Chapter 44
SEVERIN
“I don’t like doing this here.” Severin looked around. They were almost to the base of the communications tower but the area was too open—too exposed. What if the cure he carried in his fangs overwhelmed his best friend? What if it weakened Ravik too much for him to fight if more Infected came?
But there was no time to worry about such things now.
He and Ravik had been fighting about this almost from the moment Severin had stepped out of his lab and announced he had a cure.
Now there was no more time to argue—the virulent Hunger Virus was already at work on Ravik.
As Severin knew, a second exposure rapidly exacerbated the symptoms from the first exposure.
And Ravik was right to be worried—he was about to become incredibly dangerous in a matter of minutes if he didn’t get the cure into his system right away.
“Lay down.” He tugged on Severin’s unhurt arm and his friend looked at him with barely a hint of gold left in his eyes.
“Lay…down?” he repeated, his deep voice hoarse and confused.
“I can’t do this with you standing. Lay down!” Severin pointed to a patch of grass, hoping a direct order would do the trick.
Ravik just stared at him but then Cassandra was there, tugging on his hand.
“Come on, big guy,” she said. “Let’s lay down together—okay?”
“Lay down with Cassie?” Ravik asked.
“Yes, exactly. Lay down with me.” Cassandra pulled until he got clumsily down on his knees, then lay flat on his back at her urging. She looked up at Severin. “Now what?”
“Now I need to bite him and we pray the cure works,” he said honestly. “If it doesn’t, we’ll need to run before he becomes aggressive.”
Her face paled, but she nodded firmly.
“All right—just tell me what you need me to do—let me help.”
“Hold his head in your lap and distract him,” Severin ordered. “Get him to look to the right so I can get to the left side of his neck—I need to inject my essence directly into his jugular.”
“All right.” She cradled the Beast Kindred’s head in her lap and stroked his hair soothingly. “It’s all right, big guy,” she crooned. “Everything is going to be all right in just a minute.”
Severin was grateful that her scent still seemed to be working on Ravik but he was aware that could change at any minute. If the huge Beast Kindred went full Infected, neither of them was going to be safe.
He waited until his best friend was looking off to the side, (Cassie was pointing and talking to him.
“Look! Look over there!”) and then lay down beside him.
He looked for the pulse of the big blue vein in the side of his best friend’s neck and wished they could have done this another way.
Testing the cure out in the open, exposed and unprotected, was a bad way to do it. But there was no choice now.
Severin had never bitten another male before and he was worried that his fangs wouldn’t be sharp enough.
Normally, a Blood Kindred’s fangs only got sharp enough to bite when he met a woman he was very attracted to and wanted to Bond with.
They’d been sharp every time he was near Cassandra but would they be sharp enough to pierce his best friend’s throat?
And for that matter, would the cure in his essence heal Ravik? Essence was only meant to cure a mate and though he and his best friend were incredibly close, they had never had any kind of romantic or sexual relationship.
All these questions ran through his head as he scooted closer to the Beast Kindred and opened his mouth. He could feel the cure throbbing through his body and he sent up a brief prayer,
Please, Goddess—let this work! Let my fangs pierce his flesh and let the cure work on him!
Then, because there was nothing else he could do, he sank his fangs deep into his friend’s neck.