Chapter 13: Accepted

Zeus’s Point of View

November  didn’t speak to me for three days. Not a word. Just silence. Her fragile body lay curled beneath sterile hospital sheets while I sat quietly nearby, pretending not to notice how hollow she looked. Even when the nurses checked her vitals or gave her meds, she barely blinked.

Her wolf was nearly gone. The connection between them was threadbare, like someone trying to speak underwater. And with each passing hour, the distance grew.

I could feel her slipping.

She tried to hide it, but I knew the signs her aura dimmed, her breathing grew more erratic, her soul seemed half-lodged in this world. Until finally, on the fourth day, she spoke.

It wasn’t what I expected.

“Why choose me?”

I looked up from the armchair where I had been dozing lightly. Her voice was hoarse, but her eyes—though bloodshot—were clear and resolute.

“Because I knew you wouldn’t judge me,” I said. “Even if I was a hybrid.”

She smiled. 

“What makes you think that I was not disgusted?” 

I smiled. 

“I just felt it,” I said as I was searching for something in her eyes.  The disgust. The fear. The barrier that everyone should  build between us with those words.

My wolf growled low in my chest, not at her—but at what had been done to her. The lies. The promise and the pain inflicted to her.

“You do not hate us, do you?”

November looked at me. 

“Why would I hate them? They’re like me, like humans, and have a purpose and the right to live. Everyone has a fair share in this world,” she said. 

Unlike the bloodline of my father, even with my mother, I could see no hatred toward hybrids in her green eyes.  I exhaled slowly, trying not to scare her. 

“You know I’m huge,” I said. 

“You’re a dragon of course you’re huge.”

She laughed. 

“Do you want to try to ride someday?”

“Hell, no. I’m afraid of heights,” she said and then she looked at the ceiling. “But seriously, Zeus, are you sure you’re going to take me? I mean I’m difficult to deal with.”

“It doesn’t matter,’ I said. “We can adjust.”

And she looked at me.

“Knox said… hybrids were always something we were told to avoid. You’re dangerous. Tainted,” she said. “But here you are, saving me despite I'm already shattered, and now you want me to bond with you.”

“We’ll it’s going to be worth fixing you, November,” I said gently. “And I will not break you further. I’m here to keep you from dying.”

“Thank you, Zeus. But if you didn’t save me back there, I would have died.”

“Death is not always the answer,” I said, standing up. Her eyes widened but full of sadness. “You don’t get to say that. Not after I pulled your body from that ocean lungs filled with water, heart barely beating. You don’t get to pretend you’d rather die when your wolf—your wolf—is still clawing at the edge of your soul, begging you to live.”

Her lips parted and tears started to form in her eyes.

“You may not want to be in your situation but maybe there are a lot out there waiting to have someone like you  for second chances.  You may think you're beneath because you were cheated on and rejected. Fine. But everyone deserves second chances. Don’t you dare lie to yourself and say death is a better option.”

That made her cry. Hard.

Tears welled in her eyes, but she clenched her jaw. 

“My wolf hasn’t spoken to me since the rejection. She’s silent. She’s… mad at me.”

“She’s not mad,” I said softly, crouching beside her bed. “She’s grieving. And fading. The rejection did damage, yes, but the drowning pushed her further. She’s slipping into the void, and the only thing that could tether her back is the bond. With me.”

She shook her head. 

“I used to think she was the strongest part of me. But now I feel so empty. So cold.”

“You are cold,” I said. “Because you’re half dead. And that silence? That emptiness? That’s what dying feels like.”

Her voice broke. 

“But I’m scared. What if it didn’t work?”

I stared at her for a long moment. 

“All we have to do is trust the process.”

That quieted her.

“You’re special, November,” I said, bitterly. “If I want to mate again, I want it to be you.’

She blinked rapidly. 

“Then why me?”

“Because we're the same and I want you.”

Silence.

Then she whispered.

 “What if I say yes… and I still lose my wolf?”

“Then I’ll grieve with you,” I said. “But we’ll know we tried.”

Her eyes brimmed with tears again.

“And what if I say yes… and I never love you?”

“Then I’ll learn to live with that.”

She looked away, her throat bobbing with a hard swallow.

“And if I say no?”

“Then your wolf will die,” I said bluntly. “And you will follow. No medicine, no healer, no second chance. Wolfnip will vanish into nothing. And she’ll never forgive you.”

I leaned closer, my voice a whisper. 

“And neither will you.”

Her breathing hitched, like the wind had been knocked from her lungs.

“Then we’ll gamble and let’s see what the future brings us.”

I reached for her hand and  she didn’t pull away.

“You can hate me all you want, November. But don’t let your wolf die because of fear.”

She stared at our joined hands, lips trembling. After a long pause, she whispered:

“I’m scared.”

I nodded. “Me too.”

Then, finally, she said the words I’d been holding my breath for.

“…Okay.”

A single word.

But it was life. It was hope. It was the beginning of something terrifying and beautiful and broken—but real.

I pressed my forehead to her hand and exhaled a shaky breath.

We had a long way to go.

But she was choosing life.

And that was enough—for now.