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It came on slowly, after he’d fully grasped that he was alive, and that he was no longer dreaming, but waking from a drug-like, healing slumber. The first sensation was of the warmth of sunlight on his face. He heard the twittering of birds, and some other sound, regular and slow. Like a growl, but not. Snoring, he realized after a time. He wasn’t alone, and whoever was with him had fallen asleep, and was snoring.

He cracked his eyes open, and the sunlight stabbed them – and then kept stabbing. His headache burst to life like lightning streaking across the sky, branching through every part of his skull until the whole thing was throbbing and swollen-feeling. He winced, and that hurt, sucked in a breath, and that hurtterribly. For a moment, the pain turned his vision white, and his whole torso thrummed with so much ugly hurt that he became convinced an invisible demon was perched on his chest, clawing him open just as the drake had done.

He sipped shallow breaths through his mouth, and held very still, and slowly, it receded to a dull roar. His vision cleared, and when he blinked it clearer, he made several discoveries.

He was indoors: not merely in a campaign tent or pavilion, but truly inside. He saw smooth, if dusty plaster walls, and a high ceiling set with plaster curls and ornaments; a cobwebbed chandelier of heavy brass, its candle stumps freshly-melted. Someone had lit it, then, along with the myriad candles set in sticks, and dishes, and candelabrum spread across the bedside table, and the low wardrobe against the wall. Someone had needed light to bandage him – and bandage him they had. When he touched his chest – slowly, carefully, his arm dragging with terrible fatigue and soreness – he found that someone had stripped him, and cleaned him, and wound him with linen strips. The wounds beneath were fiercely tender, but he knew his wolf was tending to them, knitting flesh and healing bone even as he lay here.

That was another thing: he was lying here unguarded and unconscious, vulnerable to any sort of threat. Alarm quickened in his breast – but he could do nothing for it, too exhausted, too battered.

The regular snoring was interrupted by a snort, and a rustle, and Leif felt movement down at his left hip.

He rolled his head the other way, and saw a tangle of dusty gold hair on the edge of the mattress. Heavy, folded arms over the white linens, gold bands gleaming in the sunlight from the window, and a hand fisted in the covers over his thigh.

As quickly as it had flared, his alarm died. He took a deep breath, careful not to overexpand his ribcage this time, and breathed in the smell of his packmate. Dust, and musk, and dried sweat, and the now-familiar notes that were justhim: his skin, his hair, the wolf pheromones that clung to his nape.

Fondness welled up in Leif’s punctured chest, too strong to fight in his current state. The only thing to do was indulge it. He was alive, and glad of it, and his beta had fallen asleep at his bedside in a show of devotion so touching it left his eyes stinging, too dry to form tears, thankfully.

He shifted his hand from his own chest and dropped it into that mane of rich gold, bone-braided hair. When he opened his mouth, he found it so dry that he had to peel his tongue from the roof of it with more than a little effort. “Ragnar,” he croaked, and his cousin came awake with a start.

His head jerked up, sending Leif’s hand falling to his arm instead, and swiveled side to side, nostrils flaring on a deep breath as he sought a threat, eyes wild and glittering as they darted around the room.

“Ragnar,” Leif repeated, and his blue gaze snapped to Leif’s face.

Eye contact was like a collision. It struck Leif like a physical blow, and he flinched back into the bedclothes away from it, which sent pain arcing through him in fresh, fiery bursts. But he didn’t look away – couldn’t have, had a real fire broken out in the center of the room.

In that first instant, before he guarded himself, Ragnar’s face was open, and uncharacteristically honest. Luminous with relief, and awe, and a gladness bordering on joy. An expression that left Leif reeling; it cramped his stomach, and tightened his fingers on Ragnar’s arm.

Then Ragnar looked away, and visibly dimmed his smile to something small and wry, and didn’t brush his hair back when it swung forward to hide his face. He reached with the hand not pinned down by Leif’s grip to scratch at his short beard.

“Finally awake, are you? I thought you meant so laze about for weeks and leave the war for the rest of us to fight.”

“Hm. No. Too stubborn for that.” Talking was an effort –breathingwas an effort. But he said, “Where are we?”

Ragnar lifted his head, and his gaze moved around the room, eyes wide with undisguised admiration tinged with contempt. Aeres was the finest place he’d ever been inside; he’d never seen anything like these plaster walls and dainty furnishings. Leif hadn’t in person, but had had the advantage of a thorough education growing up, and had toured the South through books and lectures from Olaf; stories from Erik and Birger. Any admiration Ragnar felt would be tainted by a clansman’s resistance to finery.

“We’re in Inglewood – in the manor house. Apparently the forest and the duchy have the same name. Big surprise the lazy Southerners couldn’t come up with different names for different things.”

Leif snorted – and then winced when that simple motion sent bright bursts of pain through his sinuses. Ragnar’s attention returned to him immediately, brows drawing together as he frowned. His fingers twitched, and Leif had the sense he’d wanted to touch him in some other way, and had held back. The torq bobbed on his throat as he swallowed.

“How long have I been out?”

Another swallow. The faintest tremor along Ragnar’s lower lip. “Three days.”

A long time for a wolf.

Had he been only human, he wouldn’t have survived.

He tried and failed to work a little moisture into his mouth. He wondered if there was an ewer of water and cup to hand. His stomach rumbled and he wanted a whole ham to himself, but would settle for some broth instead. He wanted to know how many Southerners had been lost in the attack, and how they’d managed to get here, to the manor house. Was Amelia alive? Unharmed? What of her generals and their troops?

All of that could wait. For now, he was caught fast in Ragnar’s melancholy gaze, marveling at the way he seemed to be physically choking on emotion: the leap of his torq, and the flicker of his lashes, and the flex of muscle in his jaw. The room was silent save the twitter of birds beyond the window, and the rasp of Leif’s breathing within.

“I heard you,” Leif said, and watched Ragnar’s eyes widen. “I heard you shouting my name. You were trying to get to me.”

“Well. I…” Ragnar’s jaw worked some more, and Leif saw the moment he gave up on human pride, and allowed all his inner turmoil, colored now with painful-looking relief, to bleed through to the surface.

He turned his face away, blinking fast, and drew in a shuddery breath. “They were killing you,” he whispered. His hands knotted in the sheets over Leif’s thigh, twisting until a thread snapped. “They were killing you, and I couldn’t – I was trying – but it was too far – and my leg–” He whimpered, and bent forward to press his forehead to Leif’s leg, whining quietly, shoulders heaving as his breaths hitched and shuddered.

Leif dredged a low, soothing rumble from his chest, though it hurt to do so, and stroked his head, petted his hair. Ragnar shifted into the touch, seeking more, and everything from his posture to his scent was subservient.