“Good lord, Ian!”
“Matthieu was uninjured,” Ian said in a small voice.
Geoffrey came to his side and squeezed his hand. “But you?”
Ian closed his eyes. Sorrow resonated in Matthieu’s chest, and he knew it came from Geoffrey, who lowered his gaze and slotted himself against Ian’s chest.
The two of them were a united force, beautiful even in their sorrow. Matthieu watched, feeling small and culpable for their misery, even though he hadn’t meant it.
“What happened?” Geoffrey asked in a whisper after a long while spent pressed to Ian. “It was your leg, wasn’t it?”
“It was.”
“Ian…”
Ian withdrew from Geoffrey. For a pained moment, he did nothing, then, hesitantly, he lifted his pant leg. The limb beneath was no longer charred to little more than exposed muscle and bone, but the skin that Ian had regenerated was scarred and uneven—too thin in some places, then too coarse and discolored in others.
Geoffrey’s lips tightened, but through their bond, Matthieu felt him silently scream. Without a word, Geoffrey dropped to his knees and touched a hand to Ian’s leg. A dull glow pulsed around his hand, then enveloped Ian’s wounded calf.
“Beloved,” Ian murmured in gentle protest, but Geoffrey didn’t stop. The pain in his heart was too great.
“I don’t have much magic,” Geoffrey admitted, “but what I do have, I will give it all to you.”
“It won’t be enough.”
“Then let me call my brother.” The glow around Geoffrey’s hand faltered, like a flickering lightbulb ready to give up the fight. A void swept through Matthieu’s mate bond with Geoffrey, and with a start, he realized what it was—magic. Or, rather, the lack thereof.
It wasn’t the first time he’d felt it, and now that he knew what it was, he would never mistake it again.
Ian’s recovering leg looked improved, but his skin still wasn’t quite right.
“And how would you explain all of this to him?” Ian asked. “Not only would you be asking him to assist the enemy, but when he arrives and inevitably checks in on how his little experiment is going, he’ll discover that Matthieu smells like family, and he’ll know what we’ve done.”
“I don’t care.”
“I do.” Ian returned his pant leg to where it belonged and took Geoffrey’s hand in his own. “Geoffrey, what we’re dealing with now is serious.”
Geoffrey grimaced. “And your leg isn’t?”
“No. It’s not.” Ian offered him a weak smile, but it did little to put Geoffrey, or Matthieu, at ease. “What I was trying to say before Lucian interrupted was this: you were taken from the Pedigree for a reason.”
“Oui.For the experiment.” Matthieu looked Ian in the eyes, trying to understand Ian’s point. “And, as the experiment stipulates, I have been mated. It worked.”
“It’s not that simple.” All of the sunshine in Ian’s expression extinguished itself, and Matthieu’s mood sunk. “You were taken from the Pedigree to be mated to a Topaz dragon—as far as the records are concerned, you are Topaz property.Myproperty.”
“And now you’re mated to an Amethyst dragon,” Geoffrey uttered. He looked away. “A dragon who, in the eyes of anyone outside our situation, never should have touched you in a sexual manner to begin with.”
“A dragon from an influential family who is at odds with the Topaz clan,” Ian added, worried. “And who holds tremendous power within the council.”
“What are you saying?” Matthieu asked, even though he thought he might know.
Ian grimaced, and what he said next confirmed Matthieu’s greatest fear. “What I’m saying is, if we don’t find a way to spin this in our favor, what happened to my leg will look like nothing compared to what will happen to all three of us.”
“And, perhaps, to our clans,” Geoffrey said in a small voice.
All of it jumbled in Matthieu’s head, impossible to untangle. He looked first at Geoffrey, who appeared more miserable than ever, then at Ian, who did his best to seem composed, but who failed by the slightest degree. “Then what you’re saying is…”
Ian looked up and met Matthieu’s eyes. “We very well may have started a war.”
