’s going on with him?” Blythe asked once she returned with a syringe.

She depressed the plunger and injected the meds into Merrick’s veins via the IV.

Merrick instantly calmed.

“That’s the side effect of using my powers,” Ian said, sounding tired. “Causes seizures and shit.”

I whirled around and glared at Keifer. “You knew this was going to happen?”

Keifer shrugged.

“We weren’t getting anywhere the easy way,” he said unapologetically.

I narrowed my eyes at him, but Ian chose that moment to pass out.

He hit the floor so hard that I was worried he’d broken something.

He’d fallen well, though, his head landing on my feet rather than the concrete floor beneath them.

I crouched down and rolled him over to his back, checking his pulse.

“He’s fine,” Keifer said.

I growled.

“Nikolai,” Brooklyn said through clenched teeth. “If you care for your brother at fucking all, you’ll get him the fuck out of here before I kick his ass.”

I wisely said nothing as to how improbable that was, and grabbed my brother by the collar and started ushering him outside.

Brooklyn

“Fucker,” I muttered under my breath.

“He’s protecting me,” Blythe said softly.

I looked over at her where she was checking Merrick’s blood pressure.

“I don’t really give a fuck,” I said.

She flinched.

“I know it’s harsh,” I said. “But you need to get him under control. He can’t put his people at risk to save you. When’s it going to be too much?” I asked. “What if next time it’s me?”

She didn’t have anything to say to that, and frankly, neither did I.