The Alpha's Fatal Choice: My Broken Mate Bond

"Your wolf is gone."

Sarah's voice barely carried over the hum of the filtration unit beside my hospital bed.

I kept my eyes on the ceiling. "Say it like a doctor."

She swallowed. "The Silver Venom remained in your bloodstream too long. It attacked the neural pathways that connect your human body to your wolf core. Nyra burned through everything she had trying to keep your heart functioning. The core fractured during the second filtration cycle."

I reached inward.

For most of my life, Nyra had been a second heartbeat. She complained when I skipped meals, laughed when Theo learned to shift, and paced whenever Knox rode beyond the border without me.

Now there was only silence.

"Permanent?"

"Permanent." Sarah looked down at the chart. "Your kidneys took significant damage. Your cardiac muscle is scarred. You can walk, but you may never tolerate sustained running. Shifting is no longer possible."

"I understand."

Sarah shook her head and moved to the foot of the bed. "There is one more thing. Your wolf's death changed the mate bond. It is still present, but it is unstable. Knox can feel you through it. He may still be able to push Alpha pressure through it. You, however, have almost no instinctive buffer left. If he forces the bond while your heart is this weak, it could trigger another collapse."

"Can it be severed?"

Her eyes narrowed. "Not safely in your condition. Not through a normal ritual."

"That was not my question."

She looked at me for a long moment. "Yes. It can be severed. But I am putting that answer in the same category as jumping from a roof because the stairs are inconvenient."

I almost smiled. "Noted."

She tucked the blanket higher over my ribs. "The Tribunal acknowledged your sanctuary petition at three seventeen this morning. If the criminal inquiry disappears, they can move you to neutral protection immediately. Until then, Blackwood can argue that removing you obstructs an active investigation."

So even my escape had been turned into a procedural trap.

"No, you don't." Her voice broke. "You almost died because he decided you could wait."

The door opened before I could answer.

Knox entered alone.

He looked clean. Showered. Changed. There was no blood on his cuffs, no sign that twelve hours earlier I had been vomiting black poison at his feet.

His gaze moved over the IV line, the oxygen cannula, the bruising at my throat.

"You're awake."

"Apparently."

Sarah stepped between us. "She needs rest."

"Leave us."

"No."

His Alpha aura pressed into the room.

Sarah's shoulders tensed. Mine did not. Without Nyra, his command no longer hooked into my wolf the way it once had.

"Sarah," I said quietly. "Give us five minutes."

She glared at Knox, then left the door partly open.

He moved to the foot of the bed. "Bianca is stable. The antidote worked."

"Good for her."

His mouth tightened. "I knew you could survive long enough for Sarah to treat you. Bianca couldn't. I made the only tactical choice available."

"My wolf is dead."

He paused.

Only for a second.

"Then we'll find a specialist."

"There is no specialist who resurrects a destroyed core."

"You have always adapted."

I stared at him. "You still think this is a test of my resilience."

"I think the Luna of this pack cannot collapse every time something goes wrong."

A laugh almost escaped me, but my ribs hurt too much.

"My heart is scarred. My kidneys are failing. I will never shift again."

"You survived."

There it was again. The word they used to absolve themselves.

You survived, therefore the choice had been acceptable.

"Bianca would have died," he continued. "She had no one else to protect her."

"I had you."

His jaw flexed. "Don't twist this into a relationship argument."

"What should I call it? A resource allocation decision?"

"Evelyn."

It was the first time he had said my name since the banquet.

I wanted it to hurt more than it did.

He reached for the blanket near my hand. I pulled my fingers away before he could touch them.

"Theo?" I asked.

"With Bianca. He was terrified after the attack."

"Of me dying?"

Knox looked toward the window.

That answer was enough.

A security alert chimed from the tablet mounted beside my bed. Knox glanced at it before I could stop him.

RESTRICTED STATUS: LUNA EVELYN BLACKWOOD. INTERNAL INVESTIGATION PENDING.

I read the line twice.

"What investigation?"

Knox exhaled. "Bianca remembers seeing your maid, Elara, near the banquet kitchen before the toast. The rogue who served the poison carried gold traced to one of your household accounts."

The monitor beside me accelerated.

"You opened an investigation into me while I was unconscious?"

"Emergency procedure."

"On whose authority?"

"Mine."

"Pack law requires the Luna's co-signature for an inquiry into her office."

"I invoked emergency powers."

I stared at him.

Hours after he gave away the only antidote, my husband had used wartime authority to make me a suspect in my own poisoning.

"Do you believe I hired someone to kill Bianca?"

He hesitated.

That hesitation hurt more than the answer would have.

"I believe evidence has to be examined."

"Get out."

"Evelyn—"

"Get out of my room."

He stepped closer. "If you cooperate, this can be resolved quietly."

"Quietly." I tasted the word. "Like leaving me on the banquet floor?"

His expression hardened. "You are emotional."

"And you are no longer welcome here."

I reached for the call button.

Knox looked at my hand, then at my face. For once, he did not use his rank to stop me.

He walked out.

Sarah entered immediately, carrying a sealed tablet.

"Your sanctuary request was received by the Tribunal," she said. "They issued a provisional protection code, but they cannot extract you while Blackwood has an active criminal inquiry."

"Then we clear the inquiry."

A shadow crossed the open doorway.

Garrison, Knox's lead deputy, stepped into view with four armed guards behind him.

He held a formal notice in his hand.

"Luna Evelyn," he said. "By order of the Alpha, you are confined to the medical wing until the attempted-murder investigation is complete."