Chapter 12

Elouera

"He’s trying to put you into heat."

Jace’s rough whisper shattered the stagnant air of the bedroom.

My lungs completely forgot how to work. The terrified breath I had been holding died instantly in my throat. I looked up to Commander Corowa’s storm grey eyes, my body completely paralyzed.

He knew. He didn't just know I was the Weaver. He knew what I was.

Before I could form a single word of denial, before I could even begin to beg for my life, a heavy, booming sound echoed from the far end of the stone corridor.

Footsteps.

Not the careful, measured steps of an Imperial Guard. These were heavy and aggressive, each stomp making the floorboards tremble beneath me.

The temperature in my bedchamber seemed to drop instantly.

A cold, suffocating scent of ice and raw leather pushed through the cracks in the broken door, drowning out the faint traces of Jace’s ozone and my own wild honey.

Callan.

Jace’s jaw tightened, and his eyes immediately snapped toward the doorway.

Without saying a word, his large, leather clad hand closed around mine and pulled the black pill from my sweaty fingers. He didn’t even look at me.

He simply stepped back, disappearing into the deep shadows behind the heavy velvet curtains just as the splintered oak door was kicked wide open.

The heavy wood slammed against the wall. The damaged hinges gave a final, metallic scream before snapping entirely.

Crown Prince Callan stood in the doorway, blocking out the dim corridor light with his massive, imposing body.

He looked untamed. His icy blue eyes were calm and untouched, his strong jaw covered in a rough golden stubble, and his heavy military tunic hung open at the chest, revealing the thick fabric of the shirt underneath., scarred cords of muscle in his neck. He had a half empty bottle of dark liquor gripped tightly in his right fist.

"Look at this," Callan sneered, his deep, gravelly voice slurring just enough to be incredibly dangerous. "The cowardly little prince, hiding in the dark while the rest of the empire actually does the work."

I sank back into the damp pillows and pulled the heavy wool blanket up to my chin. My heart pounded painfully against my broken rib.

“Callan… please. I’m sick.”"You're always sick, Elian," he spat, stepping over the threshold.

He didn't stop at the foot of the bed. He tossed the glass bottle carelessly onto the floor. It rolled away, Dark amber liquor splashed across the stone floor as he came straight toward me. He stopped beside my mattress, his tall figure blocking out what little light reached me.

Then his Alpha presence pressed down on me, cold and heavy. It felt like an invisible weight settling over my chest.

My suppressed biology, already tortured by the crossfire of Holden’s drugs, instantly panicked. My body screamed at me to submit, to bare my throat, I lowered my gaze, trying to calm the dominant male in the room. My mind was starting to fall apart, and I struggled to keep myself grounded.

"I have a fever," I choked out, turning my face away from him. "Leave me alone."

"Leave you alone?" Callan laughed, a harsh, barking sound completely devoid of humor. "You embarrassed me at the banquet, you pathetic little rat. You collapsed like a dying whore and then covered yourself in vinegar. You made me look like I was dragging a rotting corpse out of the hall."

He reached down.

I didn't even have time to flinch. Callan’s massive hand closed around my jaw, his rough fingers pressing into my cheeks as he forced my face back toward him.

His grip was iron, but the exact second his bare skin touched my fever slicked face, the violent aggression in his posture visibly faltered.

A strange, electric shock seemed to ripple right up his arm. His icy blue eyes widened for a fraction of a second.

I gasped, my chest rising and falling against the tight linen bindings. His rough touch made the feverish heat in my body spike. The faint scent of wild honey and rain mixed with the stale smell of sweat and sickness, filling the small space between us.

Callan froze entirely.

He didn’t let go of my jaw, but his grip changed. The painful pressure eased, replaced by a firm hold that somehow felt even more threatening.

He leaned over me, his broad shoulders blocking most of my view. He was close enough for me to catch the sharp smell of liquor on his breath.

"Why are you so hot?" Callan murmured. He dropped the angry slur, his voice slipping into a rough, gravelly register that made my stomach completely drop.

"Callan, let go," I whispered, my voice breaking. I tried to pull my head back, but he followed the movement, leaning down until his nose was bare inches from my temple.

He took a slow, deep inhale.

His chest rose sharply. The cold scent filling the room suddenly seemed heavier, making the air feel thick and hard to breathe.

The hatred that usually filled his eyes whenever he looked at me was gone. In its place was a deep, confused expression I couldn’t understand.

His gaze dropped to my bruised, trembling lips. His pupils widened as he stared at me, almost hiding the blue of his eyes.

"That scent," he breathed, his thumb slowly, almost involuntarily, stroking the damp skin of my cheek. "It's you. It was you at the banquet."

He was an apex Alpha, but his own instincts seemed to be fighting against everything he believed.

In his mind, I was still his weak, pathetic younger brother. Yet something about my presence was triggering a response he couldn't understand or control. The conflict was written all over his face.

He hated me. I could see it in his eyes.

But for some reason, he still couldn't bring himself to step away. His jaw tightened as he struggled to regain control of himself.

"Get off me!" I panicked, planting my hands flat against his solid chest, trying to shove his massive weight back.

It was a fatal mistake. The exertion pulled sharply on my broken rib. I let out a sharp, genuine cry of agony, my arms giving out as I collapsed back onto the pillows.

Callan didn’t step back. My cry of pain didn’t bring out his usual mocking laugh.

Instead, a low growl rumbled in his chest, an instinctive reaction to seeing someone hurt.

He hated himself for it. I could see the furious denial warring with the raw, desperate biological instinct in his eyes. He looked sickened by his own reaction, yet completely captivated.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" Callan asked, his voice thick with a strange kind of panic. He didn't sound like he was asking about my fever. He sounded like he was begging for an explanation for why his own body was violently betraying him.

He shifted his weight, planting one knee on the edge of the mattress and blocking my way toward the headboard. His hand dropped from my jaw and caught the collar of my sweat soaked silk shirt, his grip tightening as his expression hardened.

"Callan, no!" I scrambled backward, but there was nowhere to go. My spine hit the solid wood.

"You reek of it," he snarled softly, his face hovering just above mine, his gaze dropping to my chest. "You smell like a..."

He didn't finish the sentence. He couldn't even force the forbidden word out of his mouth.

With a sudden, violent yank, Callan tore my shirt open.

The cheap silk tore straight down the middle, the sharp sound breaking through the silence of the room. Cool air rushed over my skin, but any relief I might have felt disappeared almost instantly, replaced by a wave of blind terror.

Callan’s icy blue eyes dropped to my exposed chest.

He didn't see the flat, sunken chest of a sickly prince. He saw the thick, heavy layers of tight linen bindings completely wrapped around my torso, viciously compressing curves that no man should have.

Complete, absolute silence fell over the room.

The heavy tension around him suddenly turned cold and dangerous.

Callan didn’t move. He barely could breathe. His eyes stayed fixed on the bindings, the confusion in them slowly fading until only a grim realization remained.

Slowly, his hand moved. His large, rough fingers brushed against my skin, tracing the rigid edge of the linen directly over my racing heart.

“Elian,” Callan whispered. His voice was strangely flat, almost empty, as if eight years of lies had finally caught up with him all at once.

“What exactly are you hiding under there?”