I sprangto catch Addie before she could collapse. She landed on me right before hitting the ground. The two other wolves, yet unnamed, came over to nudge her with their noses. A burst of warmth blossomed around us.
It wasn’t that they were superheated. No, I realized that Addie was cold.
Panicked, I twisted to get a better look at Addie. Her cheeks were cold and gray. My heart lurched. A chill spread through my chest. It made my heart thunder and my beast anxious. I whimpered and lowered myself beside her, so I could rub my cheek along hers.
The beast’s instincts flared, overwhelming my logical mind.
I used logical loosely.
No, I used it as a lie to cover what I was really feeling. The panic swelling in my gut hid my fear. I refused to believe that she’d sacrificed her own life only todelaythis fight. Even from here, I could still hear the other wolf howling and thrashing in the cage that Addie had built for him.
The other two wolves flanked her. They pressed their noses to her and exhaled. Some sort of alchemy happened right before my eyes. Life flowed between the wolves and into Addie. I lunged and nipped the female wolf before she gave everything over to Addie, but the wolf paid little attention to me.
“Tell Ness she doesn’t have to forgive me,” a sorrowful male voice said before vanishing.
Before my eyes, light flowed from the wolves and funneled into Addie. Warmth filled the air. Then, in an instant, the wolves fell apart. Their bodies rotted and turned to dust that flew away on the slightest breeze.
No portal to the afterlife opened, though. Their spirits didn’t slip away to live on happily ever after. No, they were gone for good. Both gave everything they had left over to Addie.
She woke with a gasp. Bolting upright, her head collided with mine. She let out a sound of pain and winced, grasping for her forehead.
Flinging her hand away from her head, she looked out over the estate with wide, fearful eyes. My beast moved to comfort her without thinking. I wanted to wrench control back from the creature, but now wasn’t the time. Addie had just come back from near death.
Over and over, she came close to death. I wasn’t going to lose her. I would stay right beside her while we saw this through. With Paige, I made the mistake of letting her out of my sight. I’d thought that she needed the space, but she’d needed someone to keep her safe.