Exile stepped into the lead instead, his massive frame acting as a human battering ram through the dense garden overgrowth. His heavy boots crushed the stone debris as he carved a straight, brutal line toward the western ridge. Beside him, Lucan flickered in and out of sight, a lethal ghost anchoring their forward guard, ensuring no remaining rogue tiger guards could ambush them from the flanking paths.
Ivan took up the rear. His golden eyes were wide, tracking every shifting shadow, his claws extended and still faintly stained with the residue of his neurotoxin. The entire settlement was in absolute upheaval now; the distant wail of the sirens grew louder, echoing off the sandstone facades of the old Victorian buildings as panic spread through the market districts.
Voss didn’t look at the chaos. He didn’t look at the turning heads of the frightened beastmen who melted into the ruins at the sheer sight of the bleeding, furious protectors. His focus was entirely locked on the steady, rhythmic rise and fall of Felicity’s chest against his own. He ran with a smooth, terrifyingly efficient stride, absorbing every jolt so her heavy belly wouldn’t be jostled.
As they broke through the inner boundary of the manor grounds, the heavy oak gates were already thrown wide.
Dimitri stood in the courtyard, his massive frame as tense as a coiled spring. Next to him, Victor’s eagle wings were fully extended, the razor-sharp feathers gleaming in the morning light as he scanned the skies for any aerial threats. Damien stood just behind them, his serpentine grace taut, his hands already glowing with the faint, green warmth of a diagnostic spell.
"She’s breathing," Voss breathed out before Dimitri could even ask, his voice raw from the strain of resisting the sleep command. "An assassin used a localised mental strike in the greenhouse. She’s unhurt, but the spell knocked her out cold. The babies are moving, and feel and sound ok."
Dimitri’s jaw clenched so hard the scars on his neck flared white. He didn’t waste time on rage, not yet. He stepped aside, signalling for Voss to keep moving into the house. "Take her straight to the bedroom. Damien, check the cubs immediately. Victor, lock down every single gate on the western ridge. No one enters. No one leaves."
Voss carried her through the heavy stone archway of the manor, his boots thudding against the hardwood floors until he reached the deep, fur-lined sanctuary of their bedroom, nest.
He set Felicity down on the sunken mattress, cradling her head so gently that her ears, her real, living fox ears, didn’t even twitch in protest. Only then did he realise his own arms were shaking so hard he had to brace them on his knees. He peeled off his coat and arranged it into a makeshift pillow at the base of her neck, then, with an awkwardness utterly at odds with his size, began the delicate process of unfastening the dress she wore. Each button was a puzzle. Each brush of fabric over her skin was a test of restraint. He exchanged the ruined dress for one of Victor’s shirts, she always swam in them, the sleeves a foot too long, the collar loose enough to show a glint of collarbone and tucked the comforter around her, as if that might be enough to keep her safe from the world that had never stopped trying to kill her.
She was out cold, her hands fisted in the bedding, ears flat against her skull. He ran a slow, careful thumb along the inside of her wrist, counting pulse beats. There were too many. Then not enough. Then too many again. Her breathing was at least steady. He watched the tiny gold lashes flutter on her cheek, wondering if she was dreaming. Wondering if, this time, she would wake up.
A soft knock at the door. Voss was up and in front of it before he meant to be, body blocking the handle out of pure instinct.
"It’s just me." Damien’s voice was muffled but unmistakably serene, the words soft enough not to disturb the sleeping. "May I enter?"
Voss opened the door a crack. The snake was standing there, his arms full of medical supplies scavenged from every room in the house, scalpels and bandages and a battered digital thermometer clutched in the crook of one elbow. He bowed his head as soon as Voss let him in, moving with a deference he rarely showed to anyone.
"I need to check her vitals, I think", Damien whispered, setting the supplies down on the desk before kneeling beside the bed. Voss hovered just above his shoulder, arms crossed and eyes zeroed in on every movement.
"She’s stable," Damien murmured, and the clinical calm wavered just enough to show the worry underneath. "Heart rate’s elevated, but that’s normal for her. Pupils respond. No bleeding I can find." He paused, slit-pupil gaze flicking up. "If she stirs, you wake me before she finishes opening her mouth."
Then he leaned in. He kept his lips a breath above her forehead, not quite touching, drawing her in; she smelled of honeysuckle and the cedar of Victor’s shirt and underneath it all, something that was only ever her. His forked tongue tasted the air over her pulse. He listened to her heart for a long beat, then pressed the lightest kiss to her hairline before withdrawing.
Damien shifted fully into his snake form, obsidian scales rippling gold in the strange light, and settled into a slow protective loop around her side of the mattress, a living wall, jaw resting near her hip, amber gaze half-lidded but never closing.
Voss sat on the edge of the bed, just breathing her in, every inhale calibrating something deep in his chest he was never able to articulate. Night outside the windows was brightening into that weird, post-apocalypse gold, the light filtering through shattered glass and tangling itself around the sleeping fox in a makeshift halo.
For the first time in memory, nothing in him was calculating. No odds to tally. No move to plan three steps ahead. He let himself have one full minute of stillness, of watching her chest rise and fall, of the small wrinkle that had eased from between her brows, of her ears slowly unflattening as the dreaming let go of her.
Visit and read more novel to help us update chapter quickly. Thank you so much!
Use arrow keys (or A / D) to PREV/NEXT chapter