Undying Hate~ Book Three

“Get him on the bed.” Amira flitted around, opening her cabin windows as Rowan carried an unconscious Elias into the room.

Sylvie followed closely beside them, holding his cold limp hand while Kian walked behind her. He sent calming waves through her, but Elias’ condition still filled her with anxiety. He had never faltered, at least not like this. Now she wished she had paid more attention when he started paling or shaking after their rapid shifts across realms.

“Wake up, wake up, wake up,” she chanted softly as Rowan laid him on the crinkly plastic of Amira’s bed.

“Do you have a tube we can use to get some blood into him?” Kian asked, perching himself beside the bed.

Amira paused and narrowed her eyes, thinking. “Yes, I believe I do.”

“Good. Rowan, can you grab six bags of Type O from the blood stores.”

He grunted his reply and dashed from the room, leaving Sylvie sitting on a stool at Elias’ side in a daze. Her eyes wandered after the rapidly moving and speaking Amira, but she couldn’t keep up. The world moved faster than she could follow.

Swaying and nauseous, she turned her gaze back to Elias’ face, the paleness startling. His veins shone through his skin, and his chest’s slow laboured rise and fall drew her attention. She stared at his heart, almost seeing the irregular beat through the skin of his chest. Where had his shirt gone? She fingered the fabric absently dangling off the bed into her lap, barely noticing the jagged cuts from Amira’s scissors.

Rowan returned in a rush of feet, and Brodi and Shan followed. Their gaze jumped between Sylvie and Elias.

“What happened?”

“Are you alright, your Majesty?”

Sylvie just shook her head and returned to her numb staring.

“Portal sickness,” Rowan growled, running the back of his hand across Elias’ forehead. Sylvie looked up then, surprised by his tenderness and was rewarded with a gentle kiss on her temple.

“He’ll be okay, right, Kian?” Rowan said as Amira threaded a tube up Elias’ nostril and down his throat. Sylvie winced as Elias jerked on the table. His eyes remained closed, but a brief expression of pain crossed his face.

“You’re hurting him,” she whispered. Nobody heard her as a blood bag was connected to the tube, and the see-through plastic turned a dark red.

“Yes. We got to him fast enough. He just won’t be able to travel again for a few months. Maybe years.”

“But Argyncia-” Brodi started.

“Hush, would ye. Yer bloody blabberin won’t help him. An A’m tryin tae work.”

Amira came over and added a few drops of yellow liquid into Elias’ feeding tube and offered a steaming mug to Sylvie.

“Here. Drink this. It will help wi the shock. Finish every drop, an then give me the cup. Wi luck, A’ll be able tae get a readin about yer fate.”

She took the mug with shaking hands and took a sip.

“Any day now, lassie. Don’t sip it; drink the damn thin.”

With a huff, Sylvie tipped back her head and skulled the bitter mixture, returning the mug when she swallowed the last disgusting drop. She had to admit it made her mind clearer, though.

“Now what?”

“Now be quiet. All o ye.”

She looked sternly at everyone in the room through her bushy brows before grabbing a small plate. Then, with a clatter, she flipped the mug onto the plate and lifted it, revealing a blob of leafy mess.

Sylvie rolled her eyes and lowered her head onto Elias’ arm, the coolness helping ease the weird burn from Amira’s drink. She never really believed in the reading of tea leaves, it always seemed like a scam, but if Amira believed in it, it was probably legit. There were crazier things she had to believe.

She exhaled a sharp laugh through her nose and turned to face the healer again. From the corner of her eye, she could see Rowan’s focus on the plate and Kians’ raised brows at her. He probably heard her laugh and thought she was losing her mind. He wasn’t wrong. She was in the habit of losing her shit, and it only seemed to be getting worse.

Especially after becoming a lycan.

“Thare is darkness. Death. If fate is not heard, then death will follow ye, child. The division can be healit wi the end o a monster. Nay, a demon. A demon is hauntin the realms an will cause yer death if ye dae no kill thaim first.”

Amira shuddered and avoided Sylvie’s eyes.

“A’m sorry it couldn’t be more hopeful, lassie. But I ken ye are used tae the disappointment.”

Amira threw the plate on the bench, using the bottom of the mug to disperse the reading and returned to Elias’ side.

“Another bag, please, laddie,” she said to Rowan, holding out her shaking hand.

Rowan moved quickly, scooping up a blood bag and flicking off the stopper on the top. Amira grunted her thanks and hooked it up before throwing the other bag in a trash can under her workbench.

There was a scuffle outside, and a wide-eyed man appeared in the doorway. “Aunt Am’s?”

It took Sylvie more than a few seconds to realise he was Mattias, the same man she had once exposed to her particularly nasty potty mouth.

“We’re fine here, Mattie. Run along.”

He swallowed and looked between Kian, Sylvie and Rowan, the latter of which had a darkness in his eyes as his wolf prowled at the surface.

Rowan shifted closer to Sylvie, keeping his body facing Mattias. The trust had been broken between them, and even though Sylvie demanded haven for all the rescued shifters, Mattias still had a lot of making up to do, obviously. In Rowan’s eyes, at least.

Sylvie was almost indifferent. If Amira trusted him, then she would. However, she knew very little about the complex dynamics and understanding between blood families, so she let it be. Maybe it would come to her once she came face to face with Magnus again, but she doubted it. She sensed he didn’t even know she existed.

“I saw you with the blood bags- thought the Vampires had returned or something.” Mattias swallowed. “Is there anything I can do to help?”

A low growl vibrated from Rowan’s chest, but Sylvie took his hand and kissed it. The growl lessened, and Mattias gave Sylvie a jerky nod. She returned it and sighed.

“If no one else wants anything, then maybe you could run up to the main house and grab me a burrito from the fridge? I know it wasn’t exactly the help you offered, but I’m starving.” Her stomach rumbled as if to prove her point.

Rowan’s head snapped to her. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because I need you here.”

His eyes flashed, but a slight twitch on his lips meant he liked what she had said.

She turned to Mattias again. “Is that okay?”

“More than okay, Alpha. Thank you.” He turned and ran in the direction of the house. The genuine relief in his tone from her trust was enough to make her eyes burn. With a teary swallow, she dropped her head on Elias again, eyes shut.

A few minutes passed, and a tune appeared in her head. It was the same one her mother had hummed in her vision. She tried thinking of anything else, but the lilting melody remained. So instead of fighting it any longer, she exhaled and began humming it, eyes still closed and fingers stroking lightly down the lines of Elias’ abdomen.

The tune was short, breathy and wordless, but as she finished and opened her eyes, her mates, Amira, Brodi and Shan, stared wide-eyed.

“What?”

Blinking as if falling from a trance, Brodi and Shan turned to one another while Rowan knelt before her.

“Where did you hear that song?”

“Song? It’s just a weird sound that kept replaying in my head.”

“But where did you first hear it?”

Sylvie sighed. “In a vision of my mother.”

Kian’s voice cut about the rest of the group.

“It’s a Fae spell of rebirth. The Fates created it and gifted it to us.”

His jaw clenched, and throat bobbed as he walked behind her and rubbed her back. “And it’s not something you need to worry about right now. You need rest too.”

“I’m fine, Kian. I just need food.”

“Here, Alpha!”

Rowan spun and snatched the warm burrito from Mattias’ hands before sniffing it long and hard.

“Careful, Ro, sniff any harder, and you might get a bean up your nose.” He growled but handed her the food. Then, when she frowned at him, he spun and apologised for snatching.

“If you need anything, I’ll be outside.”

“Thank you, Mattias.”

“Off ye go, lad.”

She munched the burrito, lifting it to Rowan when his staring grew annoying, but he just shook his head. “No. I’ll get something soon. When he wakes up.”

“When do you think that will be Amira?” Sylvie asked between bites.

“Impossible tae ken. A few hours likely, a few days maybe. Best tae get yourself some rest an come again later. A’ll take good care o him.”

Sylvie shook her head immediately. “I appreciate that, Amira. I do, but I think I’ll stay with him.”

“We all will,” Kian added, glancing at Rowan.

Rowan nodded and grabbed a stool sitting at Sylvie’s side, letting her lean into him. His heat comforted her, along with the gentle waves of peace coming from Kian.

“As ye wish. But don’t come cryin’ tae me when ye have a crook neck from sleepin’ funny.”

Her words drew a tired smile from Sylvie. “We won’t.”

They wouldn’t, but Amira wasn’t wrong either. Sylvie awoke with dribble pooling under her cheek when the bed— no, body—she was lying on moved.

“Wife?” Elias’s croaking voice made butterflies flip around her stomach, and she jumped up to look at his face.

“I’m here.”

“You’re beautiful.” He lifted his hand to brush her face, but it snagged on his feeding tube.

“What the-” Elias snatched the tube from his face, throwing it at the wall with insane strength and wiping the dregs of blood from his nostril. Shuddering, he continued his path to her cheek. “Perfect.”

Kian cleared his throat and stepped into his eye line. “Amira gave you Plithias tears. Go easy.”

Elias frowned and bared his fangs. “Don’t tell me what to do, Kian, or I’ll tell her about your fetishes-”

“Shut your mouth.”

Kian’s eyes held barely restrained fury as Elias smiled contentedly—such a dope. Rowan pulled Kian back and looked Elias over with a half-smirk.

“That potion is really doing a number on you, isn’t it?”

Instead of answering, Elias took Sylvie’s hand and kissed it. Each knuckle got more love than the last.

“I heard you in my dream.” Elias’ eyes seemed to grow heavy then, his breathing deepening as sleep took him, and Sylvie smiled, kissing his cheek. She needed to do two terribly important things once he woke up.

One was to convince him they would go to Argyncia far later than she planned so he wouldn’t be suspicious.

And two: she’d have to get more clarity on Kian’s fetishes.