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“I appreciate your understanding.” I looked at Mom. Her wound had been cleaned and was covered with the strips of cloth I’d prepared for bandaging. Crimson beaded through the white linen, but the blood wasn’t flowing the way it had been minutes before. She was calmer, and her breathing wasn’t as labored. She almost seemed peaceful.
“She looks more stable, but how is she really?” I almost hated to ask, but I had to know.
“Well, she’s very weak, so it’ll be touch and go for the night.” He used some spare linen to gently dab away the sweat on her forehead. I’d never seen Doc work on a patient, but his touch struck me as particularly gentle. Mom’s eyebrow twitched at the contact, but she otherwise lay still. “She’ll be in a lot of pain, but as long as she survives the night, she will recover.”
“Is there anything I can do to help her?”
Doc put the cloth on the pillow beside her head and rubbed the edge of his eyebrow. “I won’t sugarcoat this, Alpha. There’s not much you can do. I’ve seen Alpha wounds a couple times in my life, and they’re never easy. Even young, healthy men don’t always survive these injuries.”
“She’s a fighter.”
The doctor nodded and smiled a bit. “Of course she is. She’s your mother, after all. She couldn’t have raised the greatest Alpha I’ve ever seen without being able to take care of herself. And you didn’t know what she was like before she was your mother.” His smile became wistful. “The best you can do for her is sit with her, talk with her. She should be able to hear your voice even in this state.”
It was so surreal. Mom and I had spoken to each other just yesterday. She’d been lively, playful, and wise, as she always was. Seeing her now so pale and quiet made my heart ache.
“I can do that, Doc. Thank you.”
“Of course.” He left the strip of linen on the pillow beside Mom, and then stood. “I’ll be staying in the living room, if that’s alright, Alpha. If her condition changes, I want to be close enough to help in any way that I can.”
Tension released from my shoulders by a few increments. Having the doctor so close made me feel a little more at ease.
“I won’t make you sleep on the couch, Doc. Take my bed, please. It’s a couple of doors down the hall.”
“Oh, I couldn’t ask you to—”
“You’re not asking. I’m insisting.” I slipped by him and sat on the bed next to Mom. “You’re free to use my house however you’d like, Doc. Coffee, tea, beer—whatever you need, the fridge and all that’s inside it is open to you.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I watched Doc bow slightly. “I thank you for your exceedingly generous hospitality, but I think the only thing I’ll need tonight is a place to sleep. Still, thank you.”
He left to find my room, and I turned my full attention to Mom. Each breath she took was a tight, rasping pant, but at least she was breathing.
“I’m so sorry that I let this happen to you, Mom,” I whispered, brushing her hair out of her face. “I swore an oath to protect this pack, yet I allowed my own mother to fall to my worst enemy.”
She didn’t respond, of course, but her mouth twitched. To me, it looked like an attempt at one of her disapproving frowns, and it made me chuckle.
“I know you wouldn’t want me to blame myself, but how can I not? I hate when anyone gets hurt on my watch—especially when it comes to the people I love most.” I took her hand in mine and squeezed gently. “You’ll pull through, won’t you? There’s still so much that you need to experience, so many people who need you. For one, my future children—Tavi’s future children, and Dom’s, too—they all need to know you. You’ll spoil our pups endlessly with treats and snacks, but that’s what grandmothers are supposed to do, right?”
Her lip twitched again.
I leaned down and pressed her hand to my forehead. I had watched these hands dig through soil, fend off men when I was a pup, and handle planks of jagged wood to assist in the construction and repair of cabins throughout the village. How was it possible that they could feel so thin and fragile to me now?
“I swear to you,” I whispered, “I will make sure Troy suffers for this. I’ll get Bryn and Tavi back safe and sound. But you need to be there to see it.” I squeezed her hand again. “Please, please, be there to see it.”
3
NIGHT
Hours passed, and I didn’t sleep for even one of them. I spent all night reminding Mom of the fun we had when we were younger, the adventures we went on, the plants I helped her harvest (or stomped on as I played), and all the trouble I’d gotten into as a pup. I spoke both for her benefit—to let her know that I was there and that I wasn’t going anywhere until she was better—and for my own.
As the night wore on, the ache in my chest worsened. I felt like I was going crazy the longer I sat there, but I couldn’t get up to leave because what if she took her last breath while I was away?
The stories I told Mom were all I had to keep myself sane. The stories, and the memory of Bryn’s smile. If she were with me, I knew I wouldn’t feel so lost. If I could hold her in my arms or feel her touch, I knew I’d be able to do anything. As it was, I felt weak, like an Alpha wound was sapping my strength in addition to Mom’s.
As dawn pierced through the midnight-blue sky, I heard Doc open my bedroom door. Seconds later, he walked into the room.
“Morning, Alpha Night,” he said, kneeling next to Mom. “How did she do last night?”
“She’s alive, thank everything.”
