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Her words create hunger deeper than the pain. I catch her wrist again, holding her hand against my chest where my heart pounds beneath muscle and bone. "What am I, then?"

She goes still, eyes meeting mine with unexpected boldness. "You're mine. As much as I'm yours."

The claim—so simple, so powerful—breaks something inside me. Without thinking, I pull her closer, ignoring the protest from my injuries. Her body heat radiates against my fur, her scent filling my senses with notes of concern, desire, and something deeper I hesitate to name.

"I could have lost you today," she whispers, hand rising to cup my face, fingers gentle against the scars that mark my features. "When they said how bad the fighting was at the western approach..."

"I'm not so easily killed," I murmur, leaning into her touch despite myself.

"No," she agrees, thumb tracing my jawline. "But you're not invincible either, no matter what you want your soldiers to believe."

Her closeness, her touch, her willing care for my battered body creates need that goes beyond physical pain. When she leans forward, pressing her lips to my forehead in a gesture of such unexpected tenderness it steals my breath, my restraint crumbles completely.

My hand slides to the back of her neck, guiding her mouth to mine. The kiss has none of the battlefield desperation of our earlier moment outside the caves—this is slower, deeper, connection beyond mere claiming. Her taste floods my senses, sweet and warm and tinged with the metallic hint of my own blood.

She responds with unexpected hunger, careful of my injuries yet unwilling to pull away from this newfound intimacy. When we finally part, her pupils are dilated, her pulse visibly racing at her throat where my claiming mark stands stark against her skin.

"You need rest," she says, voice husky with emotion she doesn't try to hide. "Actual healing, not... this."

"This is healing too," I admit, the truth easier in this moment of shared vulnerability. "Different kind."

Her smile—genuine, unguarded—creates warmth that pushes back the darkness creeping at the edges of my vision. Exhaustion and blood loss fight against the desire to maintain this connection, to explore this new territory between us.

"Sleep," she urges, going back to bandaging with gentle efficiency. "The fortress is secure. Thorne has command till morning."

I should protest, should assert alpha strength rather than give in to weakness. Instead, I find myself trusting her judgment, trusting her presence, trusting her in ways I've trusted no one in decades of lonely command.

"Wake me if the dragons return," I manage, consciousness already slipping despite my efforts.

"I will." Her promise carries weight beyond the simple words.

As darkness takes me, I feel one final sensation—her hand resting against my head, fingers sliding through the fur between my ears in a touch reserved for deepest intimacy among mykind. The gesture speaks volumes, creating safety I haven't known since earliest childhood.

My vigilance—the constant alertness that has kept me alive through combat and politics and betrayal—surrenders completely under her protective watch. My last thought before unconsciousness claims me is amazement at how completely our roles have reversed from that first claiming—the monster now vulnerable, the captive now protector, the forced claiming evolved into something I've never dared to seek.

Something I hesitate to name, even in these final private thoughts before darkness takes me completely.

CHAPTER 20

HEALING TOUCH

Aria POV

Three days.Three days since the dragon attack. Three days since I've left Fritz's room for more than minutes at a time. Three days watching over the most feared commander in the Feline Confederacy as he lay wounded and vulnerable in a way no one at Shadowthorn has ever seen.

Morning light slips through the narrow window, casting harsh shadows across the bed where Fritz lies still except for the shallow rise and fall of his chest. Blood has soaked through the bandages I put on last night, dark purple-black stains spreading like spilled ink across the white fabric. Time to change them again.

I gather fresh supplies from the table where I've lined up herbs and bandages in neat rows. The medicine smells—sharp yarrow, bitter blackthorn bark, sweet comfrey—have filled the room so completely that even my limited human nose can pick out their different scents.

"Fritz," I say quietly, approaching the bed. My hand touches his shoulder, feeling heat radiating through his fur attemperatures that would mean dangerous fever in a human. "I need to change your bandages."

His eyes snap open instantly, pupils shrinking to vertical slits as battle instinct surges even through his weakness. For a heartbeat, he's pure predator—all primal response and deadly intent—before recognition fills his golden eyes.

"Aria." His voice comes out as a rough growl, dry from days of barely drinking and constant pain. "Report."

Still the commander, even flat on his back with wounds that would have killed any human three times over.

"Fortress walls secure," I answer, reaching for the water flask beside the bed. "Dragons have pulled back beyond the ridge. Thorne has kept the defensive positions just like you ordered."