The Fever

I didn't know if I was dying, but the world burned down around me.

The castle became a dizzy, spinning blur of grey stone and flickering torchlight. I was held tight against a chest so broad and hard it felt like being pressed against a boulder. The heat coming off Cillian's body felt like pure heaven.

I hated myself for it. My mind screamed to fight, to pull away, to claw at his eyes. He was the enemy. He killed my pack and chained me in the dark.

My inner wolf got lost in his smell. Dark pine, rain, and the heavy, rich scent of a powerful Alpha took over my brain. Every time my bruised cheek rubbed against his dark shirt, a small, sad, high-pitched whine came out of the back of my throat.

"Clear the hall!" Cillian roared.

The sound shook straight into my skull, so loud and angry that I flinched, burying my face into the side of his neck without thinking.

I heard the panicked scramble of boots on stone. Guards, servants, and fighters threw themselves against the walls to get out of his way.

"Eyes down! If anyone looks at him, I'll gouge them out!" Cillian snarled.

He had lost his mind. The Lycan King, known for being cold and cruel, walked through the halls like a wild animal. His huge chest rose and fell with every rough breath he took, breathing in the thick, sweet smell of vanilla and flowers pouring off my skin.

He kicked open a set of massive, heavy wooden doors. They slammed against the stone walls with a huge crash. He carried me through, kicked the doors shut behind us, and I heard the heavy clack of an iron lock sliding into place.

We were alone.

He practically threw me.

I hit a huge mattress covered in dark furs, jarring my broken ribs. A choked scream tore out of my throat as I curled into a tight ball, grabbing my left side. The freezing, soap-soaked rough shirt clung to my shaking body.

Cillian backed away from the bed like I had burned him.

He hit the heavy wooden door, his broad shoulders pressing against the wood. He breathed hard, his hands squeezed into fists at his sides. In the dim light of the huge fireplace across the room, his eyes burned a terrifying, bright gold. His pupils narrowed into thin black slits.

He fought his own Lycan. The beast inside him wanted to crawl onto the bed and claim his mate, but the King who hated Omegas held it back with everything he had.

"An Omega," Cillian whispered, the word tasting like poison in his mouth. He dragged a shaking hand through his dark hair, pulling at the roots. "A male Omega. You... you hid this. From me. From everyone."

I couldn't speak. The fever shot up so fast my teeth chattered hard enough to chip. The room spun. The heavy, manly smell of Cillian's room closed in around me. The strong Alpha presence demanded I give in.

"Answer me!" he roared, kicking a heavy wooden chair across the room. It smashed against the stone wall.

I flinched hard, pressing myself back against the big headboard. "What do you want me to say?" I rasped, my voice tearing. "That I didn't want to be a slave? That I didn't want to be chained to a bed and passed around until I broke? Yes! I hid it! And I'd do it again!"

Cillian went still, his chest heaving. "You think I would let them touch you?"

"You threw me in the dirt!" I screamed back, nineteen years of fear snapping open in my chest. Hot, angry tears spilled down my cheeks. "You chained me to a wall! You let them beat me in the yard! You're no different than Thorne. You just have a bigger crown!"

The gold in his eyes flared dangerously. In the blink of an eye, he crossed the room.

His hands slammed into the mattress on both sides of my hips, boxing me in. He leaned over me, his face inches from mine. The heat rolling off him was painful. My fever spiked in response, a heavy, burning fire curling low in my stomach, making me want to press up into his chest.

"I didn't know," Cillian said through clenched teeth, his fangs fully out, grazing his bottom lip. "If I had known what you were, no one in that yard would have survived looking at you."

"Then finish it," I choked out, staring up into the terrifying face of my fated mate. "You hate Omegas. Everyone knows what happened to your mother. You swore to wipe us out. So do it. Snap my neck. It's better than whatever you have planned for me."

Cillian's jaw clenched so hard I thought bone would crack. "You think I want to use you like an animal? Is that what you think I am?"

"It's what I am to you!" I cried out, my voice breaking completely. "I'm just a freak! A broken male!"

A violent shake rocked my whole body.

Suddenly, my stomach twisted. I lurched to the side, hanging over the edge of the mattress, and coughed hard. Thick, black, metal-tasting slime forced its way up my throat.

The pills.

My body pushed out nineteen years of poison all at once. The pain was blinding. I couldn't breathe. My airway got completely blocked by the dark, bitter mess coming up. I choked, my hands clawing weakly at my own throat as the room went black.

"Elian!"

Cillian's anger disappeared, replaced by pure, raw panic.

His big hands grabbed my shoulders, pulling me upright. He dragged me off the edge of the bed and onto the thick rug in front of the roaring fire.

"Breathe, damn it! Elian, look at me!"

My eyes rolled back. I shook hard, my bruised ribs grinding together with every violent spasm.

"The pills," Cillian realized, his voice frantic. "Your body is sick from stopping them."

He didn't wait. He grabbed the collar of the freezing, soap-soaked rough shirt. With one hard pull, he ripped the thick fabric completely in two, tossing the wet rags aside.

The blast of heat from the fireplace hit my bare, shaking skin. But Cillian went completely silent.

I gasped for air, the black slime finally clearing my throat, my chest heaving as I breathed in desperately. As my vision slowly cleared, I saw Cillian kneeling over me, completely frozen.

He stared at my chest.

I was dangerously thin. My ribs stuck out against my pale skin, painted with ugly black and purple bruises from Torin's training sword and Thorne's boots. His eyes moved past my ribs and locked onto the scars.

My chest, my shoulders, my stomach — they were covered in hundreds of thin, silvery, jagged lines. Burn marks. Whip marks from the Silvermoon guards. And right over my heart, a rough, jagged brand of a crescent moon with a line struck through it. The mark of a "Broken One."

I had been hurt every single day of my life.

Cillian stopped breathing. The Lycan King, the most ruthless monster in the world, looked like he was going to be sick. The full picture of everything done to me lay right in front of him, impossible to ignore.

Slowly, his shaking hand lifted.

"Who did this to you?" he whispered, his voice completely broken.

"Everyone," I rasped, squeezing my eyes shut, too ashamed of my broken body to look at him.

His big, rough hand cupped the side of my face very gently. His thumb brushed away the freezing, dirty water from the kitchens.

The second his bare skin touched mine, the whole world exploded.

A bolt of pure, white-hot electricity shot through my blood. The mate bond, finally freed from the toxic pills and pushed forward by the raging fever, snapped into place with the force of a falling rock.

A sad, desperate whine tore out of my throat. I tried to stop it. But my body completely betrayed me. I arched up off the rug, pressing my cheek frantically into the palm of his hand, reaching for his heat, reaching for his smell, reaching for him.

"Alpha," my inner wolf whimpered, the word falling from my lips before I could stop it.

Cillian froze. The sound of that word — a pure, giving-in plea from his fated mate — broke whatever iron hold he had left.

A deep, dark growl ripped through his chest. He grabbed my hips, pulling my bare, fever-burning body straight into his lap, his fangs dropping fully as he buried his face into the side of my neck, right over my scent spot.

The King disappeared. Only the beast remained. And I belonged to him.