Chapter 4:The Wounded Stranger

(Penny’s POV)

For one frozen second, I just stared at him.

Genesis, my Genesis, the one I’d written page after page about, lay crumpled at my feet like a broken action figure. Chest rising and falling in shallow, uneven breaths. Blood soaked the torn fabric of his shirt, spreading dark and wet across his ribs. The gash on his side was deep, ragged, probably from claws. His left arm hung at an odd angle, like the joint had popped or worse.

He looked smaller than I’d imagined him. Not the towering, invincible alpha prince who commanded entire packs with a single growl. Just… a man. Bleeding. Hurting. Human in all the ways that mattered right now.

The howls in the distance sharpened, closer, angrier. They’d finished whatever slaughter they were doing back at the village and were fanning out. Hunting stragglers. Hunting him, probably. Or me. Or both of us.

I couldn’t just leave him here.

I should leave him here.

He was a werewolf. An alpha. In my book, he healed fast. In my book, he didn’t need anyone.

But this wasn’t my book anymore. This was real dirt under my knees, real blood on my hands when I reached out to check his pulse. Real panic clawing up my throat.

His heart beat strong under my fingers, too strong for someone who looked half-dead. Werewolf perk, I guessed.

“Okay,” I muttered, mostly to myself. “Okay. You’re a nurse. Act like one.”

I shrugged off my backpack, unzipped the main compartment with shaking hands. Med kit first. Always the med kit.

Gauze. Tape. Antiseptic wipes. A roll of Kerlix. A couple of trauma shears I kept for emergencies. I’d restocked it after the last volunteer day, thank God for small habits.

I tore open a wipe and cleaned my hands as best I could. Then I knelt beside him.

“Hey,” I said softly, not expecting an answer. “I’m going to touch you. Don’t bite me, okay? I’m trying to help.”

No response. Just that ragged breathing.

I peeled back the shredded shirt. The wound was ugly, three long claw marks raking from ribs to hip. Deep enough to show muscle in places. Not arterial, thank God, but still bleeding steadily. Dirt and bits of leaf were ground into the edges.

I poured saline from a small bottle over the worst of it to flush out debris. He flinched, barely, but it was enough to make me freeze.

Then his eyes snapped open.

Storm-gray. Pupils blown wide with pain and something feral.

“Don’t touch me, you fool…” The words came out as a hiss, low and dangerous, edged with a growl that vibrated in my chest.

I jerked back, heart slamming against my ribs.

“I’m trying to save your freaking ass!” I shot back before I could stop myself. “And you’re calling me a fool? Really?”

He blinked slowly, like he was trying to focus through a fog. His gaze raked over me, hoodie, messy ponytail, blood-streaked hands, and something like confusion flickered in those eyes.

He lifted his good arm, inspected the hasty bandage I’d already started wrapping around his ribs. Then lower, to the pressure dressing on his side.

“You’re… welcome, by the way,” I added, because sarcasm felt safer than screaming.

He tried to sit up. Made it halfway before his face went gray and he dropped back with a grunt.

“Where am I?” His voice was rough, like gravel dragged over silk.

I laughed, short, bitter, a little hysterical. “That’s what I want to know. Because right now I’m fucking clueless where the hell I am.”

He stared at me like I’d grown a second head.

I reached for the small bottle of ibuprofen in my kit. “Here. Painkiller. It’ll help until you… you know, do your werewolf healing thing.”

His eyes narrowed. “What did you give me?”

“Nothing yet. But if you keep thrashing around like that, your wound’s going to reopen and you’ll bleed out before your magic fur kicks in.”

He tried to stand again, stubborn idiot, and immediately swayed. I lunged forward without thinking, catching him under the arms before he could face-plant.

“Sit. Down.”

He snarled, actual snarl, lips pulling back to show elongated canines, but the fight drained out of him almost instantly. Whatever adrenaline had been keeping him upright was gone. He slumped against the log, breathing hard.

“What… happened to me?” he rasped.

“Claw marks. Blood loss. Probably some internal bruising. And I gave you a low-dose sedative with the first round of meds so you wouldn’t feel every stitch. You’re welcome again.”

His head lolled toward me. “You… poisoned me?”

I rolled my eyes so hard I saw stars. “I wish. But no. I’m a nurse. Not an assassin.”

He moved faster than someone that injured should have been able to.

One second I was kneeling. The next my back was against the rough bark of the fallen log, his forearm braced across my collarbone, not choking, just pinning. His face was inches from mine. Heat rolled off him in waves. Blood and pine and something darker, wilder.

“I can heal myself,” he growled. “I don’t need your—”

His words cut off. Eyes rolled back again. Body went limp.

The sedative, combined with blood loss, had finally won.

He collapsed sideways, head thudding against my shoulder.

I sat there, pinned under dead weight, heart hammering so loud I was sure the entire forest could hear it.

After a long moment, I carefully extricated myself. Checked his pulse again, still strong. Breathing steady. Color returning, just a little.

He’d live.

Probably.

I looked around. The howls were fainter now, maybe the fighting had moved on. Maybe they thought everyone was dead.

Maybe they’d come back.

I couldn’t stay here.

I couldn’t leave him here, either.

Not really.

I dragged him, awkwardly, painfully, deeper into the underbrush until I found a small overhang of rock and roots that formed a shallow cave. Just big enough for two people if we squeezed.

I hauled him inside, propped him against the back wall, covered him with my hoodie because he was shivering now, shock, maybe, and draped a spare emergency blanket from my pack over him.

Then I sat cross-legged at the entrance, med kit open, listening to the forest breathe around us.

My hands wouldn’t stop shaking.

I’d saved him.

The same way Elara was supposed to save him in chapter five.

But this wasn’t fiction.

This was me.

In socks.

In a cave.

With an unconscious werewolf prince bleeding on my blanket.

And somewhere out there, two packs were still tearing each other apart.

I pressed my forehead to my knees and whispered the only thing I could think to say.

“Please let this be a dream.”

It wasn’t.