“What happened?” I heard someone asked as I broke my kiss with Merlin and dropped my head to his chest, suddenly exhausted.
“Guinevere!” Arthur’s voice carried over the sudden cacophony of bewilderment.
I could feel him again and the relief was so potent that my knees gave out just as I was pulled into a pair of strong arms.
“Are you hurt? I tried to break free but I could not,” Arthur told me, his voice panicked as his big hands ran over my body checking for injuries.
“I’m not,” I told him as I threw my arms around his neck and held on for dear life. “But Lancelot is, can you take me over to him?”
Arthur’s breathing was heavy as he moved to where Gawain and Bedivere were sitting on either side of Lancelot who looked pale again, his back weeping from freshly opened wounds.
“Lancelot, I—” Arthur began as he stared down at his handiwork with horror.
Lancelot held up a hand to stop him. “It is nothing, your majesty, you were not in your right mind.”
“My dreams did not show me this part,” Arthur said so softly that only I could hear it. I made a mental note to ask him about it later as I gave him a gentle tap to put me down.
My legs were wobbly as I crouched next to Lancelot and called upon my magic. It came easily, almost eagerly, to my fingers as I pressed my hands into Lancelot’s back, willing the flesh to knit itself together again.
It would leave scars—some of the wounds were too deep even for my healing abilities—but at least he would be whole again.
People spoke around me as I worked and I could hear Andrivete and Kay asking Arthur questions before beginning to give orders in an effort to organize our people.
I ignored it all and continued to pour my magic into Lancelot’s back until a pair of callused hands stopped me.
“Guinevere, love,” Gawain whispered as he pulled my hands away. “You look pale.”
“Do I?” I asked dazedly. I hadn’t realized how much of my magic had been used up today and just how nauseous I still felt from my heat being left unattended to.
My ears began to ring loudly as the world flashed a bright white, then everything went black. Then I was lost.
Chapter Forty
“And you are certain she has disappeared?” I asked Sir Kay as I sat against the headboard of my bed with my omega lying against my chest. She had fainted an hour ago and had not stirred since.
The healers found nothing wrong with her aside from a few burns on her feet and ankles from the flames of the pyre.
The same pyre that I could remember ordering to be built. The one that I had thrown the torch onto myself.
I closed my eyes tight for a moment, trying to banish the image of Guinevere’s wide eyes and the fear in her voice as she called out to me from my memory.
But I had been a prisoner in my own mind, watching with horror as my own hand dropped the torch and walked away as the sound of her cries followed me.
When I first had the dream about the events of the past few days, I knew that something was going to happen—that I would not be in my right mind and that there would be fire.
Like all of my dream visions, they were a muddled mess of images and sounds—the only clear one being a pair of purple eyes and fingers covering my face.
I had not expected Merlin to be trapped by Morgana, nor had I expected to come back to the castle and discover my omega in heat wrapped up safely in Lancelot’s arms, only for me to rip her from them despite the joy I felt inside of my mind at the sight.
My gaze drifted down to the purple bruises on her arms and the shadows beneath her closed eyes.
She had been to the hells and back, her body covered in soot and the scent of her heat still very much present on her body underneath the smell of smoke.
Gawain was gently wiping a wet cloth up and down her arms and legs, cleaning the smudges from her body as his expression was as morose as mine must have been.
Lancelot, who also remained asleep, was stretched out in the bed next to us, just as he should be. I could now feel his end of the bond and the relief he felt even in his dreams.
We were whole and I finally understood what Merlin meant by a pack fated to be. I was not alone in my guilt, I could feel it wafting off of the other two alphas in the room as they worked to right what had gone amiss.
