“Overnight. How do you feel?”
“That doesn’t matter—”
“Let me rephrase,” he drawled, icily dry. “We made it to my family’s fortress, but during our escape you were shot at, drugged, and exposed to weather conditions no human or lion would normally survive. Sometime in the next few days, we are likely to find ourselves under attack by enemies who will not hesitate to kill us at best or sacrifice our inner animals to an ancient shifter demon-god and then kill us, at worst. This demon-god, if freed from his prison, will wreak devastation on the world outside unlike anything seen in half a millennium.”
“Fine. I feel like shit.” She pulled her injured arm close to her chest. The movement sent the smell of blood into the air, which was—frustrating.
Painful.
She rubbed her face. “Whatever Elly did to us—”
And she was still calling herElly.Still thinking of her as Elly. As her friend.
She forced herself to look down, following the scent of blood burning in her nostrils. White bandages covered her upper arm. She tore them away, ignoring Julian’s hiss of disapproval.
It must have started healing already, she reasoned with herself. That would be why it looked like that, the broken flesh half-grown over already. It must have looked much worse whenit first happened. What happened? She remembered gunfire ripping through…
The world lurched. She sagged and bent over sharply, catching herself on the edge of the bed and lowering herself to the ground. Mostly under control.
Half-controlled.
Possibly.
“What are you doing? Are you all right?” Julian was by her side, the beautiful fabric pooling around him like a waterfall of stars. Francine gritted her teeth.
“I am attempting not to faint. I’ve never—” Admitting it was worse than the pain. Almost. “I’ve never been hurt like this before.”
Silence, long enough for her to reflect that she’d just complained of a single gunshot wound in an extremity to a man who’d only days ago flown through an explosion that had ripped his wings and half his hide to shreds. Her stomach roiled.
“Francine.”
Julian’s voice was gentler than she deserved.
“Why am I naked?” she asked, rough sandpaper to his softness.
“Your clothes were soaked through. And evening gowns aren’t appropriate cold-weather gear.”
“Having no clothes at all is better?”
“I wouldn’t dare choose an outfit for you.” His smile was as thin as a paper cut. “You can choose your own. Generations of shadow dragon couture await your judgment. But first—”
Something flashed behind his eyes. She searched for his dragon, thinking if she could see it, she might be able to tell how injured it still was, how much more hurt it was as a result of her failure on the ship—but he was very good at keeping it hidden. Whatever she had seen was all human.
“First what?” she demanded.
“Come with me.” His hand was at her elbow, and she burned with a sudden renewed awareness of her nakedness. “There is a bathing room next door. You can wash, and the steam will help you heal faster.”
Francine didn’t see how steam would help her heal any faster, but she soon discovered that when Julian said she could wash, he meant he would be the one washing her.
The bathing room was large and airy; if Julian hadn’t told her they were underground, she would have expected the high fluted ceiling to be open to the elements, and the stone walls, carved into intricate fretwork, to let in a cooling breeze.
There was a breeze. Some hidden ventilation system kept the air moving around the room and drew away the steam so that it only hung in the air, instead of filling it like a sauna.
The bath was more like a pool, luxuriously large and inset into the marble floor, apparently carved from the same single block. Julian had called the whole fortress an enchantment—was this all created by magic? How else would they import marble to the south pole?
All her questions flew from her head as Francine stepped into the pool. The water was gaspingly hot. She sank into it, holding her breath, then let it out in a shivering sigh.
Julian joined her. She realized as he dropped the midnight robe that it had only been loosely wrapped around his body; he must have thrown it on, barely bothering to do up the ties. Before or after he had put her in bed to recover?
