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I’m vaguely aware of movement all around me. Everything is muted, as if I’m underwater.
I drop to my knees and sink my hands into Kyan’s thick pelt. I can’t sense any sign of life.
No pulse, no lifting of his ribs to denote breathing. Nothing.
Finally, I raise my head to find Ammie and Sapphire standing over me. There’s blood and sand in Sapph’s tangled hair. She’s trembling, but her gaze is lucid, and her grip is firm when her hand lands on my shoulder.
“Is he dead?” she asks. I flinch at the emptiness of her tone. She must be as drained as me.
And Ky...
I release a sob. “I don’t know. I think...”
I can’t say it out loud. I don’t want it to be true.
Around us, the battle seems to have died down. The remaining demon wraiths and enemy hellhounds have vanished. All that is left are small groups of Ky’s shifters, clustered together around their injured, and their dead.
A shadow falls over me, and I swipe a hand across my face, drying my tears, before looking up.
A hellhound looms over us. He is almost as big as Ky. The fuzz around his muzzle is flecked with a touch of gray, and he has a jagged scar—an obviously old injury, not from today’s battle—showing through the fur on his right flank.
I don’t know who this is, but he is staring at Kyan as if willing him to live.
I get to my feet and the shifter transfers his stare to me. It feels like a battle of wills. I will not drop my gaze. Eventually, the hound bows his head slightly as if in supplication, and then lopes off.
What was that about? I don’t speak shifter language.
A tiny noise, so faint that I almost miss it, catches my attention.
The hound lying at my feet is gone. In its place, a naked Kyan lies curled on his side... and now I can ascertain the faintest movement of his chest, rising and falling.
“He’s alive!”
I crouch, my heart rate thundering as I scan him from head to toe. There is no visible sign of injury; his skin is unbroken. Why is he not awake? Something is wrong.
He shifted back. Is that a good sign?
“Ky?” I whisper.
He doesn’t respond.
“Okay.” My voice is full of false cheer, but I can’t seem to stop. “It’s okay. You’re totally fine. I’ve got you—and I’m going to heal you again, all right?”
I press a hand to his breastbone and gently roll him onto his back. He’s like a dead weight. I shove down the panic threatening to rise, and feel for his heartbeat. It is faint and thready, but it’s there.
“This’ll be three for three. You’ll owe me big time after this one, shifter man.”
My voice trembles, but Ky shudders slightly in response. Is that...a laugh?
“What did you go and do that for?” I ask. He’s so cold, like he’s taken a dip in icy water. After getting used to his higher-than-average body temperature, the coolness is frightening. “I had it under control.”
“Didn’t....” His eyelids flutter. His hand creeps out and touches my wrist, but then he releases a whimper. Even that small movement seems too much for him.
I bend down, close to his ear. “Don’t talk.” I stroke a stray lock of hair away from his eyes. “I know that’s hard for you, but just try, okay?”
A faint smile ghosts about his lips.
Please don’t let this be our last conversation. I don’t want the last words we say to each other to be laced with sarcasm.
Still, the sound of my voice seems to calm him. He remains still as I lay my hands on his chest again, more firmly this time.
I look up at my cousins. They watch us both with carefully neutral expressions.
“Will you help me? You know healing isn’t my strongest suit. And, I don’t have much left in the tank.”
Without hesitation, both Ammie and Sapphire step forward and kneel down beside me.
“Of course,” Sapphire says. “I don’t have much left, either, but what I have is yours.”
“Me too,” Ammie adds. “We need to wake him up properly, so I can apologize. What do you need from us?”
“He’s seems to be freezing. We need to counter it with warmth. Restore the balance.”
I use magic to cut my finger and swipe blood across my other palm. I have so little power left; I need the direct touch of my blood to boost the spell. Then I concentrate, allowing the warming spell to flood through me. I feel my cousins’ magic entwine with mine—the dreamy quality of Amethyst’s and the fierce, almost battle-like dark-light from Sapphire.
Slowly, heat leaches from my palms and into Ky. Starting where my hands connect with him, directly over his heart, I visualize healing energy spreading to every region of his body. His skin begins to return to its natural tawny hue as the blood magic flows.
When I look up, I realize we have an audience. The whole pack is gathered around us, their gazes fixed on Kyan.
He shifts beneath my touch, moaning and half-opening his eyes before he settles.
When his body is properly warm, I withdraw my hands and allow myself to exhale.
I sit back on my heels in the sand, and wait for him to wake fully. And then, I wait some more.
Kyan—sexy, stubborn, impossible Kyan—seems to have fallen straight back into unconsciousness.
***
The next few hours pass in scattered fragments.
I move in a dreamlike state, only half-listening to Amethyst as she leads us to a disused beach house a little way up the shoreline. I let her drag me up the front steps to the porch, my hand trailing over the peeling white paint on the handrail.
Behind us, the pack is mostly silent. A couple have retained their shifter forms, but the majority are human again. The fact that there are a whole bunch of naked people hanging around us on the beach, feels like the least weird thing that has happened the past few days.
Some of the pack took Burley’s broken body and disappeared somewhere—whether back to the pack lands, or through some portal to their Otherworld origins, is unclear.
Others from the pack are injured; Sapphire weaves her way through the group as they straggle over the sand behind us. Her face is pale and strained. She must be close to the end of her energy. And yet still, she reaches out to push a burst of healing energy through the wounded every so often.
Sweet Sapphire. Strong Sapphire. How does she still have anything left in the tank?
Not for the first time, I consider that Ammie’s little sister might be the most powerful witch of us all.
That is a thought for later. For now, I need to focus on Kyan. He is still unconscious. One of his pack mates carries him, flanked by two other men. All the shifters’ faces are like stone, but I know it’s a façade. Their leader fell in that battle, and it isn’t guaranteed that Ky will make it, either.
The pack are likely just as terrified as I am.
They carry Kyan up the steps of the cottage, and one of the men shoulders open the front door after Ammie pushes a small burst of magic into the lock. Inside, the house is neat and homely. Judging by the leaflets pinned to the noticeboard in the kitchen, it’s some kind of holiday cottage. Lucky for us, there’s no sign of occupation at the moment.
I exchange a silent look with Amethyst. She merely shrugs in a very un-Amethyst-like manner.
I guess we’re breaking and entering.
It seems to be turning into a habit, for me.
I can’t bring myself to care. I follow the shifter carrying Ky up to the next level, to a small bedroom overlooking the sea. He lays Ky out on the bed and turns to look at me.
“We were never introduced. I’m Dane. Kyan’s second, now that Burley is...”
Raw pain flares in his expression.
“Dane. I’m so sorry for your loss.”
He nods and, noting the flecks of gray in the man’s dark hair and the jagged scar on his right hip, I realize this was the hellhound who nodded at me earlier. I stare at him, unsure what it all means. Was he acknowledging me earlier? As Kyan’s healer, or his mate?
“Um, when you say you’re Ky’s second, does that mean—”
“It means Kyan is our new Alpha.”
“I...see.”
And I do. The desperation in the air is almost palpable, and now it makes more sense. The pack have lost their leader. They cannot afford to lose another, within the space of an hour or two.
“Do you know what’s wrong with him?” Dane’s question is straight to the point.
My heart squeezes in my chest as I move closer and lay a hand on the coverlet beside Ky’s arm.
“I don’t know.” My voice is thin, almost a whisper. I hate that I feel so powerless. “The demon wraith sent something after me. I’ve never seen it before... It looked like a ribbon of black but there was no scent. It wasn’t smoke, I’m sure of it. I couldn’t stop it. It just kept coming. And then Kyan leapt in front of me and... the black ribbon seemed to disappear right inside of him.”
I trail off as Dane’s eyes flare red, as if he doesn’t like what I’ve said. And yet he remains silent for a long moment, before turning to stare out the window.
I follow his gaze. Outside, the sea is calm and bright. No trace of the death and destruction that graced the beach a short time ago. On any other day, the view would be a peaceful one.
“Kyan is like a brother to me,” Dane says, his voice gruff. “I would die for him, if I had to.”
“I believe you.”
He grunts. “It took him a long time to settle into his role in our pack.” Dane turns his gaze back to me, and his eyes are shadowed. “He kept acting out, refusing to acknowledge his place with us. Not wanting to accept that he might one day need to step up as Alpha. And then, one day, he began to accept. Now that the day is here...”
He might not live long enough to take up the mantle.
He doesn’t need to say the words out loud. I can almost hear them in my own head.
I think back to the other night. Kyan’s firm body pressing me down into the mattress, the feel of him inside me. The complete rightness of our coupling, despite the horrific circumstances of our meeting.
“I won’t let him die. But I need to know about the black smoke ribbon thing. I saw it in your face. You know what it is. Please tell me.”
Dane pins me with a dark stare. “That black smoke... demons call it Shadow’s Bane. One touch of the stuff will stop the heart of most mortal creatures—supernatural and non-supe alike.”
Shadow’s Bane? Fear clenches tight in my chest. “But... Kyan isn’t dead.”
Dane’s mouth twists. “Like I said, most mortal creatures. Kyan comes from the Otherworld, from the place where demons rise. To him—to us—their magic isn’t quite as deadly.”
I cast a glance down at Ky, like his eyes might suddenly snap open. “Then why doesn’t he wake up?”
“If it was Shadow’s Bane that felled him, then he still took a direct hit of demonic energy.” Dane lays a hand on my arm before he crosses the room. In the doorway, he lingers. “Hellhound shifters are tough, but that kind of magic... there are no guarantees.
“We are hot-blooded creatures, Topaz. Born from the pits of Hell. Shadow’s Bane is designed to freeze the life out of anything it touches. Keep him warm, and pray to whatever deities you believe in. He’ll either wake up, or he won’t. We’ll stand guard to keep you safe in the meantime.”
