It was more the human police and detectives who had come tromping through the previous day and early that morning. No matter how professional they attempted to be, they all still ended up passing through with their mouths hanging open and tripping over each other at the sight of him.
He got it. Not one of them had seen a real dragon in the flesh before. As far as they had known, up until a week ago, all dragons had been extinct.
But, come on! He was in pain and bored. He didn’t want to be gawked at. It might have been better if they’d at least stopped over to say hi or ask how he was doing. But, nope. They stared and gave him a wide berth as if they expected him to leap up and swallow them down whole.
Not a chance. He wasn’t going to be leaping anywhere for another day or two, at least.
If he was going to be stuck healing, he would have preferred to do it in the privacy of his own room, or at least somewhere that wasn’t a main thoroughfare for the entire castle.
His friends were trying to keep him occupied and happy, but they were also trying to clean up the mess from the explosion, deal with the police, hold back the reporters, and soothe their new mages so no one would bolt, all while looking out for more attacks from the Jaeggi. Ravi couldn’t be a priority in the middle of that chaos.
“How’s my favorite patient?” Sora’s playful inquiry instantly lifted Ravi’s spirits.
His head jerked up from where it had been resting on a pile of pillows and he looked around until he spotted Sora striding purposefully toward him from the far staircase. The mage had a knapsack hanging from one shoulder, and he was comfortably dressed in a pair of worn jeans and a slouchy sweater that seemed to offer up a few tantalizing hints of warm fawn skin around his shoulder and chest.
God, he was such a good-looking man. He had all that dark hair begging for Ravi’s exploring fingers. Would it be weird if he asked one of the female mages to teach him to braid hair? He wanted to spend a lot of time playing with Sora’s hair. Assuming Sora would let him do such a thing.
Sora’s low, throaty chuckle drew Ravi out of his thoughts. “You must not be feeling too bad, considering the smile that just stretched across your face.”
Ravi could feel his face burning and was extremely grateful that Sora couldn’t see him blushing. He’d totally gotten lost in thought, daydreaming about Sora and his hair, and nuzzling that wonderful neck so Ravi could get wrapped up in the scent of him. He wanted—NO! He had to stop and focus.
Huffing a breath and popping out his bottom lip as best he could around his fangs, Ravi pouted. “Your patient is feeling very impatient. I want to be healed already. But I’m better now that you’re here.”
“How about I check you out and see if you’re any closer to being able to shift to human? At least then we can move you to your own room to finish recovering.”
Sora waded into the mound of pillows and carefully dropped his bag beside Ravi. There was a muffled clink of glass against glass from where the various healing ingredients in jars tapped against each other.
“Sounds good to me.”
Ravi laid his head back down on the pillows and closed his eyes so he could focus entirely on Sora’s gentle but firm hands as they explored him. Bandages were removed and replaced. New creams and poultices were applied. It wasn’t the pleasant exploration he would have preferred. There was still too much pain for that, but every time Ravi flinched or grunted, it was immediately followed by a soothing heat that pushed aside the pain. The delicious scent of mage filled the air, like lightning and cinnamon. Yes, Sora smelled like electric cinnamon, and it was amazing.
A hand landed on the top of his head and gently caressed him. “You’re healing nicely, but I’m sorry to say your wings need a little more time. If you shift before you’re fully healed, you may do permanent damage to them.”
Ravi tamped down a shiver. He knew what that looked like all too well, thanks to his precious Hoheit. Though, his incredibly talented consort was using that mechanical engineering mind of his to craft something that would one day put Alric in the air again. Ravi prayed that Cameron would succeed. He’d never gotten the pleasure of soaring in the air with his king like many of the other dragons, and he was desperate to know what it was like.
But until that happened, this was very nice, too. Sora continued to stroke his head, and Ravi let out a happy rumble of pleasure. He and his dragon were in perfect accord in that moment. They were happy and never wanted Sora to stop what he was doing.
“How are you doing? Aside from being hurt and stuck right in the middle of everything?”
Ravi cracked open an eye to find Sora smiling at him teasingly, but his dark eyes also looked worried.
“Bored. I’m really, really bored. The German police detectives have been in and out of the castle since yesterday, asking questions of everyone but me.”
“Well, you’re scary and intimidating.”
Ravi delivered his best skeptical look, which wasn’t easy because his dragon face wasn’t nearly as expressive as his human face. But he must had gotten his point across because Sora threw his head back and laughed.
“I don’t count. I—” He seemed to catch himself and rolled his eyes with a sigh.
It was clear that he’d barely stopped himself from saying something very revealing. Sora looked frustrated, as if he weren’t happy about the restrictions placed on him. Ravi was buzzing with hundreds of questions about who he was and where he came from, but he didn’t want to upset the mage even more.
“The point is that I’m not intimidated by you because I know you’d never do anything to hurt me,” Sora continued, and Ravi rumbled with pleasure again.
He scooted his head closer to where Sora was sitting on the pillows beside him, practically nuzzling the man’s thigh. Okay, he’d let that slip go if it meant Sora would continue to pet his head.
“Has anyone else stopped by, besides the police?”
“Lots of people have checked on me, but no one can stay long. There’s too much to do. Cassie brought me a tablet to watch movies on, but those stupid touch screens aren’t designed for dragon fingers.” Ravi lifted one hand and wiggled his long claw-tipped fingers at Sora, earning another chuckle from the mage.
“We can fix that easily enough.” Sora reached across the pillows to where a tablet had been pushed aside. With Ravi’s help, he logged into the device and queued up a comedic movie that would at least help to distract Ravi’s mind for a little while. “What about food? Have you had breakfast yet?”
“Not yet.”
“What are you in the mood for?”
Ravi huffed a heavy sigh. “Tacos.”
“Really? For breakfast? Do you mean, like, breakfast tacos?” Sora asked with a soft chuff of surprise.
“No, I mean regular beef-filled tacos with lettuce, cheese, tomatoes, sour cream, and just a little bit of salsa. I’ve had the worst craving for tacos for the past two days.” He moaned a little pathetically because he was feeling very pathetic. “But I can’t have tacos until I’m in my human form because tacos are too hard with these hands and this face.”
He hit his own snout with his hand, and Sora immediately grabbed his hand to stop him from doing it a second time.
“Hey, now. Enough of that. I happen to like this face.”