I didn't want to cry, but my eyes burned and swelled with unshed tears.
This past year had wrung me dry. There was nothing left to give.
The first breakdown came when I discovered the Alpha who'd once sworn to bond with me for life had betrayed our pack—for a high-born Beta female barely past her first shift.
When Lily had a fever, one howl from Raven Frosthollow was all it took. He'd abandoned us and walked out of the den without a backward glance.
Then came the despair. Alaric's cruelty knew no bounds. To force my hand so he could claim Raven openly before the pack, he'd cut off our share of the tribute entirely.
But what could I do?
I'd refused to accept the Bond Rejection because I wanted Lily to have an intact pack family. But tonight, at that birthday moot, Alaric's words had slapped me awake.
An Alpha who could use his own pup as a bargaining chip to please his intended mate—keeping him in our lives would only cast an endless shadow over my child's future.
If he was so desperate to run to his chosen female, then fine. Let him go.
A dull ache throbbed in my chest, making it hard to breathe. I forced myself to stand, intending to check on Lily in her sleeping chamber.
She'd cried so hard earlier. I was worried the stress might trigger her condition overnight.
But before I reached the door, a heavy thud echoed from inside the room.
Like something had hit the floor.
My heart lurched. A terror I'd never known before seized my throat.
"Lily?"
I shoved the door open and called forth a dim glow from the wall sconces.
My daughter—who should have been curled asleep in her nest—was crumpled on the stone floor. Her tiny body convulsed violently, her face mottled purple, foam frothing at her lips. Her eyes had rolled back, and her throat produced a horrible rasping wheeze, like broken bellows struggling for air.
A breath-crash from her lung-curse.
Lily had been born with the condition—a weakness in her chest that made breathing difficult when cold or panic struck. The pack healers had warned me over and over—no major stress, no intense crying.
"Lily! Don't scare Mama! Lily!"
I lunged forward and scooped her up, my hands shaking uncontrollably.
Her body was burning hot beneath her fur-lined sleeping gown. Her breathing had faded to almost nothing.
Raw terror shattered every rational thought.
I scrambled for the healing herbs and tinctures in the medicine chest—the special blend the healers had prepared for emergencies like this.
It wasn't there. The spot where the remedy should have been was empty.
Then I remembered—two days ago, Alaric had torn through the healing supplies looking for a salve for his training wounds, scattering everything. I hadn't had time to reorganize it.
No remedy.
The movements in my arms grew weaker by the second. I didn't stop for my cloak. I grabbed my daughter and ran for the den's entrance, reaching through the pack bond to find Alaric's presence.
Thunder rolled outside. Rain hammered down in sheets, cold enough to freeze the marrow.
We lived in the outer estate—the pack healers would take at least twenty minutes to reach us through this storm. But Alaric had left less than five minutes ago. If he just turned around, if he carried us to the healing hall at his Alpha speed, it would only take ten minutes.
This was a life.
I pushed through the bond, desperate, calling out with everything I had.
Finally, a split second before the connection would have faded completely, someone responded.
I clutched at the thread of awareness like a lifeline, my voice cracking into a desperate scream through our fading link.
"Alaric! Come back! Please, come back now! Lily's having a breath-crash—she's going into shock! Come back and take us to the healers! I'm begging you!"
But the presence that answered through the bond wasn't Alaric's frantic response.
It was a female's presence—soft, satisfied, laced with drowsiness and mockery.
Raven Frosthollow.
"Oh my, if it isn't Selene."
"Alaric left his mind open to me when he fell asleep in my den."
"So you really accepted the Bond Rejection?"
"Yes, I accepted it. Can you wake him now? Tell him to come back—something's happened to Lily—"
