Chapter 63: What’s Up, Doc?

Daemus narrowed his eyes, studying him carefully. "You like her, don’t you?"

Killian kept his gaze glued to the pages of his magazine. "I have no romantic interest in humans."

"So you just want to fuck her then, is that it?" Daemus countered, his voice edging into a low growl.

Killian calmly turned a page. "No. Unlike you, I have standards. And they are not so low that a lesser could easily jump to reach them."

The arrogant dismissal grated on Daemus’s already frayed nerves. "Then what do you want with her?" Daemus demanded, leaning forward. "Why is she your pet?"

A small, triumphant smirk touched the corner of Killian’s lips. He finally raised his eyes from the magazine, looking at the Wolf Prince. "So, you admit she is my pet?"

Daemus’s face flushed with anger. Reaching his limit with the infuriating Snake Prince, Daemus shoved his chair back. The legs screeched loudly against the tile as he stood up. "Why you—"

"Your highnesses, apologies for the wait!"

Daemus paused, his fists clenched at his sides. He looked toward the ER doors. A human doctor had just stepped into the waiting room, smiling cheerily and offering a polite bow. But it wasn’t the doctor from earlier.

"What happened to the other doctor?" Daemus asked, his brows knitting together in confusion.

"Ah, yes," the new doctor smiled brightly. "He had a sudden family emergency, I’m afraid."

Killian’s eyes narrowed into slits. "The doctors here do not have families."

The doctor’s cheery smile faltered for a quick second. He let out a nervous, awkward chuckle, rubbing the back of his neck. "Well, I didn’t want to say it, but... the previous doctor soiled himself."

Daemus let out a sigh, shooting a hard glare at Killian. He clicked his tongue in disappointment. "You just had to scare the guy. Couldn’t you be civil for five minutes?"

Killian didn’t offer a word in response. Ignoring the reprimand entirely, he stood up, tossed the magazine onto the table, and stepped past the doctor into the emergency room.

Inside the private suite, the lights were dimmed. The doctor immediately stepped up to a glowing computer monitor, pointing a pen at a series of complex, rotating digital scans.

"The patient has sustained multiple lateral costal fractures," the doctor began. "Specifically, ribs four through seven have been compromised, resulting in a minor pneumothorax of the left pleural cavity. We are also monitoring severe cranial trauma that could indicate acute retrograde amnesia, alongside a Grade 3 talofibular ligament sprain."

Killian nodded, easily digesting the information. "And the pulmonary contusions?"

"Minimal, Your Highness, but we are keeping her oxygenated to prevent hypoxia," the doctor replied smoothly.

Daemus stood next to them, blinking rapidly. He looked from the glowing screen, to the doctor, to Killian, and back to the screen. He was completely, utterly lost. Question marks practically floated in a circle around his head.

"Is she..." Daemus interrupted, waving a hand to cut through the conversation. "Is she going to be okay?"

Killian glanced sideways at the Wolf Prince. He was well aware that Daemus had absolutely no idea what had just been said.

"I am afraid not," Killian told him grimly. "She contracted a very special illness that makes her hate wolves forever."

The color drained from Daemus’s face. He looked devastated, his broad shoulders slumping as his silver eyes widened in heartbreak.

Killian’s lip twitched. He actually almost laughed.

Realizing he had been played, Daemus’s heartbreak morphed instantly into a murderous glare directed right at the Crown Prince’s head.

Standing by the monitor, the doctor forced his gaze to the floor . Who would have thought, the doctor mused silently, that the Crown Prince actually has a sense of humor?

"Right this way," the doctor said, stepping forward and pulling back the privacy curtain.

There Blair was.

She was hooked up to a rhythmic breathing machine, a clear tube resting under her nose. IV lines snaked from bags of clear fluid into her arms, and white bandages wrapped tightly around her torso and head. She looked incredibly fragile.

Daemus stepped up to the side of the bed. "Will the wounds scar?" he asked quietly.

The doctor nodded sympathetically. "The lacerations on her back were incredibly deep. It is very likely that the scarring will be permanent."

Daemus looked shattered. Gently, as if she were made of spun glass, he took Blair’s limp hand in his own. He lowered his head, pressing his forehead against her knuckles, and began whispering a stream of quiet apologies.

Killian picked up the medical chart attached to the end of the bed. He furrowed his brows, flipping through the pages. He checked the front, turned it over, and flipped back through the detailed readouts countlessly.

Behind the Royals’ backs, the doctor moved quietly toward the IV stand. With casual ease, he detached a small, plastic vial filled with Blair’s blood from the testing port. Still smiling politely at the back of Daemus’s head, the doctor slipped the vial into his pocket. He dropped it into a silver case stamped with an upside-down sun. He clicked the case shut.

Neither prince noticed a thing.

"What about the poison?" Killian suddenly asked, looking up from the clipboard.

The doctor paused, his hand still resting inside his pocket. He furrowed his brows in genuine confusion. "What poison?"

"An Inland Taipan caused the deep wounds on her back," Killian stated coldly.

The doctor’s eyes bugged out of his skull.

"And she survived?!" the doctor gasped, his voice pitching high with excitement and amazement.

Realizing his slip-up, the doctor quickly cleared his throat, adjusting his stethoscope. "I mean..."

"Useless things get thrown away," Killian cut him off, his purple eyes narrowing into dangerous slits. "Why didn’t you check her properly?"

The doctor swallowed hard, his fingers tightening around the silver case in his pocket.

"My apologies, Prince Killian," the doctor chuckled nervously, taking a quick step backward toward the door. "I was actually going to run a full analysis on her blood down at the lab right now. Excuse me!"

Eager to escape the Crown Prince’s wrath, the doctor scrambled out of the emergency suite and hurried down the white corridors.

Once he reached the secluded safety of the hospital’s laboratory, the doctor locked the door behind him. He pulled the silver case from his pocket, carefully hiding it deep within the inner folds of his lab coat.

Stepping up to the hospital’s computer system, he grabbed a needle, pricked his own arm, and drew a vial of his own blood.

He loaded his vial into the hospital’s analysis machine.

The doctor crossed his arms, a wide grin spreading across his face as the computer screen whirred and processed the results.

"Immunity to even the most potent of poisons," the doctor whispered to himself, his eyes gleaming in the dim light of the lab. "How remarkable."