Genevieve’s POV The days blurred. André remained quiet, his body slowly healing while his mind wandered through shadows I couldn’t reach. He was present, but only in the physical sense. He spoke sometimes, asked simple questions “What time is it?”, “Where’s the healer?” but nothing about himself. Nothing about us. And though I told myself to be patient, that healing wasn’t linear, every time he looked at me like I was a stranger, it scraped a little deeper into my heart. But today felt different. Not brighter exactly, but lighter somehow. His eyes had lingered a little longer when I helped him sit up this morning. His hand didn’t twitch away from mine when I brushed his hair back from his face. It wasn’t recognition. But it was a shift. And that was enough to make me try something I hadn’t dared to before. I stood beside the old trunk in the healer’s quarters one I had been using to keep my few belongings and gently pulled out the folded bundle of red silk tucked carefully at the
Genevieve’s POV When his fingers moved, it was the smallest thing but to me, it felt like the earth shifted beneath my feet. At first, I thought I imagined it. That maybe my mind, desperate for a sign, had conjured the slight twitch in his hand. But then I felt it again slow and uncertain, like he was reaching through a fog so thick it swallowed everything he once knew. His fingers curled weakly around mine, not tightly, not with confidence, but gently. As if something deep inside him something primal and unspoken was telling him to hold on.My heart stuttered, aching with too many emotions at once. I couldn’t tell if it was relief or grief that poured through me as I stared at him. His eyes were still blank, unfocused. There was no recognition in them, no soft curve of a smile or teasing spark that used to light his face when he looked at me. But there was no fear either. Just a kind of quiet confusion, the kind that cracked through my chest because it didn’t belong on his face. Not
André’s Wolf's POVThere was no light in this place not even the distant shimmer of memory. It was as if someone had stripped the world of all meaning and color, leaving only shadow and silence behind. I didn’t know how long I had been here, pacing through the endless dark, my body formless but my presence very much alive. This wasn’t death, but it wasn’t life either. It was the place in between the broken gap between who we were and who we were supposed to be. And I was trapped in it. I, his wolf, the part of him that had once given him strength, instinct, and rage, was now nothing more than a voice screaming into a void he could no longer hear.I remembered what it felt like to be whole, to move as one. The weight of our body in motion, the clarity of our shared mind. I remembered her too Genevieve. The warmth of her scent, the safety in her touch, the way our heart used to beat just a little faster when she walked into the room. But now, none of that reached him. He had opened his
André’s POV The first thing I became aware of was breath.Not a thought. Not a memory. Just breath.A slow, stuttering inhale that scraped against my ribs like sandpaper. It didn’t even feel like mine more like I was borrowing it from someone else. The sound of it thundered in my ears, far too loud, echoing in a space I couldn’t define. I felt my chest rise… halt… then fall again. Muscles tugged with stiffness, cords of tension pulling through my back, my neck, my jaw. Everything ached not sharply, but deeply, like something had settled into my bones and decided it belonged there.Then came the light.Pale. Dim. Diffused as if seen through fog or water.It wasn’t enough to burn, but it was enough to disorient. Soft at the edges, yet still too much for eyes that hadn’t opened in what felt like lifetimes. My lids were heavy. Gluey. Reluctant, as though prying them apart might unravel me entirely.Still, they opened. Eventually.Shapes bled into existence undefined blobs at first. Then
Genevieve’s POV It was the silence that woke me.Not the screaming kind the jagged, suffocating silence I’d grown familiar with over the past days. That silence was laced with dread, thick with the weight of time and breath and the slow, creeping terror that André might never open his eyes again.No, this silence was… different.It was alive. Charged. Watchful.Like the air itself had paused to hold its breath.I blinked, groggy and aching from sleeping in a curled position beside his cot. The cot that had become my world. My prison. My sanctuary. My battlefield.I lifted my head, and the moment I did, my lungs locked.André’s eyes were open.Wide open.And staring right at me.For a heartbeat just a heartbeat i forgot how to breathe. The stillness inside me cracked open like glass beneath pressure, and every fear I’d buried came rushing up at once. But I forced it down, forced myself to move. My hand shot out, trembling as I reached for him.He was really awake.Not twitching in a f
Genevieve’s POVI didn’t even realize I was holding my breath until the ache in my chest turned to something sharp something that made my vision blur and my knees threaten to buckle. The air rushed back into my lungs all at once, harsh and cold, like I'd surfaced from drowning.“André…” I whispered his name again, for what felt like the hundredth tim —but it could’ve been a thousand. My throat was raw, as if each plea had been torn from me with splinters. My fingers wouldn’t stop trembling where they clutched the edge of the cot he lay on, knuckles white, nails dug into the fabric like they alone could anchor him here. His body had been still for too long. Too cold. His skin had taken on the pale, stony pallor of death a terrible stillness, like the world had already decided to forget him.He hadn’t spoken. He hadn’t moved. His hand once so warm, so strong lay limp in mine. I’d held it for hours, whispering memories, promises, apologies. Anything. Everything. Begging the universe to g