Royal Wolf Box Set by Haley Weir
Chapter Twelve
When Aeron found Samar, she was barely able to stay standing. Her eyes flickered in a furious golden glow, and he could see that she was exerting every last strand of energy that she had in order to keep the flames at bay. Beside her, Marquette and her son were huddled up against a few of the others that had joined them. The only thing that stood between them and the consuming fires were the blue Kitsune flames that shielded them from the burning heat. But Samar had nearly depleted all of her energy trying to save Marquette and her son and protect herself as well. Just as Aeron arrived, she looked up and fell to the ground. Theo leaped off his horse and grabbed his son and Marquette. He put them both onto his horse and then gave the horse a swift slap on the hindquarters. The horse took off toward the castle, veering away from the battlefield and staying to the riding path through the woods that it was familiar with. Marquette and the boy would be safe now. Then Theo reached for the others and pulled them to safety as he led them out of the burning woods on foot.
Aeron lifted Samar from the ground and held her in his arms.
“You’re okay now,” he said gently. “I’ve got you.”
He winced when he saw how expended she appeared to be.
“The forest will burn to the ground if I don’t stop it,” she whispered.
Aeron looked around him as he got onto his horse with Samar still in his arms. He knew that she was right, but there was nothing he could do. As he turned to steer his horse away from the flames and toward safety, Samar’s eyes flickered furiously, and she made one final attempt to stop the fires. While she laid across Aeron’s lap on horseback, she pushed all of the magic that she had left inside of her out into the forest in the form of the blue flames, which drowned out the fires.
Now that Aeron was here, and the others were safe, there was no reason for her to hold back or hold on any longer. In a burst of energy-filled magic, the fires were stifled by the blue Kitsune flames and the forest was saved. But it had come at a great cost to Samar, and she closed her eyes as they rode away.
As he rode past the battlefield and toward the castle to bring Samar to safety, Aeron looked to see if they needed his help. But Rubius and the others had made quick work of defeating the smaller legion from the other kingdom, and the fight was nearly finished. The opposing shifters were already fleeing back toward their territory, and Rubius watched them with satisfaction. He lifted a hand to Aeron as he saw him ride by, and then summoned everyone to help the injured and head back toward the city inside the protective walls of the kingdom to assess what losses they had suffered. It could have been much worse. The training they had engaged in and the help from their packs had given them the advantage in battle, as had the decreased number of the opposition. And Samar’s Kitsune magic had saved the forest from burning down entirely. Some lives were lost, and some damage was done, but overall, it was less of a devastation than Aeron had expected. Or at least, he thought so until he arrived at the castle and laid Samar down upon her bed.
He had no idea how to help her. Samar looked like she was dying. He stayed by her side at the bed and called out into the castle for help. Marquette ran in as soon as she heard the king’s calls and cupped her hand over her mouth when she saw Samar.
“I don’t know what to do,” Aeron said desperately. “I don’t know how to help her. I don’t know how Kitsune heal themselves.”
Marquette looked at Samar’s ashen skin, and even her closed eyes looked sunken. She didn’t know what to do, either. When she heard the others arrive back from the battle, she ran to get Cassandra.
“We need to give her rest,” Cassandra said after she had come into Samar’s bedroom with Marquette. “I don’t know how to help a Kitsune, but I do know that all living creatures will try to heal themselves if given time and rest. Let her sleep, Aeron, and come walk with me so that you do not torture yourself by counting the seconds until her eyes open.”
Cassandra was trying to help him, and trying to remain positive, but the truth was that she too was shocked by how destroyed Samar looked.
While Aeron waited for Samar to recover, he walked with Cassandra and assessed the damage from the war. They had lost several people in the battle, and every life lost was a tragedy. But the losses were in single digits, and that was much better than the outcome could have been. The forest had sustained some burn damage, but it had all been contained within one area thanks to Samar’s help. It would regrow in time. And the opposition had been sent fleeing back to their kingdom. Rubius saw no reason to slay all of the remaining shifters after the war had been won, and he hoped that by letting them run off while they still had their lives, it would send a message to the other kingdom that there was a better way to live than the rule their alpha was currently leading. There was one thing that Rubius still had to deal with, though, and that was the snitch.
“One of the three men I sent to take Samar and the others to the forest betrayed us,” he told Aeron. “It’s the only explanation for how they could have known where she was hiding and tried to smoke her out.”
“Do you know which one it was?” Aeron asked. He was always deeply disturbed to hear about betrayal, especially in the packs. He liked to think that shifters held themselves to a higher standard than the sometimes-shady humans did. But he was increasingly seeing that they were all one and the same.
“Not yet,” Rubius answered. “But I am going to meet with them now, and believe me when I say I will find out who did this.”
“When you do,” Aeron said in a grim and kingly voice, “bring him to me.”
Rubius nodded. He may have been the alpha of his pack, but Aeron was the alpha over all of the packs in this part of the forest. The shifter that betrayed them nearly cost Samar and the others their lives. Aeron would levy whatever punishment he saw fit. But first, he would attend to Samar.
“She’s awake!” Holly called down the corridor.
They had all been taking turns sitting with Samar, and Holly had been there when Samar first opened her eyes. Aeron ran toward the room and up to her bedside, where he dropped down onto his knees and reached for her hand to hold.
“You came for me,” Samar whispered to him weakly as she turned her head to face him.
“Of course I did,” Aeron smiled sadly. It hurt him to see her so drained of life and pained.
Holly stepped out and ushered away everyone who was standing at the doorway so that they could have some peace alone together for a moment.
“You scared me,” Aeron said with a frown. “What happened to you?”
“I depleted all of my magic,” she said. She gave him a reassuring smile, but he could see that there was so much sadness in her eyes that it looked as if she would burst into tears at any moment.
“But you’re better now,” he said as if he was trying to convince them both. “You’ve rested, and you’re awake. Pretty soon, you’ll feel as good as new.”
Samar didn’t say anything. She just looked at him with the same far-off expression.
“You saved the forest,” he told her. He knew that would make her happy to hear. “I don’t know how you managed to use that much magic, but you kept everyone safe until Theo and I got there, and then you saved the forest with your blue flames.”
Samar smiled with a wider and more genuine smile this time.
“I’m glad,” she said. “And the war?”
“It’s over. A few lives were lost, and a moderate amount of damage was done. But we were victorious, and the opposing survivors fled back to their kingdom. It’s over.”
“I hope so,” she said.
Her eyes told him that she didn’t really believe it was. A part of him knew that was true also. Alphas that are so hell-bent on power that they are willing to kill a member of their own pack are rarely quick to give up when defeated.
There was only one other thing that Aeron needed to tell her. Something he had thought about and known to be true as soon as he grabbed her in his arms in the forest.
“I love you, Samar,” he said.
She stared back at him with that same sad and happy look as he gently kissed her lips.