“He’s been moved?” I asked, as we continued on. “Why?”
“Elementals need a heat source to survive. We suspect the shadowed room could have been the reason for his failure to improve.”
Tao was a werewolf rather than an elemental, but it was possible that consuming the elemental had changed his physiology enough that the lack of sunlight would affect him. “So the new room is sunnier?”
“Yes.” She stopped at a doorway near the far end of the hall and motioned me to enter.
I took a deep breath, fearing what I might find, then stepped inside the small, sunlit room. Tao lay on a bed in the middle of the room, his lower body covered by a sheet—more for modesty, I suspected, than any real need for a cover. Even from here I could feel the heat radiating off him.
Ilianna sat in a chair beside the bed and did something of a double take as I entered. Dark smudges dulled her green eyes and her normally lustrous blond mane hung limp and lifeless.
I frowned. “You really need to go home and get some rest.”
“I will. Soon.” She half shrugged, but the worried look in her eyes said “soon” wasn’t going to be anytime in the near future. It also suggested that nothing I could do or say would move her, and I couldn’t use force in a place like this. The building—or the magic that guarded it—would not appreciate it.
Not that that would stop me from trying if it came down to it. The last thing I wanted was her falling sick, as well.
She scanned me from head to toe. “The new hairdo is startling, but I’m thinking there’s something a little more than the need for a change behind it.”
“Someone sent demon bloodhounds after us. Azriel thinks this will throw them off the track for the moment.”
“Let’s hope he’s right.”
He usually was. Annoyingly so. “How is Tao today?” He actually looked a little better. His face—although covered in a wiry brown beard that was growing thicker by the day—had lost some of its gauntness, and his breathing was less labored.
“He’s doing okay,” she replied, touching his hand lightly. “We actually managed to get a decent amount of gruel into him today and he kept it down.”
The so-called gruel they were feeding him was a revolting mess of herbs, vitamins, protein, and carbs, designed to bolster his body and strength. Up until recently he hadn’t been able to keep much of it down and I can’t say that I was entirely surprised. If there was any spark of consciousness inside him, he sure as hell wouldn’t have been happy about being force-fed the smelly muck.
But at least he did have some basic motor capabilities. If he’d required intravenous feeding, then he would have landed in hospital. The Brindle witches weren’t legally allowed to perform that sort of procedure, even if some of them knew more about the body and medicines than many fully trained professionals.>Azriel caught my arm and steadied me. “Does it always affect you like that?”
“It’s usually worse.” I shrugged, locked my knees in place, then gently pulled away from the strength of his touch. “I’m told it gets easier with use, but I just don’t use it often enough.”
“So it will become easier as the weeks pass?”
“I don’t really know.” I eyed him for a moment. “Do you really think I’ll need to hold it that long?”
“Until we know who is behind the attack—and why—then, yes, I think it very likely.”
“Fabulous.” Not. I ran a hand through my hair—my now short hair. It was an almost surreal sensation, but one I’d have to get used to on a semipermanent basis, apparently. “Will changing my hair work if I’m still riding the same bike and working in the same place?”
“As I said, the Ania are precise hunters. A motorbike is not a unique object, and it could be anyone under the helmet. Sending them after a particular facial image is far safer.” He shrugged. “But we’ll know soon enough.”
I grimaced. “Hopefully, Jak will come up with something interesting tomorrow, because I really don’t want to be sitting around waiting for either my father to contact me or to be attacked.”
“We have little other choice.” Frustration briefly edged his voice. “Where do you go now? To the café?”
I shook my head. “I’m not scheduled until tonight. I thought I’d go see how Tao is faring.”
“He still lives.”
I grimaced. “Being in a semi-coma and living a fully functioning life are two very different things.”
And right now, Tao was still doing the former rather than the latter. He could swallow food and water, but there was little response to stimuli, and no sense that he was aware of our presence. No one knew when—or if—he was ever going to come out of it. Even the witches at the Brindle—the place that was now the home of all witch knowledge, ancient or new—could find no mention of anyone ever consuming a fire elemental before Tao had done precisely that—and there was no spell or potion to reverse what had been done. We were all playing the waiting game and hoping like hell that he’d come back to us.
“The witches do not appreciate my presence in their sacred place, so I shall meet you there but will wait outside.” He winked out of existence, but wasn’t entirely gone, because he added, “The black hair is truly stunning, but your natural color is more beautiful.”
Then the heat of his presence faded completely, leaving me grinning like an idiot. An obviously insane idiot, because Azriel and I were about as viable as Lucian and I when it came to anything resembling a relationship. But at least I could enjoy sex with Lucian.