Ansel doesn’t like it. “Do you feel all right?”
Rowan shoots him a look. “I feel fine. My magic is just a little thicker.”
“Have you been checked for Gemling Disease?”
“I’m not sick,” Rowan insists.
“It’s fatal unless treated,” Ansel says to me. “You might want to have your mate looked at.”
“Would you stop?” Rowan snaps. “I’m fine. It’s been like this since I learned how to draw it in college.”
Like a dog on a bone, Ansel says, “Maybe you’ve had Gemling Disease since college.”
“It will kill you in a year,” Rowan argues. “It’s been ten. It’s not that.”
Ansel peers into the tray. “If this is normal, your magic is very odd.”
“It’s not completely normal.” Rowan meets my eyes. “Now it shimmers.”
“It’s the wrong color,” Ansel says. “Why is it purple?”
“It’s not purple. It’s blue.”
“It’s the purplest blue I’ve ever seen.”
“Probably because of the pixie dust.”
“All that gold should make it green.”
“You’re getting distracted,” Rowan says, growing frustrated. “We need to figure out how to separate Kit’s magic from mine, not discuss color theory.”
Ansel lets out a mirthless laugh. “You’re not separating that. I don’t know what a usual shifter bond looks like, but it couldn’t be any more permanent than what I’m seeing here.”
“Could we filter out Kit’s magic somehow?” Rowan ponders.
“You mean like dialysis, but for magic?”
“What’s dialysis?” I ask.
“Human medical thing,” Ansel says. “When their kidneys fail, they hook them up to a machine that filters their blood—cleans it, basically. My great uncle had to do it.”
“What do you think?” Rowan asks. “Is there some way we could tackle it like that?”
Ansel scrunches his nose as he thinks. “Normal mage magic? We might be able to come up with something. Your sticky-as-tar magic? Not a chance. Even if we managed to accomplish it, it’s so thick, we’d probably end up filtering out vital components, and who knows what that might do to you.”
I stay quiet while they discuss it, feeling ill. Is Rowan sick? Surely he would know—and if he is,surelyhe would tell me.
As I stand here, my phone begins vibrating in my pocket.
It’s another call with Vermont’s area code, maybe Russell again. I let the phone call go to voicemail. A minute later, my phone pings with a message notification. As Rowan and Ansel argue, I bring it to my ear.
“Kit, listen,” Russell says urgently when I click it. “It’s about your magic. I have something I need to tell?—”
I delete it and then block the number.
“Anything important?” Rowan asks, noticing the look on my face.
I shake my head, not wanting to interrupt their discussion.
