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Roman groaned, but nodded. “But only if you let me take you out to dinner later this evening.”
I stilled. Dinner with Roman … alone. We hadn’t done that yet since I lost my memories. I bit my lip. What the hell? Wasn’t the guy my mate? I should give him a chance to make me fall in love with him all over again.
I dipped my chin once. “Deal.”
* * *
In the end,Roman and I didn’t go to dinner. My father, Ivy, Rotgar, and Dot returned as we were about to leave. The maids arranged dinner for us. Meanwhile, we got together at the family room, where the fire sparked in the fireplace and brandy ran amok.
My father sat at one of the large armchairs, looking weary and weak. Seated in another of the armchairs, Dot rubbed her hands as if she had used up all of her magic and now had to warm her fingers before she could cast another spell. Ivy threw herself on the couch beside me, her black leather clothes dirty as if she had been in a muddy war camp. Rotgar stood on the other side of the room, as if he didn’t want anything to do with us. The higher demon was always quiet and reserved, but I was told that in battle, he loved to taunt his adversaries.
Roman brought a second glass of brandy to my father after he drained the first, then sat on the couch beside me.
“Stop this suspense, tell us how it went,” I said, glancing between them.
Ivy reached down and started unbuckling her boots. “How do you think?”
“I want details,” I urged.
“We found one of the portals to the underworld, but it was too well guarded,” my father said, his voice thin. “Lots of Blackthorn Demon Hunters crawling around the place.”
I frowned as an image came to mind—a huge stone wall in the middle of nowhere and several people dressed in black leather uniforms around it. One of them came to me and—
“Those damn hunters,” Ivy muttered, snapping me out of the memory. What the hell was that? “When we saw there too many of them, we decided to just scout and take inventory.”
“But one of the patrols saw us,” Rotgar finished. I almost jumped, not noticing he was standing closer now.
“We got into a fight,” Dot continued with a big smile. “It was fun.”
“Fun?” My father scoffed. “Hardly.”
“He used too much of his magic,” Ivy said, her voice low. “He’s weak again.”
I frowned, suddenly concerned. “Is there anything we can do to help you? Dot, can you make a potion to restore his energy?”
“We’ve tried that,” she said. “My potions only worked for a short while. He needs to absorb the power of some magical item.”
“Or magical being,” Ivy added.
“A potion would help for now,” my father said. “There’s one in my desk, in the top drawer—”
I was up and out before he finished his sentence. I walked to the home office he had made his own and easily found the drawer and the potion vial my father had mentioned. I grabbed from the drawer, and something on the desk caught my attention.
A broken, shimmering dragon scale rested on the corner of my father’s desk. He had told me that when my pack found me and attacked me five days ago, Ivy and I had been out, checking on a great power our father had sensed—it had been the dragon waking up. The Nightshade pack had been there for the same reason, but when they saw me, they abandoned the dragon and came for me instead. With the attack, the dragon escaped, but Ivy had caught this scale that had fallen from the dragon. It had been infused with power, and my father had absorbed it, and he felt energized on the spot. A single scale wouldn’t fix the problem, but …
I grabbed the scale and rushed back to the family room.
“The dragon.” I stood amid the couches and armchairs and showed them the scale. “The magic in one single scale gave you energy for days. What would happen if you got your hands on an entire dragon?”
My father’s eyes widened. “I could absorb his magic … if that didn’t cure me, it would at least give me a nice boost to endure another year.”
”Or even maybe another decade,” Rotgar said, his voice low.
Ivy cocked her head. “What are you saying?”
My father gestured for me and I handed the potion to him. He drank it in a big gulp and inhaled deeply. He glanced at Ivy. “You’re tasked with finding where the dragon is.”
Ivy groaned but nodded.
