Chapter 2 - Sage
Life has been so normal since I joined the Brokenclaw pack five years ago.
It had felt like a miracle when I'd gotten the job as a healer in this pack after answering an ad in the paper.
I'd found that ad at just the right time, when I was being rejected by my mate and feeling so lost, and I was able to find a home where I was accepted, magic and all.
I loved my normal life. I wasn't the kind of woman to crave attention, just the simple things, and I'd been able to settle into life with the Brokenclaws. My life was quiet. I kept my head down, practiced my magic, and just lived. It was peaceful.
And my life had definitely not always been that way.
Back in my old pack, my gifts made me a freak and not a commodity.
The other wolves were disgusted by the idea of being healed by a magic user, and even my family kept their distance when it became obvious that my power was growing and not fading.
Friends weren't really a thing for me, but I'd convinced myself loneliness was fine, as long as I was able to live authentically.
It meant that I wasn't just lonely. I was also scared, always looking over my shoulder.
I had to learn to keep my voice quiet and my eyes down.
To make myself appear small, I hoped to go unnoticed when I was among my pack.
It might have been a miserable experience, but it was all I knew.
I shouldered that burden until Noah's awful rejection.
It was hard to believe that I was welcomed by Alpha Joe so readily into his pack, but it was readily apparent that my magic was a valuable skill, and he needed the help. The Brokenclaw
pack had a few other magic users, but nothing close to what I could do, and their previous healer was struggling with an illness. They needed someone right away, and the pay was decent, so I packed up my life and moved to Maine.
And my life had never been the same since.
I might have had a hole in my heart from someone in my old pack, but life was steady. Steady was good...or at least that was what I told myself.
When Joe sent for me this morning, I hadn't thought it was anything out of the ordinary.
We'd been dealing with rogue wolf attacks that had only recently been handled, and while an injured stray wolf was a rarity, it wasn't anything I couldn't handle.
I figured it was just some poor sod trying to join one of the four allied packs that ran astray of a black bear, but when I saw the man waiting in the bed, my world stopped turning in an instant.
It was as if the clocks had stopped as I looked down at home, broken and battered on the hospital bed.
It was so surreal that for a long moment, I considered that I was hallucinating.
..but no. It was really him. Noah Aldrige, my mate, the man who had rejected me.
The man who'd broken my heart so long ago, and
had been the reason why I'd escaped my pack and come to Maine.
I'd never expected to see him again, that man who knew me better than anyone in the world and still cast me aside like garbage.
The man with whom I still had a connection, even five years later.
Seeing him was like being forced back in time to when I was younger and heartbroken and aching to be loved by him.
I wanted to fall apart at that moment, but both my current Alpha and the man who was supposed to be my mate at one point in my life were counting on me. So I swallowed the pain
and panic I felt at seeing Noah again and got to work healing him. For that time, I would be Noah's healer, and not his rejected mate.
Part of me thought he didn't deserve my help, not after what he'd done to me, but it went against my code as a healer to abandon him.
Sure, I could have passed him off to someone else, but that option tugged hard at something possessive in me.
He might have thrown me away, but he was still my mate, and no one else was going to care for him but me.
It would be my magic that brought him back from the brink of death, no one else's.
So I worked. It hurt to see him in pain, but it also gave him a sense of satisfaction to slowly and carefully take that pain away.
Little by little, I healed him, mending bones, stitching skin, and easing his pain.
It was bittersweet, knowing that this was the first and likely the only time he'd get to experience my magic, but at least I was given the chance to show it to him before he went back to his pack, and I stayed with me.
I mixed herbs until the smell had permanently soaked into my clothes, I whispered spells until my throat was sore, and I sat vigil throughout the long nights by his bedside so if he woke up in a strange land, there would at least be a familiar face by his side.
Even if it was a face he was loath to see.
On the first night, Noah spiked a fever, and it reached its peak the next evening. I washed him with cold water as he writhed in the bed, and to my shock, one out of every ten nonsensical words he muttered in his haze of sickness was my name.
Did Noah somehow know I was there with him, or was I still on his mind all these years later? The latter possibility made me feel warm all over, but I quashed any lingering sweet feelings. That was another time, another life, and he needed me as a healer, not an old flame stuck in the past.
Finally, the fever broke on the third night, as I washed his body with cool water and silently prayed. With the infection defeated, I knew he'd wake up sooner rather than later. I both dreaded and looked forward to it, even though it felt foolish to do so.
Of course, he wouldn't feel any differently about me. He'd probably still be disgusted by the idea of me being his mate. But here, in my pack, under my care, I had the upper hand for the first time in my life.
When Noah finally opened his eyes, I was there, just like I'd been the entire time.
I was well aware that I was running out of time to build my mental walls up.
There was no doubt in my mind that he would have a million questions, but Noah still needed to heal, and I wasn't about to have him confess his love to me in some pain-killer-induced haze and then regret it the moment he was in his right mind again.
I allowed myself one indulgence and laid my hand on his as he dragged himself to consciousness. His grey eyes were surprisingly clear, like the wings of a dove and not a storm cloud as they were when he was angry, but there was agony in them nonetheless.
Like a typical Alpha, he immediately tried to push himself up into a sitting position, and I had to take him by the shoulders and slowly push him back down to the bed.
He was bare-chested, and the animal side of me was screaming to look, touch, and appreciate his well-muscled chest dusted with dark hair, but the healer side of me had to win out to keep things professional.
Still, the heat of his body ran up my palms and into my chest cavity, and I made a mental note to wear gloves next time I had to touch him.
Our mate bond, long ignored and withered, stirred, and I pulled my hands away from him in horror.
No. No. I had grieved the loss of that bond years ago; I wasn't about to have it raise itself from the dead.
He said my name, over and over, asking me to stay with him.
Noah didn't know it, but I was going to stay with him, just like I'd been doing during his entire recovery, but there was a desperation in his voice that told me he wanted more than just company.
He wanted me to answer his questions, or just because he thought as an Alpha, he deserved my time and attention.
But he was also still in extreme pain. Noah told me his pain was an eight on a 10-point scale, but I knew his bravado as a male wolf meant it was probably much, much higher, and eight was pretty damn high to begin with.
The silly part of me that still had affection for him didn't want to knock him back out.
That part of me wanted to keep him awake, saying my name, and allowing me to touch his warm skin.
I felt like I was starving for any part of him or his attention, but I wasn't the gullible, lonely young wolf I once was.
So even if my heart wanted to be near him, and even if his voice, raspy as it was, made me shiver, I upped his pain medication and watched as he fell into a deep slumber once.
Once he was out, I checked his vitals and all of his injuries once more.
Noah was healing fast, his shifter DNA working in his favor.
Joe, on the other hand, was prickly, wanting to know why another Alpha was in his territory.
There had been too much upheaval in the allied packs for everyone not to worry.
Noah was another sign of something ominous.
But I knew Noah. He was an asshole, but his pack was old and well-established.
They'd been on the same land for generations, and while they had some antiquated ideas about how to run a pack structure and what to do with the women within it, there was just no reason I could think of that they would want to mess with a pack like Joe's.
He would wake up for a longer period soon enough anyway, and everyone could get their answers. For my part, I needed to keep my distance, because even his short, pain-addled words had made my blood run hot and the connection between us slowly awakened.
Once my job as Noah's healer was done, I needed to disappear. Because I knew if I stuck around until he was fully awake, I'd be in danger of falling for him all over again. And I refused to go down that path for a second time.