Wake up, tola. I’m here for you. Wake up!
She didn’t answer me after that and it terrified me. I fought hard and cut down male after male, I ignored the wound that had been inflicted upon my body because only one thing mattered. Getting to Levi.
Nalex?
My heart jumped when her voice filled my head.
Levi! I shouted as loud as I could through our metal link. Don’t block me out. You’ve been blocking me out because you’re scared. Fear acts as your shield, so don’t block me out.
I’m not scared, she said. Nicah and Asia are okay. They’re free of him. I saved them like my mama saved me.
Like her mother saved her? My blood ran cold. Levi’s mother died to save her.
I’m coming to you. Keep talking to me, and I’ll find you.
He shot me, she said. He shot me, but it’s okay.
Just as my mate spoke the words, I rounded the homestead and saw her lying a ways away on the ground, flat on her back.
“No!”
My roar was deafening even to my own ears. I sprinted over to my mate, dropped my weapons, threw myself onto my knees next to her, and gathered her up into my arms instantly. My eyes zeroed in onto the large gaping hole in her midriff. A fear that I was familiar with slid around my body and hugged me in greeting.
I had been in this very situation before, I had held Kovu as she died, and I refused to do the same for Levi. She wasn’t leaving me; she was mine to spend the remaining centuries of my life with. She was the female who would birth my young. She was the daystar light in my life, and I would not lose her.
I would not.
“You came for me … I knew you would.”
Levi’s beautiful duo-coloured eyes stared up at me, and she smiled. She looked so serene that it almost made my heart skip a beat.
“Breathe,” I demanded. “Breathe, my heart.”
“I love you,” she said, completely overwhelming me. “I’ve loved you for so long. I should have told you, nalex. I should have told you every minute of every day.”
She thought she was declaring her love for me, but I knew what she was doing. She was saying goodbye. She said she loved me, but I had already known that for terms. I could feel how she felt for me when we were intimate, and her walls were down, and she was bare to me. She couldn’t hide those three little words that warmed my heart, even if she tried.
“You can tell me every minute of every day from this day forth,” I rasped. “Just stay awake. You’re going to be okay.”
It wasn’t until then that I realised that was lissa was already focused. The second I touched my mate’s bare skin, I had it focused and began healing her instantly. I did not realise until then because normally, I had to close my eyes to focus my lissa, but not today. My instincts were wild, and they controlled my lissa, not my mind.
Within Levi’s body, my lissa was rapidly growing new flesh to replace the lost organs, tissue and skin that Enik’s blaster had blown through. While I worked, I was tapped into the scenes around me. I heard that a battle was no longer raging, and one by one, I felt the males of my company reach my space.
They surrounded Levi and me to protect us both while I healed her.
“I’m so sorry,” Levi whimpered in my arms. “I shouldn’t have left the palace. I should have let you keep me in our wing where we were safe.”
“Shush, my love, shush,” I soothed, my eyes on her. “You’ve nothing to be sorry for.”
“Ezah…” She gasped. “Please—”
The scream that left me was one of raw pain. The agony that filled my body the second I felt my mate’s heart stop beating hurt so badly that I felt it as physical pain. Every nerve in my body felt like it was being stabbed repeatedly. It was like nothing I had ever felt before in my entire life.
“No,” I roared. “No, please. Thanas, don’t take her. I beg of you. Please!”
I couldn’t hear what was happening around me. It felt like my roar was still echoing in my ears.
“No!” I bellowed once again. “Don’t take her from me. She’s mine! She is my happiness, my heart. Do not take her from me, great one. Take me instead!”
Nothing answered me as tears ran down my cheeks like a river.
I squeezed Levi’s body, and I used every ounce of strength I had to hone the focus of my lissa. I directed a huge surge of energy towards Levi’s unmoving heart. My eyes were open when I delivered the surge, and what I saw was magnificent. The glow under my palms shone brighter than ever before, and I watched as the beaming light entered Levi’s body and made a beeline directly for her heart.