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I kiss him, blood and tears and sweat mingling between us. It’s desperate, a little frantic, and everything we never got to say poured into one last breathless moment.

“You’re going to live,” I promise against his lips. “You’re going to come back to me and Noah. You’re going to wake up tomorrow and regret every single dumb thing you just said.”

A weak laugh escapes him. “That sounds like me.”

His eyes slip shut.

“Rowan,” I say, voice cracking.

He doesn’t respond.

“Rowan.” I shake him. “Rowan.”

I scream his name into the dark.

But the world goes silent around me.

After that, things get a little hazy. My vision goes blurry, and I think someone might be trying to physically pry my heart out of my ribcage.

In the end, they have to forcefully pry me off of him.

I’m still screaming his name when Rowan’s father, the Greenbriar Alpha in all his blood-soaked warrior glory, kneels beside me and restshis hand firmly on my shoulder. There’s blood everywhere. On my hands. My face. Rowan’s chest. I can’t tell what’s his and what’s mine anymore.

“He’s alive,” the Alpha says to me, his voice steady and low. “Alina. He’s still breathing.”

It’s true, but it’s barely more than a shallow drag of oxygen repeated slowly. It could stop at any minute, especially with the way his heart is fluttering.

I shake my head, clutching Rowan’s hand like it’s the only thing keeping me tethered to the earth. “Don’t take him from me. Please—he needs me—”

“You’ve done everything you can,” a Beta I vaguely recognize assures me. He speaks gently, though his eyes are sharp and full of purpose. “Let us help him now, Luna. We will help your Mate.”

Something about the use of my title—which is hardly a title at all, given that Rowan hasn’t claimed full leadership yet and I’ve only just come back to the Greenbriars—gets through to me. What kind of Luna does it make me if I allow my Mate to die because I can’t let anyone else near him? I loosen my grasp on Rowan and allow his father to pry me off him.

Two more wolves shift and step forward, their forms bloody and bruised but moving with quiet, practiced coordination. They lift Rowan’s limp body between them like he’s something sacred. I rise with them, stumbling slightly, refusing to let him out of my sight.

“I’m coming with you,” I croak out.

“You need to see your son,” the Alpha reminds me.

I falter, only staying upright because Rowan’s father is still holding on to me.

Noah.

My head snaps around, my body reacting before my mind catches up. I turn toward the dark trees just as Cal appears, blood on his clothes, scratches along his jaw. My son is clinging to the Beta, to Rowan’s cousin, as if he’s known the man his entire life. As if he knows that he’s family, that he can trust him intrinsically and wholeheartedly.

“Noah!” I rush forward, legs shaking beneath me, heart hammering like it might tear itself free. Maybe it would, if I wasn’t sure my hearthas already been yanked out and carried away along with Rowan’s motionless body.

Cal’s eyes soften when he sees me. “He’s okay. I swear it.”

Noah lifts his head. “Mom?”

His voice cracks, and that’s what does me in. I fall to my knees and pull him against me, sobbing into his hair. His little arms wrap tight around my neck like he’s afraid I’ll vanish if he lets go.

“I was so scared,” he whispers.

“I know, baby. I know. I’ve got you now.”

He’s here. He’s safe. But all I can feel is the yawning, blood-soaked hole where Rowan should be.