Chapter 15 – JUNIPER
Chapter
Fifteen
JUNIPER
T he Serpents' Den spreads around me like a living thing, walls breathing with screams. I try to run but my feet sink into the floor that's made of hands—so many hands, reaching up through rotting wood to grab at my ankles with fingers that smell like alpha musk and ownership.
The pink slip they dressed me in at the Rut Room has become the threadbare nightgown from before, the one Evan liked because it showed everything and hid nothing.
"Felix!" I scream, but my voice comes out as bubbles that pop into moths that turn into ash that tastes like?—
I jolt awake gasping, sheets soaked with sweat.
The medical bay. Not the Den. Felix lies beside me, chest rising and falling with the steady rhythm of drugged sleep.
They gave him something for the pain earlier, something that knocked him out cold, and I can still smell the chemical sweetness on his breath.
The shadows writhe in the corners, darker than usual, speaking in tongues I almost understand.
Four becoming five, they whisper. The mask cracks. The truth bleeds through.
"Shut up," I tell them, but my voice shakes like autumn leaves about to fall. "You never make sense anyway."
It doesn't stop them. If anything, the whispers get louder.
I press my palms against my eyes until I see stars that look like teeth.
The shadows are getting louder lately, more insistent, like they're trying to warn me about something I'm too stupid or too crazy to understand.
Felix says the hallucinations are getting worse. He's probably right. He usually is.
I move closer, cuddling up to him even though I'm too hot. Being close to him is usually enough to keep the shadows quiet. His scent is different, though. There's more diamond bleeding through the sharp chemicals. The alpha pheromones are fading.
Three days. Maybe four before they're gone entirely.
And he's not getting any better. The drugs they give him keep the fever at bay, but even if he's not getting worse, he's still not himself. Is it because they think he's an alpha? Maybe the drugs don't work the same.
Or maybe it's the suppressants they don't know he's on. Without them, his omega scent will start bleeding through like ink through wet paper. They'll know. They'll all know, and Felix would rather die than be exposed.
He should let them treat him properly. The silver-haired doctor with his kind eyes and steady hands could help if Felix would just let him. But my Felix is made of sharp edges and secrets, and he'd bleed out before letting anyone close enough to discover the truth beneath his mask.
I study Felix's sleeping face in the fluorescent light. Even unconscious, there's tension in his jaw, like he's fighting battles in his dreams. The bandages on his arm need changing—I can see spots of red seeping through—but I don't trust my shaking hands right now.
The ventilation grate above the bed catches my eye. It's been calling to me for hours, a whisper of possibility, of escape routes and hidden spaces where no one can find us. The screws are loose. I noticed yesterday when the shadows pointed them out with their smoke fingers.
I stand on the bed carefully, bare feet finding purchase on the thin mattress without disturbing Felix. My fingers work the screws. They're barely holding, probably haven't been checked in years. The grate comes free with a soft metallic sigh, revealing darkness that smells like dust and?—
Footsteps in the hallway.
Fuck.
I practically throw myself back onto the bed, shoving the grate back into place with fingers that fumble and shake. One screw falls, hitting the floor with a sound like a gunshot in my head, but I can't retrieve it now. The footsteps are getting closer.
I curl against Felix's side, forcing my breathing to slow, pretending to sleep as the door opens with that soft hydraulic hiss that sounds like snakes coiling up to bite.
"Just bringing some food," a voice says. Warm. Careful. The one they call Archer or sometimes Viper, the one who smells like sunshine even in the dark.
I keep my eyes closed but I can feel him watching us. The tray clinks as he sets it on the side table, more food we won't eat because trust is a luxury we can't afford. But he doesn't leave. I hear the soft scrape of a chair being pulled closer, the creak of weight settling.
"I know you're awake," he says quietly.
My eyes snap open because there's no point pretending now. He's sitting three feet away, hands resting on his knees in that careful way that says I'm not a threat even though we both know he could snap my neck without breaking a sweat.
"What do you want?" My voice comes out raw, like I've been gargling gravel.
"Nothing. Just..." He runs a hand through his brown hair, and for a moment he looks less alpha, more human. "Couldn't sleep. Happens sometimes."
I sit up slowly, keeping Felix between us like a barrier. "So you decided to watch us sleep? That's not creepy at all."
A laugh escapes him, short and bitter. "Fair point." He leans back in the chair, eyes finding something fascinating in the ceiling tiles. "You ever have nights where your brain won't shut off? Where it keeps replaying things you'd rather forget?"
The shadows lean in, interested now. They recognize trauma like dogs recognize fear.
"No," I lie, even though my brain is a constant replay of worst-case scenarios and memories.
"I was in the war," he says suddenly, like the words escaped without permission. "Eight years ago. Lost my whole unit to an IED. Everyone except me." His hands clench and unclench in his lap. "Sometimes I still hear them. In the quiet moments. Asking why I lived when they didn't."
He hears the dead too, the shadows whisper. But his dead don't dance.
I don't know what to say to that. How do you respond to someone else's ghosts when your own are having a party in your peripheral vision?
"Why are you telling me this?" I ask instead.
He finally looks at me, really looks at me, and there's something in his brown eyes that makes my chest tight.
Understanding, maybe. Recognition. "Because I see it in you too.
The way you flinch at shadows. The way you guard him like the world's about to end.
Whatever happened to you, whatever you're running from. .. I get it."
My lip curls back in a snarl. "You don't know anything about me."
"I know trauma when I see it." He reaches for something on the tray—a muffin, chocolate chip from the smell—and holds it out. "I know what it's like to trust no one. To see threats everywhere because everywhere you've been, there were threats."
I stare at the muffin like it might explode. My stomach growls, betraying me. When did I last eat? Yesterday? The day before? Time gets slippery in places with no windows.
"It's not poisoned," he says with a sad smile. "We're not the monsters you think we are."
"Everyone's a monster," I tell him, but I take the muffin anyway because my hands need something to do besides shake. "Some just hide it better."
"Maybe." He watches me pick at the muffin, not eating, just dissecting it into crumbs. "Your partner?—"
"Don't." The word comes out sharp enough to cut.
"I was just going to ask how he's doing."
Felix shifts in his sleep, mumbling something that sounds like my name. I run my fingers through his hair, an automatic comfort for both of us. "He's fine," I lie.
"He needs proper treatment," Archer says carefully. "Whatever he's hiding, whatever reason he has for refusing help... it's going to get him killed."
The silence feels like an accusation.
"He has his reasons." My voice sounds hollow even to me.
"I'm sure he does. But you love him, don't you? Sometimes loving someone means protecting them from themselves."
The shadows laugh at that. The truth always finds a way.
I don't realize my nails are digging into my upper arm hard enough to draw blood until I see Archer's eyes widen as mine adjust to the dark. He reaches out and his fingers brush my skin before I can process anything.
"Don't touch me," I snarl, lashing out on instinct, my nails digging into his hand hard enough to draw four long stripes of blood to the surface. "Don't ever fucking touch me."
"I'm sorry," he says, and he sounds like he means it. "I didn't mean—I should have been more careful."
Felix stirs again, the smell of blood finally penetrating his drugged sleep. His eyes crack open, immediately alert despite the medication. "Juniper?"
"I'm fine," I tell him, eyeing Archer's bleeding hand warily.
"It's okay," Archer says, still bleeding, still not retaliating. "It was my fault. I'll go."
He backs toward the door, movements slow and deliberate. No sudden moves. No aggression. Just a wounded alpha retreating from an omega who's more weapon than woman.
"I'll leave the food," he says. "And... I'm sorry."
The door closes behind him with that serpent hiss, and I'm left with blood and skin under my nails while the shadows dance and whisper their cryptic warnings.
Felix sits up despite the pain it must cause, pulling me against him. "What happened?"
"He touched me," I whisper into his chest. "Just for a second, and I... I couldn't stop myself. It was like I was back there, back with them, and?—"
"Shh." His arms tighten around me. "You protected yourself. That's all."
"I hurt him. He was being kind and I hurt him."
"Kind doesn't mean safe."
But something in my chest feels wrong, like I've broken something that might have been important. The sunshine scent lingers in the air, mixed with blood now.
"You smell different," I say quietly.
Felix stills, his arms still wrapped around me. "I know." His tone is blank, as usual, but I know better.
"Maybe if you just let them?—"
"No," he growls, his words turning as sharp as claws. When I flinch, he strokes my hair apologetically, his voice softening. "We'll figure something out. I just need to heal up a bit, then we're getting out of here."
He sounds as confident as always, and he's never given me any reason to doubt him. But deep down, there's a part of me that isn't sure leaving is the right thing to do.
For the first time, I don't tell Felix. Not when I know that would make him want to leave tonight.