Jeff tried to sit up but the flaring agony forced him still. “The babies?”

Kir smiled gently. “They’re fine. Jordan’s grieving. She got to say good-bye, though.”

Which was more than Jeff, Morgan or Magnus would get. “I want him to hurt, Kir. I want him to hurt the way he’s made us hurt.”

“Not possible, kiddo. You have to love before you can grieve.” Logan kissed the top of Kir’s head. “Be careful, Blondie.”

“I will.” Kir smiled up at Logan. “Go on now. She needs you.”

Logan nodded. “Fen. If you wish to collect blod gjeld for your mate’s injuries, I’ll be waiting.”

“Logan.” Kir’s voice was sharp, the clouds racing across his irises darkening to near black.

Jeff chuckled. “The only one who owes blood debt is my grandfather, you masochist.”

“I agree.” Fen’s hand stroked down Jeff’s side, lightly brushing the sutures.

“You have paid enough blood, Pappa. You did the best you could. The one who owes blood is Odin.”

“He did it again, you know.” Jeff looked up at Logan. “He disappeared right under Fen’s claws. How the fuck does he do that?”

Logan grimaced. “I have no clue. I can’t do it and neither can any other Jotun I know.”

“The Aesir can’t either.” Kir rubbed his chin. “Last I checked we need to travel the old-fashioned way.”

“What about the Vanir?” Jeff wiggled the tiniest bit, trying to get even closer to Fen’s warmth. Fen responded by moving closer, cradling him a little bit tighter. “Has anyone asked Travis?”

“The Lios Alfar can bend light around them, making it look like they’ve disappeared, but it’s exhausting and not something done lightly or for very long.” Kir and Logan exchanged a long, speculative look. “Could he be doing that?”

“Not sure, but it’s possible.”

Fen was shaking his head. Jeff could feel it against the pillow they shared.

“No. His scent was gone, disappeared from in front of me. I thought he’d moved into another room and followed it, but he wasn’t there.”

“Was he in shadow when he disappeared?” Jeff watched the expressions on Kir’s and Logan’s faces closely. “If the Lios Alfar can make themselves invisible, could the Dökk Alfar somehow manipulate shadows? Even move through them?”

“Son of a bitch,” Logan breathed. “You might be right.”

“Do we know any Dökk Alfar?” Kir’s fingers brushed against the pendant at his neck.

“Yeah. Nik.” Logan stormed from the room, flames dancing along his skin.

“That son of a bitch. We were just there, damn it. He’s the one who told us to hightail it back here.”

Kir rolled his eyes. “Here we go.” He brushed his hand over Jeff’s hair.

“Take it easy today, all right? I’ll have Travis bring Toni over once she wakes up.

Maybe between the two of us we can help your healing along a little bit more.”

“Thanks, Uncle Kir.” Jeff grinned when Kir shuddered, but the clouds in his eyes had lightened up. Kir was still pissed, but Jeff had managed to calm him somewhat with his joke. Perhaps Jordan and Logan would be able to take care of the rest.

For all he’d called Thor an asshole, the man had been Kir’s brother. Kir had to be grieving too.

“Pain in my ass.” Kir waved good-bye and followed his lover out of the room.

“How is the pain, elskede?”

Jeff grunted as Fen shifted position behind him, moving the mattress beneath Jeff and thus moving Jeff. “Let’s just say that you may be glued to my backside for the foreseeable future.”

There was silence for a moment before Fen huffed out a laugh. “This is bad why?”

Jeff chuckled again. Damn, that hurts. “Because it means you’re not going walkies for a potty break.”

Fen licked his neck, right where he’d marked Jeff. “I can live with that.”

Jeff barely restrained his shudder. How could something feel so good when everything else hurt so bad? “Fen. Ix-nay on the ex-say. I’m really not up for it.”

He took Fen’s hand and brought it to his flaccid cock. “See?”

“I want to share blood with you.”

Jeff blinked. “Ah. I see the train has stopped in Wacky Land once more.”

“Hmm?”

“Never mind. What the hell is that supposed to mean, anyway?” He shifted his legs to get more comfortable and hissed as the stitches pulled.

“You’re still mortal, Jeff.”

“And?”

Fen sighed. “We think that, though I marked and changed you, you remain mortal, which is why you haven’t healed the way I do. If I share blood with you, there’s the possibility all of your wounds will disappear.”

Jeff nodded thoughtfully. “I remember when Logan did that for my sister. It was…bad. She went into convulsions and stopped breathing. Kir came in and saved her life.”

“Because she’d shared blood with Travis and Logan one right after the other.

Travis told me about it.” Fen nipped his neck. “Your sister shared with you last night, hoping you’d get the healing she got from Logan, but it didn’t work. If you share with me, it just might.”

Jeff thought about it. Was it worth it? “Is it too soon?”

“I don’t know, elskede. But watching you suffer is killing me.”

“Would watching me die kill you more?”

Fen’s arms tightened again, earning him a gasp of pain. Fen’s arms loosened immediately with a murmured apology. “Yes.”

“Then maybe we should wait until Kir is here in case anything goes wrong.”

He felt Fen nod. “That makes sense.” They snuggled for a few minutes. Jeff felt himself nodding off again when Fen spoke. “You scared me.”

“I know. I was scared myself.”

“You can’t leave me.”

Jeff couldn’t turn to hold Fen, couldn’t comfort the man the way he wanted to. But he could do something. “Bring your hand to my lips.” He waited until Fen did as he asked. He pressed his own kiss to the back of his wolf’s hand. “I won’t. Not voluntarily.”

“Not ever. I need you too much.”

He wished desperately that he could see Fen’s face. The man sounded tormented. “I knew you’d come for me.”

Fen shivered.

“I held on because I knew you’d never leave me there. I knew, Fen.”

“Not even Hel can have you.”

Jeff nodded. What did you say to something as outrageous as that? The man literally had an in with death herself. Did Hel have a cell phone? Was her ringtone Rob Zombie’s “Living Dead Girl”? “You’ll have to ask her opinion on that some time. I might not even be slated to go to her when I die.”

Fen tensed. “Why not?”

“We weren’t very religious growing up, but my mother’s always been Christian. My father refused to go to church.” Jeff shook his head. “Now I know why. Can a god perform sacrilege?”

“Yes.”

Even raising his eyebrows hurt. Fen’s answer had been firm, unequivocal.

“Okay.”

“I’m more interested in what you may have gotten from sharing blood with your twin.”

He snorted out a laugh. “Wonder Twin powers, activate.”

He heard a feminine laugh, one as familiar to him as his own. “Shit. You had to go there, didn’t you?” Jamie yawned and settled into the chair next to the bed.

“How are you feeling?”

He snorted a laugh. “Like hammered dog poo.”

His twin had dark circles under her eyes. They were bloodshot and puffy, as if she’d been crying. He wondered how much sleep she’d gotten the night before.

Her hair was a mess of curls. In her hand was a hairbrush. “Ditto.”

He pointed toward the hairbrush with his chin. “I can’t.”

“I know.” She gestured toward Fen, who moved away from him slowly. Jeff sighed as the brush moved through his curls, soothing him. “Jordy’s a mess.”

“Does she need me?” He winced when the brush smacked him on top of the head. “Hey!”

“Dork. Like you could go two steps without falling on your flat ass.”

“My ass is perfect, thank you very much.”

“Yes, it is.” Fen blew him a kiss and left the room.

“He’s biased.” Jamie chuckled when Jeff stuck his tongue out at her. “Jordan will be here later.” The brush stroked again, untangling his hair. “What do you think he would have been like off the juice?”