I hissed low, curling over my hand. Through the cloud of pain, however, I noted her unease.

“Then do it,” Smolder snapped. “Teach the bitch her place while you’re at it.”

Whoosh.

She was gone.

“That was foolish.” The healer crossed to a drawer. He extracted a tube and squeezed a liberal amount of whatever it was onto my hand. Without asking.

I still sighed as a soothing cool replaced the burn that really had seemed to be spreading through my body. “Thanks.”

“Don’t thank me. I don’t like unclear results.”

“I thought healers valued the wellbeing of those around them.”

He closed the drawer and returned to dress my wound. “And so I do. In the grand scheme of things. Inflicting pain now for the later and greater good is a noble calling. One only I hear.”

Oh, gross. The guy was a total narcissist. “Good to know.”

Conversation was at an end aside from the string of muttered orders from the healing elemental. A line was inserted, and I watched as blood left my body to fill the clear bag. I made sure to note the volume of blood he took via the markings on the bag.

He didn’t take a drop more than we’d agreed upon. I’d give him that. And he wouldn’t be able to take more for a month.

Electrodes were placed on my chest and head, and a pressure cuff around my arm. He measured my pulse, and then ordered me to perform a series of physical exercises.

“I usually just walk, so I could do better if I trained. Just so you know.” I puffed, hands on my knees as I finished stepping on and off a low box.

The healer didn’t answer, jotting times and readings on the clipboard.

“What’s all this for?” I asked, wiping sweat off my brow.

“Baseline.”

Cool. That cleared everything up.

He jotted something else on his clipboard. “I’ll need to take a skin biopsy. The shoulder will suffice. I will ensure there is no scar.”

“That’s in the contract,” I replied. “Sure.”

The healer left to search the drawers on the opposite side of the lab. While he dug around in the bottom cupboards, I leaned over to peek at the clipboard he’d left resting on the bench. The paper on top detailed his scrawlings from today, but a stack of papers was pinned under the metal spring bar along the top.

A big stack of papers.

I grabbed the clipboard and flipped through. A whole bunch of medical jargon swirled up at me, but one phrase was repeated through the next five papers.

Stress test.

“Are you done?” the healer asked tightly.

I beamed. “I can’t say I’m happy about the amount of stress in my future.”

His expression shuttered, which seemed to confirm that the phrase stress test could be exchanged for the word torture.

“Just so you know,” I said. “The power of Venus’s line responds to warm fuzzies, not… whatever stress you’ve got in mind.”

“You know everything about her power?” His voice was snide. The guy didn’t like me telling him how to experiment?

If that was the case, I might keep doing it for a cheap thrill.