Chapter 22 - Nicholas
Darkness presses around me like I’m suspended underwater, weightless, soundless, trapped in a void where even breathing feels like a forgotten skill.
Then, a flicker of gold cuts through the darkness, like an olive branch of goodness, a small flicker of hope.
At first, it’s just a speck in the distance, trembling like a candle flame in a cavern. But it grows brighter, expanding, until the dark void splits open, and I’m dragged into a scene I know too well.
The clearing.
Donna.
But everything is warped, like I’m seeing it through thick, frosted glass. Shadows pulse at the edges of my vision, and the air is heavy with the echo of my own ragged breathing…except, I’m not breathing.
Not really. Not as I should be.
Donna is on her knees beside my body. My lifeless, unmoving body. I can see myself lying there on the ground, chest torn open, blood mixing with earth, my lips and eyes empty.
Donna is crying. No.
She’s begging, her voice cracking with a desperation that hits me harder than any blow I've ever taken.
“Nicholas! Nicholas, stay with me! Please!” Donna wails, and I try moving toward her, but my legs don’t work. My arms feel anchored to nothing and everything all at once. Panic claws up my throat, but I can’t even move my hand to it.
Donna’s hands glow, golden and trembling as she presses them over the wound in my chest, but the darkness in the gaping hole spreads like overflowing ink, swallowing her light and guzzling it down as if it's sustenance for the darkness.
“Donna!” I shout, even though I’m not sure my voice exists outside this place where I’m stuck. The sound echoes like it’s trapped in a metal chamber, resounding in my own ears and not going further than that.
She doesn’t hear me.
She can’t.
I take a step back, but slam into something solid. Invisible. Cold.
Bars of black magic rise in front of me, tall and twisting, sealing me inside a cage. I grip the bars instinctively, and agony bolts through my hands like electric fire. I roar and yank, but they won’t budge. They only pulse, sealing tighter with every breath I take.
Donna gasps suddenly from where I can see her crouched over my body, and her power explodes outward.
Golden light erupts from her palms, shooting skyward, swirling around her like a violent storm.
Her hair flies back, eyes blazing, tears streaking her face.
She appears to be the epitome of chaos, fury, and power.
She’s becoming something more, something powerful, ancient, and terrifyingly beautiful.
Once again, I’m left in awe of her, but I can’t reach her; I can’t tell her that she’s turning into something beyond my wildest imagination.
Like the Moon Goddess Herself, Donna is becoming a magnificent being, wielding extraordinary power.
The bars around me constrict, pulling me back as if the dark magic is trying to drag me deeper into unconsciousness. At the same time, I can sense the immense energy emanating from Donna, and it’s frightening now, alarming.
“Donna!” I choke, a warning, a plea, slamming my fists against the bars. “Stop! You’re burning yourself out!”
She rises to her feet, golden light roaring from her like a star imploding, and the wolves fall, freed from their curse. Morganna screams, staggers backward, shadows tearing away from her body.
Donna doesn’t stop.
She can’t stop.
She’s destroying herself.
I slam against the barrier again and again, my bones aching, my vision fracturing. Then, Tobias appears, eyes blue again, human again despite his wolf arm outstretched. A broken apology aimed at Donna before he grabs Morganna.
The golden blast surges, and finally, both Morganna and Tobias vanish into the golden light.
Donna collapses beside my body again, sobbing, trembling, fading.
“Donna!” I scream, slamming my head against the bars like a madman. “Don’t you dare close your eyes! Don’t you—”
My vision cracks, and light bursts through.
And I shoot upright with a strangled gasp…
… in my body once again.
My hand flies to my chest, where I remember the gaping hole, but there’s a heap of bandages covering me, wrapped around my chest and back. Frowning, I look down warily, fearing what I might see when I look there. But there’s not even a speck of blood or dark magic, as if it were all a dream.
“Donna…” I murmur, my voice hoarse against my dry throat and chapped lips.
“She’s fine,” a familiar voice responds to the first word I’ve spoken since waking up as if it were a question.
I look up to find Dominic in the corner, peeling himself off a sofa I recognize. That’s when I realize I’m in the Crescent Moon clinic, recovering in a private ward.
Dominic huffs as he approaches me, lips toying with an amused smirk. “Glad to see you finally awake, buddy.” He stops beside the bed, chuckling as he playfully slaps my shoulder.
“Grr…ow!” I protest, flinching and wincing and glaring at him with dramatic fury. “Watch it, Dom! I almost died!”
Dominic continues to chuckle as he slides a chair over, spinning it so the backrest is in front of him before he straddles the seat. He leans in, amusement slipping away, so his expression becomes hard.
“I think you deserved it,” he says as he watches me intently through narrowed eyes.
“I think you’ve lost your mind,” I chuckle dryly, attempting to sit up higher and test out my body to see if I’m capable of standing. “Where’s Donna?”
“She’s recovering in the room next door,” he informs me, and I let out a sigh of relief.
“She took a knock after what she did, but she saved us all,” he declares proudly, then continues to explain what happened last night after I was hit with Morganna’s strike.
He describes his sister’s majestic powers with pride, and I know exactly what he’s talking about, because I saw it in my dream.
“Whoa…that’s crazy,” I say when he’s done recounting the events of last night’s battle.
“I had a dream about the whole thing.” I frown, confused by what I saw, what I felt in my dream.
“Or, it could have been an out-of-body experience, but I saw the whole thing playing out the way you described it.”
“It does sound like an out-of-body experience, but it’s probably because of your link to Donna. You know…the fated mate bond,” he offers as an explanation, and I nod slowly.
“So, Tobias really sacrificed himself? Just like Barry did?”
“Yeah…” Dominic says with a hint of sadness in his tone. “He died a hero, and we’ll pay homage to him honorably.”
“How is Donna dealing with it?”
“Only as you can imagine. Tobias was her friend,” Dominic says, and I nod slowly again.
It’s only when I turn that I see him staring at me through narrowed eyes again.
“What?”
“You never told me when you discovered my sister was your true mate.”
“Yeah, it was after the wed—”
“Cut the bullshit, Nick. You’re my best friend.”
I sigh heavily, averting my eyes and leaning my head back to stare at the ceiling.
“Yeah, you’re right. You’re my best friend, and you deserve the truth from me.
” I take a deep breath before starting the story at the beginning—the moment I met Donna for the first time, when we dropped Dominic off in Nightmist.
“But it wasn't until you guys visited last summer that I knew she was my fated mate. I knew I couldn’t tell you when I fucked up and hurt her badly.”
Dominic takes a controlled inhale. “You rejected her, even when you knew she was your true mate?”
“Yes,” I say, without giving him a reason or an explanation about why I did it. It all seems redundant now, like an excuse when nothing excuses my sin.
“Bastard!”
“I deserve that,” I admit bashfully, and Dominic throws a punch into my shoulder.
This time, I purse my lips and make no protest, accepting the pain as my punishment for my past crimes, even if I deserve much, much worse than that.
Dominic chuckles, almost triumphantly. “You deserve that, too. You’re lucky my sister loves you, or I might have killed you myself.”
“L-loves me? Your sister loves me?” I mutter disbelievingly, and Dominic scoffs.
“Anyone with two eyes would have witnessed it last night,” he laments. “Besides, I can’t be upset with you when I was no better myself. But she’s my sister”—he lifts a pointed finger—“and if you ever hurt her again, you’re done for.”
“You don’t have to tell me twice,” I say, lifting my hands in a show of surrender. “Goddess gave me a second chance in Terramor, and I’m not gonna fuck it up. I know I did in the past, but it won’t happen again. I love your sister. I love Donna.”
Dominic nods slowly as he rises to his feet, pushing the chair aside.
“Then you should probably go to her now,” he says, gesturing to the door. “She’s been waiting for you, Nick.”
A smile of gratitude warms my lips as I carefully slide out of bed, taking a moment to acquaint myself with my weight on my feet. Dominic offers to help me, and I accept, slinking my arm over his shoulders as he assists me to Donna’s room.
Once we’re outside her door, I can make out her small, petite frame in the bed through the frosted glass window, and my heart skips a beat.
“Thanks, Dom.” I nod at him, sliding my arm off and placing my hand on the handle.
He pats me on the shoulder, gently this time, as if encouraging me now. “See you around, man. We’re all staying at the guesthouse until you guys recover.”
“Everyone else okay?”
“Except for some bruises and some of us needing light stitches, we’re all alive.” He winks and turns to leave.
Taking a deep breath outside, I finally open the door and step inside. Donna is watching the sun hang in the sky through the window, and turns her head slowly when she hears me step inside.
“Nicholas…?” she whispers as if she can’t believe her eyes, jolting upright.
“Hey, sweetheart,” I return with a half-smile, and that’s when Donna throws herself off the bed and bolts toward me. She flings herself into my open arms, and I soak in her scent with a deep inhale at the top of her head, my eyes closed.
“Don’t you ever scare me like that again!” she wails, scolding me through sobs.
“Oh, so you do care about me, then,” I chuckle, and Donna leans out of my embrace to pound a tiny fist at my shoulder.
“I hate you!” she squeals, and I grin at her.
“You don’t mean that,” I say as I cup her cheeks, wiping her tears away with my thumbs. She stares softly into my eyes, hers glistening with moisture, her lips forming a pout.
“N-no. I don’t. But I would have if you didn’t wake up.”
I take Donna’s hand and lift it to my lips, pressing a chaste kiss on her knuckles. “Forgive me for scaring you like that, sweetheart. I promise it won’t happen again.”
Donna flutters her eyelids at me, her warm brown eyes carrying the weight of the world from her worry. “Well, if you ever refuse to wake up, I’ll just bring you back!” she declares firmly with a haughty huff, and I chuckle again, taking her hand and leading her back to the bed.
Once we’re both seated on the edge, I turn to her, stroking her knuckles on my lap. “You were quite spectacular out there, Donna,” I praise, and she frowns at me.
“What do you mean? You were out cold.”
“I saw everything,” I reveal. “It felt like a dream, but I think I had an out-of-body experience or something. You collapsed, and I must have been snapped back into my body. But I saw it all, and you were phenomenal.”
“So, you did die,” she whimpers, her bottom lip trembling.
“Almost,” I shrug. “But you brought me back to life. The mate bond—it kept me afloat for as long as you needed to use your powers.”
Donna’s eyes widen at the realization of the extent of our mate bond. “I’m glad you didn’t die. I would have killed you if you did.”
I can’t help the full-belly laugh that rips through my chest, through the dull ache where I’m still healing. “I would be dead already.”
“And then you’ll die twice.”
“Then I guess I’ll just make sure I stay alive,” I smirk, letting out a drawn-out breath. “I guess my father was wrong. Love doesn’t make a werewolf weak. It actually makes us stronger.”
Donna pauses, even stops breathing momentarily, and I gulp. I didn’t mean to blurt that out, but I did, and it’s not how I wanted this to go.
Donna deserves more than us sitting in a clinic room, and me half-dying and declaring my love for her. But staring into her eyes, I know she doesn’t care about the logistics.
“I love you, Donna Rivera.”
My admission is met with Donna blinking at me as if she’s dumbfounded. I use it as my cue to go on.
“I should have told you this sooner. A long time ago. I’m in love with you, Donna. Since the first day I met you, I was enchanted. I’ve been in love with you since the first time I saw you.”
Donna doesn’t say a word, but she doesn’t have to. Not when she grabs my face and crushes her lips to mine. The kiss is enough of a response, and that’s all I need for now, especially when I don’t mean to pressure her into anything.
She doesn’t need to say it for me to know how she feels. Anyone with a pair of eyes can see that Donna loves me. I mean…she wouldn’t kiss me like this if she didn’t love me as much as I love her. And that’s why this kiss feels like the most passionate one we’ve ever shared, fueled by love.