Her mate came back.
I blink, but I still can’t seem to make sense of any of it.
Then he’s moving, rushing toward me with panic written across every line of his too handsome face. He doesn’t look angry. He doesn’t look frustrated. He looksterrified.
“Noa.” My name leaves his mouth on a breathless growl, not sharp or cruel, just rough with something I can’t name.
His hands are on me in the next breath, warm and solid as they cradle my face. His blood-covered thumb brushes over my cheekbone like he’s trying to calm himself with the feel of me. I flinch on instinct, nerves still frayed from everything that came before his arrival.
But that changes in a matter of seconds. His familiar touch and comforting scent wash over me. Vetiver. Leather. Mint. A combination that anchors me and calls to me on a cosmic level.
I break.
Everything in me softens at once. My weight leans into his. My eyes flutter closed of their own volition. Ivey’s cries grow distant, like they’re coming from somewhere far off and unreachable.
“Noa, baby, talk to me.” His voice cracks. “Are you hurt? I can’t...I can’t...fuck! There’s too much blood on you, I can’t tell if any of it is yours.”
I try to answer him, to say something,anything, but the words refuse to come. My tongue is suddenly too thick and heavy behind my teeth, my jaw refuses to cooperate. I don’t have strength to force my eyelids open either, they feel like they’re made of lead now.
Rennick’s hands tighten around my face, thumbs pressing in with just a bit more pressure as he gives me a single, careful shake. Like he thinks it might bring me back to him. I can feel the panic bleeding off him, but I can’t do anything about it. I can’t tell him I’m all right.
I don’t know if it’s shock setting in or something else entirely. Maybe it’s just the adrenaline that’s kept me standing finally abandoning me, the fight slowly draining from my limbs now that my body senses Rennick is close. Like some primal part of me still believes I’m safe with him. That bond intact or not, he’ll step between me and whatever comes. That he’ll protect me. And because of that, my body decides it can rest. That it can let go. That it doesn’t have to fight anymore.
But I can’t. Not yet.
“Ren...” I think I say it, but I can’t be sure at this point if it ever leaves my lips. “Take…take the baby.”
I don’t know if he hears me. I have no way of knowing if he understands because my knees give out beneath me and the world slips away.
Chapter 5
Rennick
Icatch them both.
The baby first—small, warm, screaming like the sound itself might be the only thing sustaining her. Seren’s daughter, Ivey, the one I’d formally met for the first time this morning, fits awkwardly against my palm and forearm, fragile in a way that makes me overly aware of the strength of my grip. I’ve barely just secured her when Noa starts to go down. She doesn’t try to fight it. Can’t. Not when she’s used the last of her energy to make sure the baby is safe. Because that’s who she is—someone who guards others without thought for herself, even if her own body is threatening to hit the dirt.
I won’t let that happen.
With my free arm, I hook her around the waist and take the full force of her dead weight. She sags into my bare chest, head lolling limply back, hair a tangled mess of sweat, dry leaves, and pine needles. I look between her and the baby—one deathly silent, the other beyond consolation—and my mind works out the only problem that matters right now: how to keep them both safe while getting the hell out of here. Taking the baby back first and coming back for Noa is out of the question. Even if there wasn’t the possibility of more dark forces lurking in the trees, leaving her behind underanycircumstance—even just momentarily—isn’t an option. Not when every part of me refuses to let her be out of my reach again. My wolf is snarling, demanding that I shift and let him take them both. As if he thinks teeth and claws are capable of carrying them safely. Butfangs can’t cradle an infant or my delicate mate. I need my arms for this.
After one last sharp glance around my surroundings, I adjust my hold on the baby before awkwardly crouching and easing Noa’s stomach over my shoulder. I hate this hold. It’s not the way I want to carry her, but it’s the only one that leaves me an arm free for Ivey. It denies me the reassurance of being able to watch her face, tracking every twitch of her expression even while she’s out, and feeling her chest rise and fall against mine.
Precious cargo in hand, I make my way back toward Noa’s manor with deliberate silence. Every one of my muscles are coiled, senses tuned for the snap of a twig or the slightest shift in the air.I don’t know what I’ll be walking back into when I reach Ashvale—how much has been lost, or who’s still standing to defend it. My wolf’s protective instincts infuse with my own overactive ones and demand I bring them home—tomyhome—far away from this ruin. I fight the pull, but it’s there with every step and hard to ignore. I want Noa in my territory, want her scent permeating the air of my house. My room. My bed.
Not yet, I remind myself.
The closer I get to the edge of the tree line, the shift in sound and energy tells its own story. The clash of bodies, the battle cries, the screams. Gone. In their place come sharp commands, the yips and barks of wolves running the town’s perimeter. Voices call for healers, shouting names as they account for their coven members and packmates.
It hits me. We’re in the aftermath. The cleanup.
The Craddock Pack and the Ashvale Coven won and for now, the enemy is gone or dead.
Relief tries to take root, but my body doesn’t loosen. The adrenaline and fear that sliced through me when I’d first heard Noa’s pleas for help still haunt me. Their grip is relentless.
Walking through the open gate of her backyard, I note that the smoke coming from the open hatch has changed color. No longer is there an active fire blazing below. I don’t give myself more than a moment to ponder how it’s already been extinguished. My protective alpha impulses driving me to get Noa and Ivey out of the open are overriding everything else.
I’m halfway to the house when movement on the opposite side of the yard catches my eye. My muscles tense, preparing to spill more blood, but at the sight of wolves jumping the iron fence and cutting through the raised garden beds and hedges, I relax.
