Royal Wolf Box Set by Haley Weir
Chapter Thirteen
Over the course of the next few days, things seemed to be at ease. There had been no further word from the other kingdom, and Aeron was confident that they had just given up. Rubius had searched for the shifter that he believed to have been the traitor, but that man had also fled. The only thing that remained now was a peaceful kingdom that was trying to fix the damage incurred and carry on. Cassandra and Holly even led a bunch of peaceful humans into the damaged part of the forest to try and plant some new seeds for regrowth. The shifters peered on as they watched from behind the trees in the woods at the humans who seemed to be earnestly trying to help. Everything was recovering slowly, and nicely.
Everything, except Samar. There was still something that seemed off with her. It seemed like she was in pain. But anytime Aeron asked her about it, she simply brushed his question aside and changed the topic to something else. He could tell that she didn’t want him to worry about her, but he was worried. He may not have known very much about Kitsune, but he did know enough to be able to tell that she was hiding something from him, and he didn’t like it.
It wasn’t until he had overheard Samar talking with Cassandra from just outside the kitchen that he became aware of what it was. He stood to the side of the doorway and listened.
“There must be something we can do,” Cassandra said.
Aeron could hear distress in her voice, and he knew that Cassandra rarely ever sounded worried. Whatever they were talking about must have been bad.
“There is not,” Samar said. “I pushed my Kitsune power too far. I had no choice but to try and save the forest. This place and all of you have become my home. I couldn’t let it burn down.”
“I understand that,” Cassandra said. “And we feel the same way. There has to be something that can help.”
“There isn’t,” Samar said again. “I’m dying.”
Samar went on to explain to Cassandra how a Kitsune that uses too much of its magic all at once can become so drained that she never recovers. Without magic, the Kitsune will soon die. But Aeron didn’t hear any of that because right after he heard Samar say the word “dying,” everything seemed to go mute in his ears, and the hallway suddenly looked blurry and as if the walls were closing in around him.
He wouldn’t believe that; he couldn’t. The mere idea that Samar might actually be dying was so heinously overwhelming to him that he couldn’t even think rationally about it. He didn’t know what to do, so his wolfish nature did it for him. He shifted, right there in the middle of the corridor. That was something that Theo would do out of reckless abandon, but definitely not something that Aeron would. But his shifter side was stronger, and it was going into self-preservation mode. It wasn’t going to let him become paralyzed by fear or sorrow.
Aeron ran down the hall on his four padded feet and ran straight out into the open. He ran past terrified humans that thought somehow a wolf had gotten into the castle and straight into the forest. Against his typical behavior, he ran through the woods at a furious pace until everything was a blur, even his own thoughts. He ran until his chest burned and his paws were raw. He ran until the wind had torn at his eyes and saliva was spilling from his mouth as he tried to push air into his lungs. He was beside himself. He didn’t even feel like himself anymore. He felt like everything he loved got taken from him, and he felt as if he would disappear.
Aeron narrowly missed colliding into another wolf who cut across the forest to intercept him. It was Rubius, and a feeling of dread immediately overcame Aeron as he shifted quickly back into a man, fearing that Rubius had tracked him down to deliver devastating news.
“What has happened?” Aeron asked in a frenzy.
“Nothing,” Rubius said. “But Cassandra saw you outside the kitchen, and she told me about the conversation you overheard. I’ve come to talk with you.”
Aeron shook his head.
“I don’t need to talk about my feelings of despair,” he said. “And I certainly don’t need to talk about it with you.”
“You can be as nasty to me as you’d like,” Rubius said. “I’ve got a thick skin that can take it. But I think I might be exactly who you need to talk to right now. I know about love and loss, and I know how it feels to watch helplessly from the sidelines while the woman you love makes every decision that you cannot. I know that you want to do something, anything to be with her, and that it is tearing you up that you can’t control what will happen. Does that sum it up fairly accurately?”
Aeron sighed and sank down to the ground to sit naked upon the dirt. Rubius was right. He did know what he was going through.
“What will I do if I lose her too?” Aeron asked. His voice cracked as he spoke, and he tried not to give in to sorrow.
“You will not lose her,” Rubius assured him as he sat down next to him. “Just as you have never lost Cassandra.”
“What are you talking about?” Aeron asked.
He lifted his face up and tilted it to the side in confusion at what Rubius had said. He had lost Cassandra—to Rubius.
“A part of Cassandra will always belong to you,” Rubius said. “I admit that I tried to deny that fact for a while, but when I realized that there was nothing that I could do to change it, then I began to get comfortable with the idea. Cassandra may have chosen to be with me, and I know that she loves me as much as I love her. But there is a love for you that she still also carries in her heart, and that part of her will always only belong to you. The same is true for Samar. No matter what happens, we cannot help but leave imprints of ourselves on those we care about.”
The two men were a sight to see, sitting nude and cross-legged on the open and muddied floor of the forest. It was not a conversation that Aeron would have guessed they would ever have.
Rubius had hoped that their talk would temper Aeron’s reckless reactions to hearing of Samar’s condition. He was hoping that he could bring Aeron back to the castle with him in a peaceful and supportive demeanor to speak with Samar. But instead, even though the talk with Rubius had made sense to him, Aeron decided to go another route. He decided that he would become obsessed with the impossible. He would fixate on achieving the one thing that he knew would soothe his heartache and make things right again.
“I’m going to find a way to prevent Samar from dying,” Aeron said.
Rubius looked at him with a heavily furrowed brow.
“You can’t keep death from her,” he said to Aeron. “I don’t know how long she has, or how grave her condition is. But no one can escape from death.”
“What good is it for me to be alpha, and king, if I cannot even save the ones that I love?” Aeron said.
Rubius looked at him with concern, as if he was looking into the eyes of a madman who was slowly descending into lunacy.
“I will find a way to save her. I will make sure that Samar does not die.”
“Aeron—”
But he wasn’t’ listening to Rubius. He was focused on a new purpose now, one that would fix everything. Aeron was going to find a way to prevent Samar’s death.