04. MY REVENGE

TEMPEST

"I was poisoned by a Brood Level SS, and the infection keeps advancing. The best doctors have only managed to slow it down."

I assumed SS level meant a top-tier lethality rating in the Brood.

My gaze slid to his covered legs; the smell of medicine was stronger there. Medicine... and something else that tugged at my blood.

"What... what do I have to do with that?" I played dumb.

"My right-hand man was out with a group of my soldiers, desperate to find a cure, and they witnessed you being attacked by a swarm of buzzers."

"Buzzers?"

"That’s what we call the smaller insects... like the ones that were about to eat you and, for some reason... didn’t..."

«Maybe they didn’t find me tasty», my stupid brain offered... I kept that to myself.

I was starting to see where this was going.

"I don’t know why those things didn’t devour me. But, General, don’t pin your hopes on me..."

"I don’t pin my hopes on anyone, and stop calling me General." His voice turned dangerous and he leaned forward.

His fierce features came into the light. Black hair, dark as night, fell in waves over his shoulders.

Battle-worn skin, but he still carried a wild, rough beauty, even now, gaunt.

You could tell he’d once been a remarkable man.

Short, unkempt stubble framed his mouth. Full lips, pale and cracked.

A straight nose. Eyes like two sapphires staring me down, all challenge.

Deep shadows under them; he didn’t sleep well.

"In fact, I’ve made my peace with dying, but the few people who care about me refuse to give up," he said, brusque and dry.

"I’m going to ask you once, and if you can’t or won’t, you leave my house today. Can you, or can’t you, do something about this?"

As he spoke, he swept the blanket aside. His outstretched legs were suddenly bare, and I couldn’t stop the gasp.

Holy Goddess. I’d seen bad infections on that bastard Knox, but never anything like this.

The former General’s legs were a ghastly gray, mottled with purples and reds.

A web of veins ran under inflamed skin, black spiderwebs climbing higher than his thighs.

Round lesions had opened up. Likely the puncture sites where poultices of herbal medicine had been set.

I guessed to blunt the kind of pain that had to be eating him alive.

He watched my reaction, maybe expecting me to vomit like the last maid.

"I..." I hesitated, a thousand thoughts slashing through my head at once.

If they threw me out, where would I go? I didn’t have a home.

They wouldn’t take me just like that in the royal pack.

I was basically a rogue, bound to be kicked out of these lands and wander until I died a nasty death.

Even so, dying didn’t sound so bad; at least I’d keep my son company...

"Don’t set your hopes on me. I’m not…"

"Aaggrr!" A strangled growl tore out between his teeth.

He grabbed his legs, claws digging in, sweat running as he squeezed his eyes shut in raw pain.

The muscles in his jaw jumped under the grind of his teeth.

"Get out now! Leave or you’re in danger!"

His warning roar and the oppressive aura rolling off him snapped me to.

I turned to bolt, but my eyes stuck on fluorescent glints flickering under his skin.

Greenish points ran his veins... the poison was on the move.

"AAAHH!" His screams of pain made the walls seem to tremble.

He pressed back against the bed, trying to hold it in, but he was past holding.

Suddenly his blue eyes bled red and he looked at me full of danger.

"What the hell are you still doing here?! Go before I lose control!"

He shouted again and shot out a hand, fighting to yank the bellcord beside the bed. He jerked so hard he nearly went over the edge.

Signs of the beast were surfacing in the bulge of his powerful muscles, slick with sweat. His face, fangs bared, was pure agony.

He was suffering so much, and I knew too well what it meant to live with a spike of pain in your soul, to wait for the end with no hope at all.

Moved by something like mercy, I slit my wrist and went back to him, letting the drops fall over his reddened legs.

Under the skin, the veins seemed to bulge like greenish snakes, writhing and glowing brighter.

Something in me craved the connection, to pull the toxins in, so I put my hand on his legs.

The moment we touched, the vein cords went frantic. My palms burned and a current tingled up my arms.

Heat climbed through my body... the same as when I healed Knox.

"Gggrr... what are you doing to me, you fucking witch?!" he screamed in a frenzy.

I was so focused on not wasting a drop that I didn’t sense the danger closing in.

Two huge, clawed hands seized my small neck and started choking me.

"My... blood... heals..." I tried to reason, but the male was gone.

I fought him without lifting my hand from his legs, until the pressure became unbearable.

My nails dug into his powerful hands and I stared into the beast’s eyes, rabid and wild in front of me.

Air fled my lungs as he bent me forward over his chest, still choking me. I looked into the depths of his torn-up soul through that storming red.

"I... can heal you..." I rasped, losing the fight. Black spots danced and my mind drifted.

Just when I thought it was time to cross over to the dead, I was released and shoved onto a corner of the mattress.

I coughed, clutching my throat, about to rip my lungs out.

My legs dangled off the edge while the rest of me slumped on the massive bed.

When I could think again, instinct made me scramble away from him.

I crawled until I almost fell, staring like a cornered animal while he just gaped at his legs.

"Is this... your blood?" He brushed his fingers over the bloody streaks.

"Of... course..." My voice came out strangled; talking hurt. I raised my wrist and licked it to seal it with saliva.

A silence heavier than a mountain settled between us.

"If you can heal me..."

"Don’t get your hopes up, sir," I said at once, coughing a little.

"I’m sorry... damn it!, I’m an animal. There’s water on the nightstand," he growled, eyeing my throat that had to be purple.

"It’s fine," I murmured, sighing. "There’s something in me... I can heal lesser poisons, but I don’t know if an infection this far gone is even possible..."

"It doesn’t matter if you can’t cure me completely... just..." He paused, watching the veins as the swelling eased.

"Just help take the edge off the pain and it’s enough." His brow tightened and that piercing gaze came back to me.

The animal part reined in, blue winning over the feral red.

"What can I give you in return? Whatever’s within my reach... I’ll do it." He waited.

If someone had told me a day ago I’d be sitting on the bed of the former General of the wolf realm, negotiating, I would’ve said they were out of their mind.

What could this man have that I needed?

Then, Knox… The rapes… My miserable life… My inhuman labor.  The way my soul had been dying with my son… all of it crashed through me.

Power. I needed power to take revenge, and making a pact with this fallen General didn’t seem so crazy.

"I want to wipe out an entire pack. Raze them to the foundations..."

Blood…An eye for an eye… The only thing that made me want to live.