Total pages in book: 93
Estimated words: 88265 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 441(@200wpm)___ 353(@250wpm)___ 294(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 88265 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 441(@200wpm)___ 353(@250wpm)___ 294(@300wpm)
My chest swells at the fact that Elsie is defending me, but I won’t allow her to fight my wars, especially not with my family.
“They’re victims of the slave trade,” I say. “I’ll go into the details later. For now, I have to take care of Elsie. She’s injured.”
“What about them?” my father calls, gesticulating at the humans as I turn for the archway.
“Put them up in the empty quarters. Mother will send them back to Earth when she’s recovered enough.”
“You know any contact with Earth is forbidden,” he says through gritted teeth. “Opening a portal there even more so.”
“We’ll have to find a way around it.”
I don’t wait for my father’s reply. I make it back to my quarters in record time, tapping into Kian’s mind on the way. Usually, I don’t let my brother anywhere near my thoughts, but the situation calls for desperate measures.
Kian acknowledges my request immediately. Once he’s taken note of what I need, I close off my mind, making sure he can’t use the opportunity to dig deeper into my head.
Inside my quarters, I make quick work of stripping Elsie and inspecting her injuries. Through it all, she doesn’t say a word, which is very unlike her.
“Does it hurt?” Cupping her face, I ask, “How do you feel?”
Her chuckle is meek. “Terrible, actually. It feels as if my head is going to explode. I think I have a concussion.”
I don’t know what that word means, but she definitely has a head injury. She sucks in air through her teeth when, after gently parting her hair, I accidentally touch a big bruise on the back of her head. My fury ignites in a flash again. It’s a good thing the Phaelix who did this to her is dead, or I would’ve taken great pleasure in torturing him to his last breath.
“I think I’m going to be sick,” she says, sounding as miserable as she looks.
“Dragons, Elsie.” Anguish follows hot on the heels of my rage. “Hold on, my sweet.” I lift her into my arms and carry her to the cleansing room. “Vitai is on his way.”
“Remind me to never take on a gang of Phaelix again.”
Stopping dead, I narrow my eyes. “What did you say?”
“They were going to rape Alexa.” She rubs her temples. “I had to do something.”
“What exactly did that something entail?” I ask with equal amounts of anger and dread. How dare she put herself in such a vulnerable position?
“I sent a swarm of prawns to, um…” She clears her throat. “To get rid of the Phaelix.”
I frown. “Prawns?”
“Huge, orange-brown insects with mean pinchers and hairy back legs. Unfortunately, when I sent them away after clearing the area, I didn’t know that the Phaelix live in treehouses and will jump on me from the sky.”
I grind my teeth together so hard I feel the crunch in my jaw. “If you ever do anything so dangerous again—”
“I should’ve kept the prawns around.” She rolls her eyes. “Yes, I know. It was stupid to let them go immediately. In my defense, I’m new to all this fighting.”
I’m having a hard time keeping my voice even and not showing her just how much I’m fuming inside. “You’re not listening to me, Elsie. You’ll never—”
“Don’t worry. I can’t try something like that again even if I wanted to. My power is gone. It seems the Phaelix who hit me destroyed it when he gave me the blow on the head.”
The scenarios she’s describing are enough to drive me to madness. It’s difficult to cling to reason through the haze of red that invades my vision.
“I’m kind of sad about it,” she says in a small voice. “I mean, about having lost my power. It was cool.”
Just like that, my anger vanishes, and my heart softens. A need to soothe her compels me to say, “Maybe it’s temporary.”
“Have you seen Betty?” she asks with sudden alarm.
I grit my teeth and remind myself that the priority is healing her.
“Aruan?” she says when I continue on my way to the cleansing room.
“No,” I say through a clenched jaw.
She searches my eyes as I climb down the steps and lower us into the water. “You’re still angry.”
Angry doesn’t come close to describing what I’m feeling. I sit down on the reclining bench, bend my knees, and settle her between my legs. “Lean back. I’ll take care of you.”
She does so reluctantly and gasps when the water washes over the back of her head.
“Sore?” I ask, gently scooping water over her wound.
“It burns like a bitch,” she hisses.
Holding her in my arms has a profound calming effect on me. As the knowledge that she’s safe takes root, the anger and tension flow from my muscles, aided by the salts I added into the water.
I even manage a smile as she tilts her head back and gazes up at me.