Chapter 152

Kayla

I stared wide-eyed down at Nora’s unmoving body, at the pool of blood forming around her abdomen. She coughed and sputtered, eyes glazed over, already worlds away from this place by the time I found her.

The warrior said that he had accidentally pushed her too hard during a spar, and she fell against a jagged boulder sticking out of the ground. It impaled Nora’s abdomen almost clean through, the sharp corner pushing through the soft flesh of her belly.

She was almost dead by the time Nicholas arrived. She wasn’t even breathing.

My hands moved over her, years of training trying to kick in, but I kept coming up short. If I gave her chest compressions, then it would just make her bleed even more. If I tried to move her, then it might scramble her organs and make the wound bigger. And I couldn’t create a tourniquet in that area—it wouldn’t work.

Finally, just as Nicholas was dropping to his knees beside me, shouting at the warrior to run and get the medics, my instincts kicked in. I ripped off my jacket without even thinking, holding the fabric against Nora’s abdomen.

“Hold it there as hard as you can,” I instructed. Then, I bent over and tilted Nora’s head back, pinching her nose gently and using my other hand to open her mouth. Taking a deep breath, I pressed my mouth to hers, creating a seal between our lips, and I gently breathed into her lungs.

I had to keep Nora alive. I had to. She couldn’t die now—not when we had only just formed a tentative peace, not when I had only just begun to know her after months of hating each other.

She had to live.

As I breathed life into her lungs, tears and blood that wasn’t my own coating my face in equal measure, I cursed myself inwardly for not taking the initiative to get to know Nora over the past months.

She was cruel, yes. She was vindictive and angry and rude, and I had bought right into it when I shouldn’t have.

I was her Luna, for Goddess’ sake. And I had gotten so wrapped up in petty squabbles that I hadn’t even thought to get to know the members of my own pack. I should have been leading them, talking to them, showing them that I was their friend and leader, not… this.

And now here Nora was, bleeding out on the forest floor, not breathing, and I might never be able to tell her that I was sorry for not taking the chance to get to know her before it was too late.

I didn’t realize how long I had been giving her the breath of life until I suddenly felt hands on me, pulling me back.

“No!” I snarled, kicking against whoever was pulling me away. “Don’t—”

“Kayla.”

Nicholas cupped my blood-and-sweat-soaked face between his hands, forcing me to look at him—really look at him for the first time in ages. His eyes were hard, but not angry and cold like they had been since the wedding. Rather, the small galaxies of bright stars that I used to lose myself in stared back at me, drawing me out of my haze and toward the present.

When I finally came back to my senses, I looked over and saw that multiple pack medics, led by Jade, had surrounded Nora. I couldn’t even see her amongst the fray.

“I-Is she alive?” I whispered, wrenching my face away from Nicholas’s palms.

Nicholas’s face was ashen. But Jade glanced over her shoulder and nodded once.

“She’s breathing, thanks to you,” she said, then looked at Nicholas. “Get Kayla out of here. We’re taking Nora to the hospital. She’s stable.”

My eyes widened. “I want to go with her.”

“No,” Jade said firmly, holding out her hand to stop me. “She’ll be okay, Kayla. You need to get warm and dry.”

I looked down at my thin white tank top, realizing for the first time that it was soaked all the way through with Nora’s blood. Surely there was a thick layer of sweat and grime as well underneath the blood, from three days spent in the forest. And in the frigid winter air, my bare skin was trembling and pale, having given up my coat for Nora’s cause.

Before I could protest further, Nicholas whisked me off my feet, gathering me in his arms like I was as light as a feather. He strode quickly toward the edge of the forest—I was surprised to find that we weren’t nearly as far as I thought we were this whole time—and then veered toward the house.

“I’m fine,” I huffed, straining against him, but he wouldn’t let me go. Wordlessly, his jaw set hard, he carried me inside and up the stairs to my bedroom.

Only then, once we were safely inside my room, did he set me down. I didn’t realize just how much my legs were trembling until I nearly collapsed, having to grab the bedpost to stay upright.

Jaw ticking, Nicholas strode into the en suite bathroom. I heard the water start running, then a moment later, he returned.

“Let’s get you cleaned up,” he said, reaching for my belt.

My face flushed and I swatted his hands away. “I can do it myself,” I insisted. Nicholas frowned and let me try, but my fingers were numb from the cold and I couldn’t get a grip on the buckle.

Finally, I relented and let him undress me.

His hands worked quickly but methodically as he unbuckled my belt, pulling it free from the loops. He then unbuttoned and unzipped my pants, gently tugging them down to reveal my shaking legs.

My body heated as he carefully undressed me, the bathtub filling in the background. He gently lifted my shirt off over my head, grimacing at the state of it.

“Just throw it away,” I muttered, looking away in shame.

Nicholas nodded and tossed it in the nearby fireplace to be burned later. I was in nothing but my bra and panties now, which were equally as filthy as the outside of my clothes, but he led me to the bathroom and turned his back while I slipped them off and stepped into the water.

Once I was submerged up to my chest, I cleared my throat. “Okay,” I said, and Nicholas turned, his eyes briefly darting to the line where the water met my nude body before he knelt beside the tub. “I can wash myself, you know.”

But Nicholas didn’t respond as he picked up the sponge and began to gently scrub up and down my body. My face flushed an even deeper crimson, but I remained silent after that, too.

As he gently washed me, I felt a strange sensation settle over me—not arousal like I might have once felt at his touch, but something else. Something deeper. Something tender and… I couldn’t put my finger on the last feeling, but it was more comforting than I wanted to admit.

Nicholas worked in silence the entire time, his eyes never meeting mine but never leaving my body. The stern set to his brow was the same it had been since the wedding, but his gaze was softer now, his touch tender and caring.

I was still mad at him. Still hurt. But as he gently scrubbed the blood and grime from my body, I felt something soften inside of me, washing down the drain with the rest of it.

When he was finished, he brought me a towel and left me to dry off.

“I want to go to the hospital,” I called as I dried my body, then slipped into my robe. “To check on Nora.”

Nicholas’s voice was firm through the wood of the door. “No. If we don’t attend the feast, the pack will panic. She’ll be fine, Kayla. Jade said she’s stable.”

I opened my mouth to protest, but quickly snapped it shut again. Not because I knew he was right, but because outside, through my bathroom window, I could see the feast in full swing below.

And the stag, stripped of his white fur and fuzzy antlers, was being loaded onto the spit above the raging bonfire.