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I was stillin a delirium when we left the pharmacy. I don’t remember much, mostly tactile things. The feel of Asher’s sweat-drenched shirt, the chill he left in his wake when he deposited me in the passenger seat. The jostle of the car as he got us back on the road.

I don’t remember several hours after that. I fell into a feverish sleep, waking only to be sucked right back under. Minutes or hours or days could have passed like that for all I knew. It seemed endless.

At some point we stopped at a hotel, and the smell and feel of Asher enveloped me once more as he carried me to a bed. He tucked me in the same way my mother and father used to do when I was little.

“I’ll be right back,” he whispered. Or maybe he didn’t and I dreamed the whole thing.

“Lana... Lana...”

I squinted my eyes open.

Asher crouched at my bedside, a bowl of soup in his hands. “You should eat,” he said gruffly.

I lifted a shoulder and let it fall. Not hungry.

He set the soup on the table next to the bed, next to several bottles of water.

He’s taking care of me.

I would have found it absurd if I wasn’t so sick.

“Thank you,” I said weakly.

He frowned. “Don’t thank me.” He nodded to the soup. “Eat.”

How to tell him that I was too weak to do much more than shiver? I gazed at him sadly.

He must have understood because he cursed quietly, then stood. Much more gently than I would have imagined, he helped me sit up, making sure not to jostle my bad arm.

I reached for the spoon and dipped it into the broth. I wasn’t incredibly hungry, but it smelled decent enough, and it was hot. But as I brought it to my mouth, my shivering body shook my hand, and the liquid dripped off the spoon and onto the blankets.

Asher’s frown deepened. He took the spoon from me and grabbed the soup, sitting down on the edge of the bed. “We’re not going to bring this up ever again,” he said, dipping the utensil into the broth.

I didn’t know what he was talking about—feeding me, saving me, or caring about me. Probably all of them.

He shook his head to himself, then passed the spoon to my lips. All the while he looked angry.

“You don’t have to do this,” I said.

“Eat.”

My mouth parted, and I had my first bite of native soup. It was mild and savory and warm, the combo everything my sick body craved.

Asher fed me most of it before I insisted I was full. Then he gave me a pill—antibiotics given to him by the pharmacist, which apparently I would have to take three times a day for the next two weeks. I swallowed it, having no strength left to resist. The entire time his features were hard, unyielding. But he didn’t once complain, and after I finished, he helped me lay back down.

He stood, the mattress squeaking as he did so. “I need to check the perimeter.”

For my kind.

They were after us, and he was protecting me from them. He could have left me here; he knew enough about the portal to finish the journey alone. Staying with me, saving me, put him in danger.

He hadn’t once looked torn about his decision.

Asher headed for the door.

“Jame,” I called to him.

He paused at the door, that impressively muscled back of his to me.