Chapter 41

Esther’s POV

The clock on the pediatric wing wall ticked so loudly it felt like a hammer inside my skull. Each second was another beat of dread. I’d sat through dozens of these checkups before—Carl’s symptoms waxing and waning—but tonight something in Dr. Reynold’s expression made my stomach lurch before she even opened her mouth.

“Esther…” She hesitated in the doorway, chart pressed to her chest like a shield. “We need to talk. In my office.”

I stood, smoothing the wrinkles out of my scrub top as if that could iron the panic from my face. “Is it about the latest labs?”

She nodded once. Her eyes darted to Carl, asleep under a warm blue blanket, then back to me.

“I don’t want to alarm him.”

“Of course.” My voice was a rasp. I leaned down and kissed Carl’s damp forehead. He always sweated during his naps now, a side effect of the suppressants. Then I followed Dr. Reynold into the hallway.

The office smelled faintly of antiseptic and old paper. She closed the door behind me and exhaled slowly.

“The medication cocktail is losing efficacy. The markers we use to measure the feral break threshold have doubled in the last week.”

My hands curled into fists. “We just increased his dose three days ago.”

“I know. That’s why it’s so concerning. His system is adapting faster than we can adjust. It’s the Alpha blood. Stronger, more volatile. We’re running out of time.”

A faint buzzing filled my ears. I had feared this for months but hearing it confirmed snapped something inside me. “What… what options do we have left?”

“We’re working with the research board to fast-track a new suppressant, but it’s still in animal trials. Even if we get emergency clearance, it won’t be ready for months.” She leaned forward. “We need a breakthrough. Something outside the usual protocols.”

Something outside. My mind immediately jumped to Sharon—my wolf—dormant for six years like a seed under frozen soil. If she would wake up, if she would lend me her healer’s strength, maybe I could stabilize Carl myself.

But Sharon slept on, unreachable.

“I’ll find a way,” I whispered, not to the doctor but to myself.

Dr. Reynold squeezed my arm. “Esther, I’ve seen how hard you work. But at some point, you can’t do this alone. If there’s anyone—”

“There isn’t.” I forced a brittle smile. “Thank you for telling me the truth.”

She hesitated, clearly wanting to say more, then gave me a small nod and left me alone with my shaking hands.

I returned to Carl’s room like a ghost. The night lights cast pale halos on the floor, and the beeping of monitors was the only music. He looked so small in the bed, this boy who carried Nicholas’s fierce blood. He should have been unstoppable; instead he was chained by his own body.

I sat on the edge of his mattress and brushed a strand of black hair from his forehead. Even in sleep, his brows knit like mine when I’m worrying. His lashes fluttered at my touch.

“Mom?” His voice was a paper whisper.

“I’m here, sweetheart.” I leaned closer. “Go back to sleep.”

“Dream again,” he mumbled. “Running. Can’t stop.”

My throat constricted. These dreams always came before an outbreak.

“You’re safe. I’m here.” I pressed my palm lightly to his chest and began humming an old lullaby I learned as a child. It used to soothe Nicholas, too, once upon a time, though he’d never admit it.

Carl’s breathing steadied. As I held him, a faint warmth stirred under my own skin. For a heartbeat, it felt like Sharon shifted. I felt the flitter of a paw against the inside of my ribs, a breath of silver fur against my heart. My wolf, long silent.

I froze, scarcely daring to breathe.

“Sharon?” I whispered in my mind. The warmth pulsed again, then flickered out. But it was something. The first something in years.

Tears filled my eyes. “We need you,” I mouthed. “He needs you.”

Carl sighed and rolled toward me. In sleep, his hand found mine and clutched it. His grip was weak but it anchored me.

The hospital ward emptied as night deepened. Nurses moved like pale ghosts, changing IVs, lowering blinds. I stayed by Carl’s bed, my free hand resting on my own belly where the phantom ache of Sharon’s absence throbbed.

I pictured Nicholas’s face with the cruel mask he wore whenever he accused me of being Kevin’s mistress and the disgust when he thought about my “illegitimate” children. If he knew Carl and Sofia were his, would he help or would he snatch them away to raise as heirs under his thumb?

The image of his courtroom-cold stare when he’d sentenced me to slavery years ago still burned me awake at night. And yet… tonight, in my exhaustion, I could almost remember a different Nicholas as the boy who used to look at me like I was sunlight.

If I told him the truth, would that Nicholas resurface? Or would he crush me harder for daring to lie all these years?

Carl stirred again, his small hand twitching against mine. His skin was warm, feverish. The monitors blipped warningly.

I bent over him, my hair spilling around his face. “I’m here, sweetheart. Mommy’s here.”

He whimpered. “It’s dark. Wolf’s coming.”

“No wolf. Just dreams.” I swallowed back a sob.

Hours blurred. I drifted in and out, my forehead resting on my crossed arms beside Carl. The scent of antiseptic mixed with his shampoo. In my half-dream, Sharon prowled a cage of light behind my eyelids, tail lashing, eyes the same green as mine.

You chained yourself, she growled without sound. You bound me long ago.

Her teeth bared, but her gaze softened at the image of Carl. Blood calls to blood. Mate calls to mate. If you want me awake, go back.

I jerked awake, heart hammering. Sharon’s voice faded like mist. But the message lingered: Mate calls to mate.

Could it be that simple? Could proximity to Nicholas rouse her fully?

I pressed a trembling hand to my mouth. The idea terrified me more than it comforted. Nicholas was a tempest, and going back into his orbit might tear me apart again. But Carl’s chart lay at the foot of the bed, full of damning numbers ticking downward. We were running out of time.

“Mom?”

His whisper was weaker now, but his eyes cracked open, pupils huge and black in the dim light.

“Hey, hey.” I stroked his hair. “It’s okay.”

“Promise…” He licked dry lips. “… promise I won’t hurt Sofia?”

My heart twisted. “You won’t, baby. We’ll stop it before it gets that far.”

“Don’t let them kill me.”

I pressed my forehead to his, tears spilling. “Never. I’ll protect you. I swear it.”

He blinked once, then slid back into a fevered doze.

When the monitors calmed again, I sat upright, wiping my cheeks. My hands trembled over his blanket.

I pulled out my small leather notebook, the one I’d kept since arriving at Blue Lake Pack. Flipping past pages of dosages and healing runes, I found the blank sheet I’d reserved for desperate ideas.

I wrote Mate bond? Sharon? in jagged letters. Underneath I scribbled all the snippets of lore I remembered from healer training: shared energy, healing amplification, the power of touch.

Could Nicholas’s proximity be the key?

It was madness to even think it. Yet Sharon’s phantom claws still tingled beneath my sternum.

The pen slipped from my fingers. I stared at the ceiling tiles.

If I returned to him, I would be at his mercy. He could destroy me. But if I didn’t, Carl might die.

My mind ran through all the nights I had whispered “never again,” all the times I’d sworn I’d never crawl back to the Alpha King who broke me. Those vows felt paper-thin next to Carl’s shallow breaths.

It was past two in the morning when the last nurse left the wing. Silence settled like dust. The only sound was the hum of machines and Carl’s labored breathing.

I rose and walked to the window. Beyond the glass, the pack’s central square was deserted, streetlamps glowing halos in the mist. Somewhere out there, Nicholas was probably awake too, his wolf pacing as mine once had.

My reflection in the glass was a stranger: pale face, dark circles, eyes full of exhaustion and rage and fear. “Who are you anymore?” I murmured.

No answer but my own breath fogging the window.

I returned to Carl’s bedside and sat again. His hand had fallen to the side, fingers curling loosely. I picked it up, pressing it to my lips.

“I don’t care what it takes,” I whispered against his knuckles. “I’ll find a way.”

His eyelids fluttered, a tiny sound escaping as half a dream and half a plea. My tears splashed onto his skin.

“I’ll do anything,” I said, louder this time. “Do you hear me, Carl? Anything.”

For a heartbeat, a strange sensation rippled through me like a heartbeat answering from deep within the earth.

Sharon? Or just my own desperation echoing back? Either way, it was a vow. A binding one.

I stayed like that until dawn, my fingers locked around my son’s. The sky outside the window paled from ink to silver. Nurses came and went softly, casting curious glances at me but saying nothing.

Inside me, something had shifted. A grim clarity settled over the fear. The time for hiding was ending. The time for risking everything was close.

But for now, all I could do was hold on to the small warm hand in mine and whisper the promise again and again, as if repetition alone could carve it into fate:

“I’ll do anything to save you.”

Under my skin, faint as a tremor before an earthquake, my wolf stirred.