Page 23 of Hexes & Heartstrings (Shifters of Bastion Keep #2)

Bruin woke to someone screaming. It was guttural and choking, and he couldn't place where it was coming from.

"Change," someone barked.

Fumbling around in the dark to sit up, he felt the bed heave, and something struck him across the chest. He heard a pained snarl.

"Ser!Change!"

Drawing up white light, Bruin's brain stumbled before he remembered the words to his basic charm.

Sun shines

and

Life thrives.

He held an arm high overhead, summoning the smallest amount of light so that he wouldn't be immediately blinded while his eyes adjusted.

And then he nearly lost hold of his charm, his concentration slipping when he saw that Sergiy was the source of the screaming.

His boyfriend was thrashing on the bed, his fingers bent like claws as they dug into his own neck and shoulders.

Russell was kneeling beside him on the bed, and he flipped Sergiy over so that he was on his belly.

The big man had a frown on his face, but he didn't seem worried, despite the aching chaos that Bruin was seeing.

Was it a nightmare? A heart attack? But he was so young. What—

As Bruin watched, not knowing what to do other than call forth white light until a haze developed over his peripheral, he saw Sergiy haltingly shift into his weredrake form.

Immediately upon doing so, his ephemeral wings appeared, flickering, a soft green light that passed through the bed, but still disturbed the air with their movements.

Sergiy's body rocked as they flapped spasmodically, only held in place by dint of Russell's strength.

At last some of the fog of sleep lifted, and Bruin lunged off of the bed, stumbling across the room to where he kept an emergency supply basket on one of Sergiy's dressers.

He might not know the cause, but he could recognize pain when he saw it, and he drew out a moss agate and a sunstone from within as he bounded back to the bed.

"Shh," Russell was saying. He moved to sit on Sergiy's back with his knees pressed up against his sides, pinning the weredrake in place while he pressed his palms into his upper back. "Easy."

Gripping the crystals so tightly it hurt, Bruin funnelled the white light that he'd gathered through their crystalline structures, then put his free hand on the back of Sergiy's head, muttering the words to a pain-dampening charm.

Slowly, slowly, Sergiy's course cries settled into whimpers, and after a last shuddering breath, he collapsed down onto the bed, his wings vanishing.

His hands unclenched, and his tail relaxed.

As Russell lowered himself down to plant a kiss on the back of Sergiy's head, Bruin saw several fresh marks on the big man's back from a lashing tail.

"Okay?" Russell asked.

"Yeah." Sergiy's voice was hoarse, and he seemed to be catching his breath like someone with the flu who had just finished a bout of vomiting.

"It still feels like a pair of ice cold spikes jabbed into my back, but whatever Bruin's doing is helping.

The pain is still there, but it feels like it's shut away in a box. "

Bruin double checked his flows of light. "You shouldn't be feeling even that much. What's wrong? Sergiy, are you okay?"

"I will be fine," he said, closing his eyes.

Russell carefully maneuvered the two of them until he was sitting against the headboard, Sergiy pulled into an embrace. Bruin followed, keeping a glowing hand on Sergiy's snout while Russell began stroking the back of his head.

Sergiy swallowed thickly, then gave him a wan smile as he lifted his head.

"It's just phantom pain," he said. "From my lost wings."

Bruin withheld the urge to throttle his beloved mate at the casual indifference. " Just phantom pain? That didn't look like just anything!"

"It's not usually this severe, or with both wings," he admitted. "Last time it was this bad was, oh, probably shortly after Russ and I broke up."

Russell wrapped his arm more snugly around him in response, rocking him back and forth a few times.

Now that Bruin knew the source of the pain, he worked to adjust his healing flows, trying to push the soothing light down to Sergiy's back, but couldn't feel any real difference. Phantom pain… that was neuralgia, wasn't it? Yeah, he needed to modify his charm.

He took a quick moment to fetch his journal from his witch's bag in the living room, flipping to some careful notes from his time working in a physical therapy center. There. A salve or unguent would be best, but until then, an opal would work in a pinch.

While Bruin harnessed a third gem and wove his white light into more efficient, self-feeding coils, Russell laid Sergiy down on his belly like a dozing gator and then slipped into Sergiy's bathroom.

Bruin heard the sound of the faucet running, and then Russell returned bearing a pair of pills in one hand and water cupped in the other.

Sergiy managed a chuckle as he downed the pills, then lapped up the water from Russell's hand.

Russell poked him in the shoulder when he was done. "Ser."

Sergiy started to adjust his own position on the bed, but stopped abruptly with a wince, and Bruin felt a spike in his mate's pain. After staring at the pillows for a long moment, he twitched a hand at Russell.

"Alright, go get my dad," he said begrudgingly. "And I'll probably need to tell my siblings, too, so they can manage the troops today."

Russell patted him on the cheek, at last showing relief on his face, then went to do just that—but not before finding and tossing underwear at both of them.

By the time Bruin had donned his boxers and slipped a tail-accessible jockstrap up his mate's legs, he'd gotten his charm functioning as efficiently as he could make it. Setting the gemstones aside, he laid beside his lover and stroked his head.

"Is there anything I can do?"

"Just keep doing what you're doing with your hand," Sergiy murmured into the bed. "It helps take my mind off of it."

Bruin was more than happy to oblige, as it gave him something to do.

"So… phantom pain, huh?"

Sergiy grunted. "Yeah. Been having it ever since I had the surgery to remove the undeveloped wings. I don't get it very frequently. A twinge every few months, maybe."

"But sometimes something like this? Oh, Sergiy."

"It's just pain," he said, trying to be dismissive, but not quite succeeding with his strained voice. "It's not like it's a real injury."

"Sergiy, between growing up with a cousin that was a recovering alcoholic and my time spent practicing charms in a physical therapy center, I've seen firsthand how debilitating neuropathic pain is. I'm the wrong person to be feeding that kind of bullshit too."

"Sorry, I didn't mean it like that. I tend to think of injuries from a battlefield point of view, so I just meant that I'm not going to bleed to death. It can't kill me. I'll just…"

"Experience so much pain that you lose your mind?"

Sergiy looked at him with one eye, and his toothy maw fell open as he hissed a chuckle. "Yes, exactly."

Bruin continued running his hand through his mane, trying to get his own heart to stop hammering from the recent rush of adrenaline. "So what now?"

"Now, I've taken my meds, and Russ has gone to get my dad.

If you hadn't cast your pain charm, I'd be making a trip to the infirmary where Teresa would be giving me a hefty dose of ketamine.

I like your method better, by the way. Doesn't make my head as fuzzy, or feels like a waking nightmare. How long can you keep it up?"

"If I left you alone right now, the stones would sustain themselves for about half a day, I think. Will the pain last longer than that?"

"Usually not, just maybe some echoes if I move too much.

It should be fine." Sergiy reached out carefully, laying a hand on Bruin's leg.

"Thank you, my mate. You saved me a lot of hurt.

It takes time to find a nurse and get medicated, and then a longer wait for the medication to kick in.

Usually I'm in agony for at least half an hour, but you took care of it in less than a minute. "

"Yes, yes, you can thank me later by buying me dinner. You just focus on resting, okay?"

Sergiy seemed okay with that order, though he still kept a hand wrapped tightly around Bruin's leg.

Ten minutes passed while the two of them laid beside each other, and then Bruin heard the living room door open.

"Ser-bear?" a voice called out.

"In here, bat'ko ."

Into the bedroom came Sergiy's dad, Zell.

Like Yacob, the dark-furred shifter preferred to remain in his werewolf form at all times, and never seemed to wear much more than an apron or other protective baking-wear.

Tonight was no exception, though the cuddly, chubby, Bequeather of Cookies and Head Pats was more somber than what Bruin usually saw.

"On a scale of one to ten, how bad's this one?"

"About a nine," Sergiy said.

Zell propped himself up on the edge of the bed, reaching over to lay a hand on Sergiy's lower back. He sniffed, and glanced over to look at Bruin.

"And you not screaming right now has something to do with the spring smell I can scent off of your mate, I am guessing?"

"His magic, yeah." Sergiy grunted as he turned his head. "He cast a pain relief charm. Dad, it was almost as bad as the month following the original surgery."

"You did say a nine," he said, his words overshadowed by the arrival of Teresa in a pair of scrubs.

"And what is it right now, with the active charm?" the nurse asked brusquely.

"About a four, and steadily decreasing."

As the nurse began plying Sergiy with questions, Bruin's eyes darted around worriedly, but no, his mate's unrelenting tidiness meant that they'd put away their lube and supplies after their evening fuck, but then Bruin realized that for a pair of shifters, the room would still smell like sex, especially with the open door to the bathroom that contained the pile of towels they'd use to clean up.