A glimmer of pity flashed over Zadok’s face before he could school it. He said nothing, instead he focused on assessing every inch of my mate, flinching whenever I couldn’t restrain the warning growl in my throat. He checked his eyes, wavering at their striking sapphire blue color before switching to his chest, listening for any abnormal sounds. I bit the inside of my cheek as he examined his stomach, his probing fingers pausing below his ribs.

His brows creased. “May I lift his shirt?”

I nodded, but as soon as he did, my blood ran ice cold.

The reaper’s wound was no longer pink and healing as it had been only that morning when I’d removed the dressings. It was raw and festering, oozing yellow pus around the edges. How had I missed that rotten scent?

“Who did this?” Zadok rumbled, the snarl accompanying his words sounding unnatural in his tranquil voice.

“Reapers,” I answered mindlessly. “I—I don’t understand. The wound was healing. It didn’t look like that this morning, so why is it⁠—”

“Their weapon was poisoned,” he said, cold anger radiating from every word. “It must have had delayed properties. Whoever hired them wanted the poor boy to suffer. I’ll have to draw it out with magic, but you’ll need to control yourself. I can’t concentrate if I’m worrying over whether you’ll attack.”

My jaw clenched, and I wrapped both my hands around one of Luca’s, giving him a grounding squeeze before nodding my assent. I would bear the urge to rip out his throat. Only because I had just enough coherency to justify that his intentions were pure. That he was doing what I could not and saving him.

Zadok lowered his palms to an inch above the wound before closing his eyes and taking a deep breath. He began chanting, a quick flow of words I had never heard. The purple light returned, filling the space between them. The rotting flesh around the cut slowly knitted itself back together, black webs crawling up Zadok’s forearms and disappearing under his shirt. He was absorbing the poison into himself, taking my mate’s suffering, and that knowledge had the tension in my frame easing and my grip slackening.

Except, before the gash had the chance to heal completely, Zadok stopped with a gasp, a look of grave realization on his face.

His arms dropped to his sides like limp weights.

“Why are you stopping?” I implored. “He is almost healed, why⁠—”

“I recognize this poison…” His voice was barely above a whisper, almost emotionless. His gaze was distant. “It belongs to the king.”

My gaze snapped to him, eyes narrowing. “What?”

“This was your father.”