Page 153 of Enchanted Heir
I shook my head, taking a moment to respond because with Owen’s back to me, it looked like a damn tapestry. Pinks, purples, and reds. The scabbing of the spot that had been split open looked so damn painful too. “No. I’ll bathe later. Once he’s awake.”
The healer scoffed, “You two.”
I squinted at him while he began putting the salve on Owen’s back. “Is this where you admonish me for young love and all that?”
The healer smiled, the first smile I’d seen from him. “No. And Krewan is in his mid-twenties, I assume you are too, so technically it is not young love either. It’s just that you both are completely stubborn about protecting the other. I find it quite refreshing from a personal viewpoint, but extremely frustrating from a medicinal one.”
I smiled back.
He added, “As the healer who took care of his back that came back looking four times as bad as Officer Raikes’s here, I can appreciate your refusal to leave him. Even if you are in my way.”
“Any chance you want to put some of that on Prince Krewan’s back while he sleeps?” I asked.
He shook his head adamantly. “No. The last time I tried that, he almost killed me. I learned my lesson.”
I laughed only because that sounded exactly like something Krew would do. And maybe this healer wasn’t so bad after all.
* * *
Owen and I played cards.At some point, the waiting around for Krew to wake became unbearable. Keir had left for dinner with the king. And Owen had sent for cards to keep me from further losing my mind.
“You ass,” Owen snapped when I laid down my hand again.
I shrugged. “Just got lucky.”
Earlier Keir, Owen, and I had discussed what to tell Krew about Owen and my injuries. We were all afraid the moment he found out, he’d try to kill the king, before his magic was fully back. The healer said in a few days he’d be up and able to attend to his duties like normal, but his magic would take at least a week, maybe more, before he was fully healed.
Normally Owen and Keir would keep things like this from Krew, but with the king acting like his vile self lately, we all felt we needed to tell him right away. Better to come from us than from the king himself.
So when Krew woke, we needed to tell him straight away. Also, I likely had two weeks ahead of me of trying to keep my hands off Krew. A Winter Solstice ball was in there too.
Owen gave his head a shake. “It’s the breasts. They give you luck in cards. That has to be it.”
I glared at him. “False. I have known lots of women with nicer bosoms to be terrible at cards.”
“Nicer bosoms, you say?” Owen asked intrigued.
I laughed, which I wasn’t sure was possible after the night before. I didn’t know what I would do without Owen to get me through these rough situations. And there had been too many rough situations back-to-back recently.
I felt the buzzing and knew that Krew’s magic was slithering along again. This afternoon it had started happening more and more often, an indication that his tonic was wearing off.
This time though, I saw his long eyelashes flutter a bit.
I moved over to the bed, abandoning the cards entirely.
I sat at his feet waiting. Wondering if he was finally coming to.
“Jorah?”
I let out the biggest breath. It felt like it’d been lodged in my lungs since I knew Krew got hurt.
“I’m here,” I said softly. “I’m here.”
He licked his lips. His voice was groggy as he asked, “Then why are you so far away?”
The healer came over, seeing Krew was awake. I smiled at him before telling Krew, “Your magic needs to rebuild and recoup. I cannot touch you, so your magic can keep working.”
“Nonsense,” Krew muttered.
