I push it wider. “Professor? I need to talk to you about last?—”
The words die in my throat.
Villeneuve is on the floor.
He’s collapsed against his desk, one arm thrown over the edge like he tried to catch himself and failed. His usually immaculate suit jacket is bunched under his shoulder, and his face?—
His face is gray. Ashen, actually. Blood trickles from the corner of his mouth, dark against his pale skin.
“Shit.” I’m across the room before I can think, dropping to my knees beside him. “Professor. Hey. Can you hear me?”
His eyes flutter open. Dark, but unfocused. It takes him a moment to register my presence, and when he does, irritation crosses his features.
“Ms. Cook.” His voice is barely a rasp. “Your timing is... inconvenient.”
“You’re right,” I say flatly. “I definitely should have waited until youfullypassed out or died from whatever this is.”
“Your sarcasm is noted.”
I sigh. “What do you need?”
He tries to speak, but another cough wracks his frame.
More blood.Waytoo much blood.
“Desk,” he manages. “Bottom drawer. Case. Vials.”
I don’t ask questions. I scramble to my feet and yank open the drawer he indicated. Inside, there’s a small wooden case as ornate as it is old. I flip it open and find a row of glass vials nestled in velvet, each filled with a thick crimson liquid.
Just like the vial I caught him drinking out of before.
I grab one and rush back to him.
“Here.” I press it into his hand, but his fingers are shaking too badly to grip it properly. “Let me?—”
I uncork the vial myself and bring it to his lips. His hand closes around my wrist and I jolt as his fingertips bite into my skin. He drinks and the motion is desperate in a way I’ve never seen from him before, hungry and raw.
When the vial is empty, he slumps back against the desk. His breathing is still ragged, his hair falling across his forehead, but some color is returning to his face. The gray pallor fades to a shade closer to human.
I sit back on my heels and watch him, my heart in my throat.
“I’ve seen you take this before,” I say quietly. “After class one day a few weeks ago. I thought—” I stop. I didn’t know what I thought. Drug habit? Magical vice? “What’s wrong with you? Are you sick?”
Villeneuve’s eyes are closed. He doesn’t answer.
“Is this some kind of drug?” I press.
Still nothing.
“Hey.” I grab his arm. Even through his sleeve, he feels unnaturally cold, and something tells me that’s not normal for a creature who literally breathes fire. “Don’t do that. Don’t shut me out.”
His eyes open, a flash of his usual coldness within them. “It’s none of your concern.”
“Bullshit.” The word comes out sharper than I intend. “You forced your way into my bond. You wove yourself into my soul without my permission, and now you’re lying on the floor bleeding from your mouth. You don’t get to tell me it’s not my concern.”
He stares at me in that infuriating silence.
“You care,” he says. Like it’s a revelation and the concept is utterly foreign to him.
