“Which is probably why the alpha was able to do it. That and...” He put out his hands in a gesture meant to tell me to keep put while he worked the latch on the cart. “He couldn’t fail.”
“As soon as they had me, they would’ve left you guys alone. At least, if he fails the next time, you know you’ll be safe.”
“True. Yet you fought like your life depended on it.”
I stared after him, struck mute for a moment. “I’m sorry I-I guess I hadn’t thought it through. I probably should’ve waited to fight him so that you guys would be guaranteed your safety. Sorry, I was just wrapped up in the moment, and Dante gave me the knives, and you were all surrounding me?—“
“Hey, hey.” He held out his hands. “Whoa. That’s not what I’m saying. You fought like your life depended on it meaning you didn’t want to go with him. You took that horrible beating just to keep out of his reach.”
Again, it hurt to frown. “Well, yeah. If it wasn’t for you guys, he would’ve completed his task. I just held him off—Oh!” Everything connected for me. “The fight was slowing because Weston got control. Alexander ran because he knew time was running out.”
“Exactly.” Tanix grabbed some sort of pouch and led me to a nearby log. “He and a few others were in their human forms because the alpha can’t form a bond unless they are in wolf form. They were waiting to extract you, keeping the hole in our line open with various weapons. Once the alpha secured the bond, they had precious little time. They had to leave you behind.”
“How are our people? Did they all make it?”
He took out a couple tins of salve and rested them on the log. “The alpha is seeing to the wounded. We haven’t lost anyone yet and we still have some of the phoenix elixir left. We should be okay.” He paused. “Our people?”
“I mean...” I rolled my eyes and then winced, which also hurt. “Your people. Weston’s. Sorry?—“
“Stop apologizing.” He used his finger to gently dab some salve on my cheek. “This will help with the swelling and bruising. Obviously not as well as if you had your animal, but it’s something. Listen, Aurelia, I’ve seen the way you’re trying to help with the drugs. I recognized the differences between your village and the places hit hard by Granny’s drugs. I always wondered, though, if it was all an act. The pretty, wide-eyed, naive routine seemed a little over the top given the hell those drugs have wrought. I wondered if you’d run back at the first chance you got.”
“That’s why I was locked in the mayor’s house? Because I was an esteemed guest, ready to be taken back?”
He shrugged. “Safe keeping? Keeping you from us? I don’t know. But now...” He paused. “The more you learned of the outside world, the more that ‘routine’ peeled away. I’ve watched it with my own eyes. You’ve tried to help, nearly killing yourself and defying the alpha to do so. And today?—”
“I got my ass handed to me.”
“No, you gave better than you got against a man twice your size and three times your muscle mass. He should’ve been much faster?—“
“He was.”
“—much stronger?—“
“He definitely was.”
“—and way outclassed you.”
“That’s insulting. He has no class at all.”
He grinned, a small expression, and it melted something inside of me. He’d always been my harshest critic.
“Today I saw what I needed to see to put my doubts to rest once and for all. I’m sorry it took me so long.”
I winced as he pressed too hard. “Forgiven. Does that mean you’ll stop doctoring me now? It’s worse than the actual wounds.”
Chapter 34
Aurelia
“Love, no, you are not going to walk like some tramp.” Hadriel very gently marshalled me toward the front of the horse procession.
“What does walking have to do with tramps?” I asked in confusion.
“I have no fucking idea but it’s the only thing that came to mind and your confusion makes you pliant. Now, here.” He pointed at Weston’s horse. “You’ll go with him so that he can mother you.”
“I don’t need mothering. I need to walk, because getting up on a horse and riding is going to hurt like a motherfucker.”
“I see what you did there, with the word play.” Hadriel winked, and then pointed at his eye. “See whatIdid there? I winked, like you are constantly doing to me because one of your fucking eyes is swelled shut and it’s giving me heart palpitations. Get on the bloody horse so that I don’t start crying. I cannot handle the sort of pain you’re in.”
