This is what a dragon looks like when he stops pretending to be human.
“Regina.”
His voice cuts through my daze. I blink, focus.
“The blue vial on the third shelf. Bring it here, please.”
I move. It’s easier than thinking.
The vial is cool against my palm, filled with liquid that seems to glow faintly from within. I bring it to Villeneuve, who takes it without looking away from the poultice he’s preparing. Considering he can clearly command anything in this room without lifting a finger, I’m pretty sure he just wants to distract me rather than actually needing help, but I appreciate the gesture.
“Hold his head steady,” he instructs. “The incantation will require him to remain still.”
I position myself at Killian’s head, my hands sinking into the fur of his neck. He’s so still. Too still. I can barely feel his heartbeat through the bond anymore.
Villeneuve applies the poultice to the deepest wound on Killian’s side and begins to chant.
The words aren’t in any language I recognize. They’reold. Older than Latin, older than any human tongue. They make the air vibrate, make the flames in the fireplace flare green. Something deep in my bones resonates in response.
Alchemy.
If he’s an alchemist, that explains how he can use magic despite being a shifter. Dragons must have a natural affinity for energy manipulation that other shifters lack.
The education I’ve received is in witchcraft, but I’ve always had a casual interest in alchemy. Never enough to study seriously, but enough to recognize the principles at work here.
Transformation. Neither creation nor destruction, but the fundamental changing of one thing into another.
As I watch him work, it becomes apparent this alchemy is his native tongue. Not witchcraft. And yet, he’s learned to approximate it so closely even an expert wouldn’t know the difference.
Not unless they had reason to suspect.
Under Villeneuve’s hands, Killian’s wounds begin to close.
The deep gash across his ribs knits together, new tissue forming where there was only torn flesh moments ago. The punctures from the werewolf’s claws seal over. Even the smaller cuts and scrapes start to fade, fur growing back over fresh pink skin.
But the bite on his shoulder stays the same.
“The other wounds are healing,” Sean says, his voice rough. I look at him properly for the first time since we arrived, and my stomach drops.
His eye is worse in human form. So much worse. It’s not just swollen shut, the whole left side of his face is a ruin of torn flesh and dried blood. I can’t even see the eye itself beneath the damage.
He’s going to lose it. I know that with sudden, horrible certainty. That eye isgone. It’s worse than what happened to mine, even if the rest of the damage isn’t nearly as extensive.
But Sean doesn’t seem to care or even notice. He’s watching Killian with single-minded intensity, like if he just stares hard enough, he can will the other alpha to survive.
“Even alchemy has its limits,” Villeneuve says without pausing his work. “This werewolf was not like the others. It was reanimated with dark magic. That makes its bite… unique.”
“Reanimated?” Rowan echoes. “You mean like?—”
“Necromancy,” I whisper.
Theforbidden art. The magic that was outlawed centuries ago because of what it did to the practitioners, to the reanimated, to the very fabric of reality.
“Kyle doesn’t have that kind of power,” I say. “He’s strong, but he’s not…”
“Which confirms my suspicion that someone powerful is assisting the coven,” Villeneuve agrees. “But that mystery will have to wait for another day.”
His hands move over Killian’s body, the chanting continuing in a low, steady rhythm. The wounds keep closing, but that bite mark stays stubbornly unchanged.
