Chapter 18 #2
“Kai would never do this to me on purpose. Something must be wrong.” Isla gathered her skirts. She’d sat around and played the part long enough. “I’m going to find him.”
“But Isla, your dress!” Davina rose from her seat, her hesitant movements betraying that she was all for Isla’s searching and likely wanted to join her.
“I’ll keep it clean.” Before any arguments could come that there were already people out looking for Kai, Isla added, “I am his mate, and there is no point in any of this if he isn’t standing next to me.”
Isla wrenched open the door and stormed into the hallway, her dress billowing around her like a whirlwind of night.
Watery sunlight spilled through the airy windows of the suspended hallway connecting the North and Western Halls.
Through the stone archways, Isla could see down the rolling hills in the expanse of Mavec.
Not as well as she would’ve from the overlook before the stained-glass window, but enough to notice the bustling closer to the hall.
Guards were being briefed on their posts, and ropes were set up to organize spectators and keep them off her processional path.
Streamers billowed from poles, and decorations of harvest were being set across the grounds.
Marin had said the crowd that gathered would be something to behold.
Though her actual anointing would take place in the throne room, where the audience would be limited, they would hold no citizen back from witnessing when she and Kai emerged to greet them as alpha and luna.
A statement. She was their queen, and she would stand by Kai, stand by them, through anything.
A knot coiled in her stomach. “Where the hell are you?” Her whisper was caught in the breeze.
“Your Majesty.”
Isla whipped around, beholding a bowing man dressed in a navy staff uniform. He was young, maybe around Kai’s age, and his brown eyes shone with uncertainty as he rose. She wouldn’t bother correcting him about her not being royal quite yet. “Yes?”
The staff member kept his head lowered as he closed the distance between them. Lowly, he said, “The alpha sent me to get you.”
Isla jerked back, blinking. “The alpha? My mate, the alpha?”
Noticing that she’d drawn some attention from below, she shifted out of the window’s eyeshot. “Where is he?” she whispered so aggressively that the staff member started.
“In one of the old staff quarters. I’ll take you to him if you’re finished… um, dressing.”
Isla let out a heavy breath. “I’m very finished. Let’s go.”
The opening of the stone-carved path may as well have been the widened maw of a beast. Isla stood frozen at the cusp, her heart in her throat as she stared down into its dimness. The staff member—Jace, she’d learned—continued for a few steps before he realized she wasn’t following.
He turned, his eyes questioning. “Your Majesty?”
Isla swallowed.
She was a warrior. She’d faced death countless times and survived.
Had beaten beasts bigger than these immovable tunnel walls.
But tight spaces, darkness, and the unknown…
maybe she still hadn’t quite recovered from what had happened beneath the arena.
It felt like a boulder pressed down onto her chest, and for a few breaths, she struggled to take in air.
She should’ve taken a knife. Jace could easily have been lying. He could’ve been working for the witch—she’d never met him before, and how easy would it have been to snag a staff uniform and play the part to lure her into a trap?
“Are you down here?” She threw the words out, battling through that pounding in her skull. And perhaps it had been hope, but she swore she felt a tug—a pull—down the stairs.
Isla breathed, closing her eyes for a moment and digging deep. She acknowledged her fear, embraced it, and stepped into the darkness.
Isla wouldn’t let Jace follow her back as they descended the stairs. The underground network must’ve also connected to the kitchens because it smelled divine, of autumn spices and the roast of a harvest.
When they came upon an old door that seemed to be crafted of worn iron, Isla paused and stepped to the side, inviting Jace to open it, while the risk of him pushing her in and trapping her here lingered in the back of her mind.
The heavy entrance groaned open, and Isla leaned forward to peek inside, her nose twitching at the pungent stench of antiseptic.
It wasn’t a grand space, reminding her more of a safe room than living quarters, but she barely took in what lay inside.
All she could focus on was a bare, muscular back and its familiar tattoos.
Kai was hunched, head hung, until he met her gaze in the smeared mirror in front of him and turned sharply to face her.
Isla hadn’t realized she was moving until she stumbled, eyes blinking wide at the blood-soaked bandages over his chest.
Though his features were tight with pain, a smile slid across his mouth as his eyes drew over her body. “Wow.”
Isla’s incredulous gaze snapped between his eyes and his wound. Once. Twice.
“What the hell happened?” She reached him as Kai gripped the vanity to support himself and reached across his chest. Isla immediately went to work on the poorly dressed injury, delicately pulling back the bandages to find the cuts still gaping, still leaking blood, though slowly. “How long ago did you get these?”
Kai cleared his throat, his nose twitching in pain as he shifted his shoulder. “A few hours ago.”
“A few hours?”
A barrage of questions ran through her head, but they could wait. He wasn’t healing properly.
“Thank you, Jace,” Kai said, dismissing him.
But Isla called, “Wait!” She kept one hand braced against Kai as she counted off on her fingers. “I need thread, a needle, a candle, some matches, boiling water, and the strongest alcohol you can find. Please be discreet.”
Jace bowed dutifully. “Yes, Your Majesty.”
When he left, closing the door behind him, Isla felt her muscles tighten. This room was so small and smelled of blood, just as the tunnels had when she beheld Sebastian’s near-dead body.
Breathe.
She felt the brush of a hand on her hip, and she turned to meet Kai’s pained eyes full of concern and comfort for her. Like she was the one with holes in her chest.
Isla willed her fingers to be steady as she peeled the bandages away. “What. The hell. Happened?”
“I—fuck.” Kai let out a ragged breath as she exposed the wounds and apologized, pressing lightly on the unmarred skin around them. Three deep slashes from his collarbones to his mid-torso.
From claws.
“I found a tunnel,” he confessed, and Isla’s fingers froze. She lifted her gaze again, harsh and imploring. “And there were bak in that tunnel. I killed all three, but one landed a good blow. I’d spent too long on my shift, used too much energy. My wolf is knocked out.”
Three bak. Three.
Isla pointed to the small cot. “Sit.” Kai obeyed, and she helped lower him to the mattress.
Pacing a few steps back, Isla observed the soiled bandages, her injured mate, the drops of blood on the vanity, and then her, dressed like a queen, the jewels of her gown and woven into her hair glittering in the lantern light.
“You’re stunning.”
Isla spun back, unsure whether she was about to cry in relief or frustration. Unsure if she wanted to berate him for being a reckless asshole or kiss him until she couldn’t breathe.
“You scared the shit out of me,” she said, turning to gather what was left of the clean bandages and the antiseptic. She set the supplies on the bed beside her as she sat to face Kai.
For a few heartbeats, they just stared at each other, and no other part of the day mattered. Because he was here. He was alive. He was safe.
Kai cupped her face in gentle hands, holding her glossy gaze as he said, “I’m sorry.”
His kiss was just as soft, and when his mouth met hers, Isla swore something cracked within her—but it wasn’t a well of emotion.
No. It was a spark of energy. An ember. A stoking of a flame.
Not of lust, but something different. Something greater.
Her mouth fell open as the warmth spread, the energy crackled.
When they parted, barely, still brow to brow, his breath was hers, and hers was his. Alive and okay. Both of them. “Why were you hunting in the tunnels alone?” she whispered.
Kai’s fingers ran delicately over her cheek, her neck. “I never thought I’d end up there. I just needed to get out. Get away.”
Isla leaned back, placing her hand over his. Was that why she’d felt so off? “Is that power acting up?”
Kai’s throat bobbed, and now Isla could see the shadows cast over his eyes. “It’s been worse today than any other. I was up a few hours before dawn, and it felt like I was about to burst right through my skin. I could barely think straight, see straight. I was afraid that I’d…”
He trailed off, but Isla knew where he was going. She squeezed his hand. “You can’t hurt me, Kai. You cannot, and you will never.”
His brows scrunched, fear and doubt evident. “I don’t understand why it’s so bad today. It’s like it led me there. To the bak, to that tunnel.”
A knock on the door had them separating.
Jace returned with everything Isla had requested, plus a small cauldron of boiling water conveniently stuffed into a small wicker basket. She thanked him and asked if he’d quietly inform Ameera of Kai’s return and to just leave it at that. They’d decide how and what to explain later.
With wares spread over the mattress, Isla got to work.
Kai lit the candle while she carefully threaded her needle with the boiled thread.
Her mind reeled back to the lessons in suturing wounds that had been part of her warrior training.
Although healing occurred naturally most of the time, some wounds needed manual manipulation.
“Hold still.”