“You’ve done everything you can,” a Beta I vaguely recognize assures me. He speaks gently, though his eyes are sharp and full of purpose. “Let us help him now, Luna. We will help your Mate.”
Something about the use of my title-which is hardly a title at all, given that Rowan hasn’t claimed full leadership yet and I’ve only just come back to the Greenbriars-gets through to me. What kind of Luna does it make me if I allow my Mate to die because I can’t let anyone else near him? I loosen my grasp on Rowan and allow his father to pry me off him.
Two more wolves shift and step forward, their forms bloody and bruised but moving with quiet, practiced coordination. They lift Rowan’s limp body between them like he’s something sacred. I rise with them, stumbling slightly, refusing to let him out of my sight.
“I’m coming with you,” I croak out.
“You need to see your son,” the Alpha reminds me.
I falter, only staying upright because Rowan’s father is still holding on to me.
Noah.
My head snaps around, my body reacting before my mind catches up. I turn toward the dark trees just as Cal appears, blood on his clothes, scratches along his jaw. My son is clinging to the Beta, to Rowan’s cousin, as if he’s known the man his entire life. As if he knows that he’s family, that he can trust him intrinsically and wholeheartedly.
“Noah!” I rush forward, legs shaking beneath me, heart hammering like it might tear itself free. Maybe it would, if I wasn’t sure my heart has already been yanked out and carried away along with Rowan’s motionless body.
Cal’s eyes soften when he sees me. “He’s okay. I swear it.”
Noah lifts his head. “Mom?”
His voice cracks, and that’s what does me in. I fall to my knees and pull him against me, sobbing into his hair. His little arms wrap tight around my neck like he’s afraid I’ll vanish if he lets go.
“I was so scared,” he whispers.
“I know, baby. I know. I’ve got you now.”
He’s here. He’s safe. But all I can feel is the yawning, blood-soaked hole where Rowan should be.
“Is Dad gonna be okay?”
The question guts me.
I pull back, brushing Noah’s dark hair away from his face, trying to smile even though my lips are shaking. “They’re helping him now. He’s strong, remember? He’s going to fight.”
I don’t know if it’s a lie. I want it to be the truth so badly that I can barely breathe.
Cal comes forward and touches my shoulder. “I’ll stay with Noah. Go to Rowan, Alina. Your Mate will need you. The bond will help the healing process.”
I hesitate, but only for a second. I press a kiss to Noah’s forehead and rise on legs that don’t feel like mine.
The battlefield is scattered with bodies and smoke. Greenbriars in wolf and human forms circle the fallen, and I think I spot a search party heading out to track down any runaway Blackburns who think they can actually get away with this. The moans of the injured mingle with the cries of the grieving, but I don’t really register any of it.
I only see the trail of blood leading toward a grassy, moon-soaked clearing. Kseniya is there, and so are a few other elder healers that I’m pretty sure I recognize from when I was younger.
But, most importantly, Rowan is there.
Alive.
Still breathing.
I follow that path like it’s the only thing left in the world that matters.
Rowan
Everything hurts.
Not in the normal way, either. It’s not the kind of pain I can grit my teeth through and keep moving with. It’s not a sore muscle or random scrape.
This is the kind of pain that pins me down, saps my strength, and makes the world blurry at the edges. The kind of pain that has settled into my bones and is now howling throughout my bloodstream.
Honestly, I’d like to think I’m no stranger to suffering. I’ve taken claws to the ribs before. Teeth to the throat. I’ve broken bones as a kid and later in training, and had them re-broken and splinted without medication. I’ve rejected the Mating bond and felt the agony of my own heart being torn straight from my chest.
But this pain is worse, mostly because I’m not supposed to be feeling it this acutely. My body should be healing by now. Shifters bounce back fast, and especially Alphas.
But something has stalled, according to Nora, the head healer, and we all know what it is.
Alina.
There’s still one final piece of our bond that lies in tatters. I didn’t know it either until right now, when I can feel those jagged tendrils brushing against my wounds with all the careless pressure of a bull in a china shop. We’ve made our promises, made love on the bed of those promises, and gone to war at each other’s sides…and yet, the bond still thirsts for more.
While I do my best not to let the pain pummel me into complete submission, Alina sits beside my bed, her fingers twisted together in her lap. The room is quiet except for the occasional creak of the old wood floors and the hushed murmur of Nora preparing her various salves and concoctions in the next room.
My parents are also here, quiet and watchful.
Even Cal and Noah sit across the room, the elder talking to the boy in low tones. I can hear Noah’s heartbeat skip every time he glances my way.
He’s still not sure what to make of me, even now. I don’t blame him. He all but watched me kill someone. Even if it was necessary, I know that’s not an easy thing to know your own father is capable of.
My son.
And my Mate.
I almost lost both of them.
“Rowan,” Alina whispers, squeezing my hand.
I look at her. Just the act of turning my head sends a flare of agony down my neck and into my chest. But I do it anyway, because looking at her is worth the torture. It’s the first day that I’ve been able to keep myself conscious for longer than a few minutes.
She meets my gaze. Her eyes are dark with worry, but there’s something stronger underneath. There’s a glimmer of resolve in those big, brown eyes of hers. Something that tells me that she can, in fact, feel what still lies broken between us.
New Book: Back Home to Marry Off Myself
Loredana’s father left the family for his mistress, leaving them to fend for themselves abroad. When life was at its toughest, her father showed up with “good news” after 8 years of absence: To marry off Loredana to a paralyzed son of the wealthy Mendelsohn family.