Page 26 of Xarius (Shunned Mages #1)

Xarius

The fire disappeared as soon as Niam got hit.

I hadn’t even seen the female mage before she threw the rock, using wind magic to throw it at such a high speed it hit harder than it would’ve without magic.

I made a wounded noise when Niam fell to the ground.

We were both naked, not that I cared, but he was so vulnerable lying there naked and hurt.

Snowflake went feral when he saw his master was down, tearing into the woman, killing her in seconds.

I still had the others caught in my wind, but without the fire it wasn’t hurting them anymore.

I made a quick decision and tried something I knew was possible, but it was difficult and only the most powerful wind mages could do it.

I took hold of the air in their lungs, and pulled.

Thirty seconds later, they were all dead.

Leon was hurt, too, laying on the ground with a torn-up wing.

Snowflake was covered in blood and his one eye was torn through.

I couldn’t dismiss them yet though. Not that I didn’t want them to heal, which they would as soon as they were dismissed, I knew as much, didn’t know how I knew, I just did.

It could take hours, yes, but they would heal.

I was just afraid to dismiss them until I had Niam back in the van.

Crouching beside him, I looked over his injuries.

He had a huge bump on his head, and blood oozed out where he’d been hit.

But he was alive. With my magic, I quickly opened up the ground where the mages lay dead, burying them on the spot.

I didn’t have time to search them, so this would have to do.

I buried the lone woman after, since she’d died further away from the others.

When the ground was filled with bushes above them, I picked Niam up and ran towards the van .

I found one of our towels and placed it at the head of our mattress, placing Niam down gently on it.

Then I put his boxers on and then pants, not wanting my bonded to be in such a vulnerable state.

I tugged him in with the covers and did something we’d said we wouldn’t do, but desperate times and all that.

“Snowflake, turn invisible and stay with him. Make sure he stays in bed.” Snowflake jumped in and turned invisible as soon as he snuggled in next to Niam.

I hoped Niam wouldn’t be too mad about the “ no familiars in the van rule ” being broken.

“Leon, go rest, I’ll call you to us when we’re somewhere safe.

” He disappeared and I quickly pulled on some clothes myself before rushing into the front of the van, starting it up, and driving towards the nearest hospital or doctor’s office.

I drove past two parked cars on the way out of the forest, which meant the mages had followed our trail somehow.

I had feared they were using portals to show up wherever we were, but if they drove it seemed like there was something they could track us down with.

I shook my head; I couldn’t think about that right now.

Not while my bonded, my precious bonded , lay unconscious and hurt.

I winced, remembering the sound the rock made when it hit him and then the sound of Niam hitting the ground.

My fingers tightened around the steering wheel.

I’d failed in protecting him. We needed the others, and until we found them, we would be vulnerable.

Today was proof of that. We might be powerful, but we weren’t used to fighting or thinking about strategies.

We’d not even noticed someone was stalking us from behind, waiting to do a stealthy attack on us.

We needed to be better. We needed to practice.

It took twenty minutes before I reached a town, and luckily, they had a doctor who took in emergency patients, too.

Niam had stayed where I left him, Snowflake right beside him.

I sent Snowflake away to heal and carried Niam inside for the doctor to look at.

When I carried him inside the clinic, the calm atmosphere erupted into full panic, and two nurses or doctors, I could never tell the difference, helped me into a room.

“What happened?” one of the medical professionals asked, while the other checked his vitals.

“We got ambushed while camping,” I said, not lying. “Someone threw a rock or something, and it hit him hard.”

She nodded. “Any vomiting? ”

I shook my head. “No, he was knocked out right as it hit him and has been unconscious since. So maybe forty to fifty minutes now.”

I could tell by their emotions that they felt sympathy and something I would describe as the feeling of dread, which really didn’t help my state of mind.

They took him to another room and had me wait out in the waiting room with the non-urgent patients who were waiting for their appointments.

I had no idea how bad it was, normally mages healed quicker because our magic mended us together, but if the damage was severe enough, his magic wouldn’t have been able to stop the damage the hit had caused.

Which meant brain damage couldn’t be ruled out.

Oh god, what would I do if he were in a coma?

Or was so injured I would never be able to speak to him again.

There were so many things I’d yet to talk to him about.

Like what he wanted our future to look like. Did he ever want kids?

The door opened and instantly all my thoughts evaporated.

All I could focus on was the doctor’s emotions.

She was tired. Relieved. Sympathetic. Angry.

All her emotions were mixing together, likely meaning she was too tired to control them.

No one would be able to tell from her calm facade as she walked over to me, but I knew the chaos that inhabited her body.

She stopped right beside me and I stood up, ready to bolt in there and get my man.

It was torture being apart from him like this.

“He’s going to be just fine,” she informed me.

“You can come in and see him now.” I exhaled in relief and followed her down the hallway past the exam rooms, and wondered briefly how long I’d waited.

It felt like hours. It likely was hours.

My needs had taken a back seat so I wasn’t even sure if I needed anything. What was food when my bonded was hurt?

She entered a room to the left and I followed, trying, but failing to walk at a normal speed. And there was my bonded. Niam was lying down on a hospital bed with tubes connected to his arm. Maybe fluids or something for the pain. They couldn’t know he didn’t need that.

“Baby,” I choked out. His eyes opened and he gave me a weak smile when his unfocused eyes met mine. I sat down on the chair next to him, taking his tube-free hand in mine and stroking it gently.

“I’ll give you both a status on your situation, Niam,” the doctor began.

“Your body protected you from further harm by having you faint. Sometimes our bodies do that to protect themselves, and in your case, it worked. There’s no damage to your brain, and no signs of a concussion either.

You were truly lucky to have a brain that acted that fast to protect you.

” She smiled kindly at Niam, her emotions showed no ill will towards him, easing my worry that she knew we were somehow mages and that was the reason he’d healed so well.

“How long until he can come home?” I asked, knowing we’d need to trust their judgement. No way was I risking him further, magic or no magic.

“Since it seems his body only shut down in order to protect him against trauma, I would say in an hour if he’s able to focus properly. I’ll come back in half an hour to do some tests and then we’ll see.”

“Thank you,” Niam said, smiling softly. I could tell from the doctor’s emotions that she liked Niam.

The story about how we got attacked must’ve really affected her.

Or maybe she was just an amazing person who had empathy in spades.

Either way, she liked my bonded and I was glad. It meant he was well looked after.

She left the room and as soon as she was gone, Niam whispered, “did you deal with them?”

I nodded. “All of them are buried, too. ”

He sighed with relief. “Ever since I woke up, I’ve been so worried you were hurt, too. I even asked the nurse if you were okay.”

I smiled at him and kissed his cheek. “I was so scared, baby. I made the mistake of thinking I was untouchable, letting the power we’ve gotten affect my judgement on what we can handle.”

He squeezed my hand. “I made the same mistake. After the first attack I still felt like I was playing pretend, but as the days went on, I stopped feeling like that, too busy thinking about how powerful we were and our mission. I guess I liked feeling powerful for once and as we stood there fighting them… I forgot to be careful. Untouchable, like you said. We need to train harder for next time.”

“And find Silver. If they could get one of us down, then he’s in real trouble.”

“And Wilston, too,” he reminded me.

“Wilston, too. I was thinking about getting a camper, so as soon as we come by a town or a city that sells them, we should get one. You know, one of those you can drive and live in.”

“So Silver and Wilston can have room to live with us. I’ve thought about the same thing. I just doubt our abilities to get enough money for it. ”

“We can check if someone is selling a used one, it’ll be cheaper and we can likely pay in cash,” I suggested, telling him about my plan.

“Let’s find Silver and then we can find a camper while we look for Wilston. I don’t want to risk anything happening to Silver while we take our sweet time, basically guiding them directly to him.” Damn, he had a point.

“Deal. Now we just gotta wait for them to discharge you.”

“Yeah,” he sighed. “How’re our familiars?”

“Both are dismissed and healing. They should be fine in a few hours, but we’ll summon them when we leave this room. I will not have you vulnerable at any time. They can heal while we drive.”

“Sounds good to me. Food after this?” his voice was strained and weak. Had it been that long since we’d eaten? And again, I thought about how long I’d waited here. My own stomach growled. Shit. It had been hours if my stomach told me the truth. My poor bonded needed some food.

The doctor came in, smiling brightly as she began checking him. “You’re fine to leave, no need to stay the whole hour.”

We took the bill and since it was way more than we could afford with our goal of getting a camper as soon as possible, we decided a little debt wouldn’t hurt us. We would simply wait with the payment, or take a loan. It wasn’t like we were staying here either way.

As soon as we sat in the parking lot of a fast-food place, scarfing down burgers and fries, Niam spoke up, “why don’t we just get an expensive camper, like an RV or something, with room for six and make a payment deal or loan for it.

What’s the difference between my medical debt and that?

We will leave Sutiner, hopefully next year or the year after that.

So shouldn’t we get the best and know it won’t die on us? ”

How was he able to think about stuff with a damaged head, when I couldn’t even do it with my non-damaged one.

“I’m so glad your brain is fine and still able to think of things that are so much better than whatever I come up with,” I said, pecking a kiss on his lips, not caring his mouth was stuffed with fries, just needing to kiss him.

He gave me a big smile as he chewed his fries.

“I’ll look for a place that sells brand-new campers,” he said, his excitement obvious as he scrolled my phone.

“Okay, so in order to not diverge too much from our current destination, aka Silver, we could check out this one.” He handed me the phone.

“They don’t have many options, but they do have two different models available, and one of them seems to fit our needs perfectly.

” I nodded as I looked over the pictures.

It was new and seemed very high tech and pretty.

“We should definitely get an RV before the last two mages arrive,” I said, looking at the one RV. “It would help immensely to have a kitchen and a bathroom. Especially since we still have no idea how to get home.”

“That would be amazing,” he agreed. “But an RV seems too big for now, and besides, the others need to agree with this stuff, too. We will start with a camper and then, once Silver and Wilston join us, we can figure out what works best for all of us. Maybe if they’re soulmatched, they’ll want their own van?

Maybe they aren’t and each will want their own private space. We can’t know.”

“So damn smart,” I sighed dreamily. I truly got lucky when fate made Niam mine.