Page 3 of Blood Loss (The Obscura Saga #2)

K YLO

Thick sludge weighs down every limb, every nerve ending, every thought trying to bubble up to the surface.

Where am I?

The first words to pop through as Kylo’s mind attempts to wade its way out of the viscous sensation holding him under. It’s as if he’s trapped in tar. Each time his brain tries to push through, the sticky black nothingness contracts to keep him in place, but he wiggles looser with each grasp at reality.

“We’ve got another four cells available in bay fourteen,” a muddled voice calls through the dark void.

Like throwing him a rope, his brain latches onto the distant sounds echoing around him, using them to pull himself from the muck, until suddenly he’s back in his body.

Kylo’s head throbs against his skull with every beat of his heart—agonizing, as if his brain is going to explode. His body is exhausted, muscles limp and lifeless. Lifting his heavy eyelids, he squints against the bright lights as his vision comes into focus.

Where am I? he thinks again, now more aware as he takes in his surroundings. W Block? The pristine, white concrete walls and fortified glass are a dead giveaway. But…the full moon’s not for another two weeks.

The constant thumping in his frontal lobe makes it hard to concentrate on what’s going on—that, and the overwhelming sensations around him. Lights brighter than the gods, sounds and voices—no matter how hushed—are as loud as sirens, and the smells. Shifting his hand, in the hopes of clutching his forehead, rattles something next to him. Looking down reveals much more than he was prepared for. Kylo jolts back, now wide awake, ensuing an onslaught of clattering metal as he straightens against the wall.

Blood. Deep and bright, tacky and dried, messy patches of crimson covering his entire body—his naked body. His wrists are bound to the wall behind him, with a few feet of leeway, just like during a full moon. The more aware he becomes, the more stimuli assaults his senses, the more panic consumes him. His heart races as he realizes he’s not only missing hours of time, but his mouth is coated in the same metallic tang that singes his nostrils, that cakes his skin.

LATHAN .

A sudden, ferocious mix of fear and rage wash over him as he registers his boyfriend is nowhere to be seen. Without thinking, his body reacts to the intense emotions and wrenches himself forward with a loud growl. The chains go taut but immediately slack as he recoils against the wall with a pained whimper—the large, aggressive action causing tension in his skull like a balloon about to burst. It’s all too much.

“Help,” he tries to call out, but his gravelly voice falls quiet in the busy air. His vocal cords are still rough and raw from the shift.

Lathan. A tear runs down his cheek from his narrowed eyes, bracing against the pain. We were at the football game… How long have I been out? D-did I? He shakes his head. No . He knows what Lathan’s blood tastes like. The first time, it was bitter and rotten, but it changed to mildly sweet when he marked him—neither of which match the salty copper currently coating his palate.

I need to find him. He swallows a mix of saliva and blood. Though it provides some relief to his raw throat, it also aids in the bout of nausea swirling in his stomach. Leaning forward, the slack on his chains dwindling the further he moves from the wall, he manages to call out more clearly. “Help!”

Footsteps clatter down the corridor at his request. A man appears on the other side of the glass wall across from Kylo. Clipboard in hand, he pulls the pen from the top of it and scribbles something down.

“You’re awake. That’s good.” He looks up again, his face pokered, not showing any inkling of emotion one way or the other—but for some reason, it’s as if Kylo can smell fear on him. “How do you feel? Any different from normally coming out of a full moon?”

“What?” he breathes, even more confused. “I feel like shit,” he says bluntly before shaking his head. “I-I need to contact someone.” I can find out what happened later. Right now, finding Lathan takes priority .

“You will remain in containment until investigators identify the cause of the shift.” His words are stark, and he continues to jot notes onto his board. The radio on his hip crackles with static and code words that he doesn’t seem to pay attention to. “How would you rate your pain on a scale of 1-10?”

Kylo quietly growls in the back of his throat, becoming impatient. “Five,” he bites out; his pain isn’t what’s important right now. “I need a phone,” he demands, then shifts to add something less direct. “Or—can someone make a call for me?”

“No.” The pen moves in the man’s hand; he doesn’t look up. “Contact is limited until we have more answers.” His eyes finally meet Kylo’s. “It’s for everyone’s safety.” He grabs his radio and brings it to his mouth. “I have another one awake,” he says into the speaker. “Five on the scale. Fully conscious.” The voice on the other end mumbles something, and the man looks at Kylo. “What’s your full name?”

“Kylo Alexander Garcia,” he says through gritted teeth. Moving closer with furrowed brows, the chains go taut, holding his wrists behind him. “You don’t understand. I need to make sure he’s okay.”

The man writes Kylo’s name down for his records and then looks at him, up and down, at the blood covering him. His eyes narrow with suspicion. “Who?”

“Lathan Park. He was with me…at the game.” He swallows, his throat tightening as another tear falls to the concrete. He can feel something is wrong in his gut, telling him he needs to escape, he needs to find him, but he can’t. W Block is designed for keeping his kind locked in.

The man watches Kylo for a few long moments, but seems to give in. He grabs his radio once more and clicks the receiver. “Does medical have a status on a Lathan Park?”

The silence after his words is dreadful.

After a few moments, a woman’s voice buzzes through. “That name has not been documented.”

The man looks at Kylo.

“What does that mean?”

“If he isn’t in their records, it means medical hasn’t treated him.”

Yet . The missing word hangs between them, which adds to Kylo’s agitation. That means he was either able to make it out unharmed, or he hasn’t been severely wounded…if he’s even been found yet.

“That’s not good enough,” Kylo hisses, lifting onto his knees and yanking himself forward, to no avail. The man looks down at him, tight-lipped, and cocks his head as if Kylo is getting under his skin.

“Get me a phone. Something’s wrong, I need to see him.” He swings his shoulders again, the chains rattling before pulling tight once more. He doesn’t know why, but he can feel something’s wrong. It’s pulling at his chest, and he knows it’s not himself.

“Tough it out. There’s a lot wrong tonight.” The man tucks his clipboard under his arm. “A piece of advice for a wolf covered in someone else’s blood: calm down, or we might have to keep you here.”

◆◆◆

Hours tick by painfully slow. All he can do is sit, bare ass to the concrete, riding out his headache, aching muscles, overstimulated senses, and that damned pull in his chest as staff walk past every few minutes to either check on the impounded or add another unconscious werewolf to the bay Kylo is currently being held prisoner.

The lack of windows makes discerning time excruciatingly difficult. On top of that, being fully conscious and alone after such an event has his mind doing backflips trying to remember—or imagine—what he’s done. Who he’s harmed. Who he hasn’t. And which side Lathan’s on.

Eventually, a woman walks up to his cell with a handful of heather-grey fabric. “Kylo Alexander Garcia?”

“That’s me,” he says in a tired, flat tone.

Using her badge to enter through the door in the reinforced glass wall, she walks up to a motionless Kylo, placing the clothes on the floor next to him before pulling on the bungee-corded key attached to her hip to unlock his chains. As the shackles clatter to the ground, he grasps at his left wrist, wringing out the sore spot from prolonged strain.

“You’ve been cleared for discharge. You’re welcome to get changed—these are just some spares we had available—then you’re free to return to your dorm. Obscura is advising all students to remain in their dorms until further notice, so please head straight there.”

Kylo just nods in acknowledgment before she turns to exit, leaving the glass door open to allow him to leave on his own. He takes a deep breath, exhaling it out slowly, preparing himself before standing. His whole body aches, both from whatever the fuck happened earlier, and from sitting on concrete for hours on end with his wrists and ankles shackled. He dons the clothes they supplied—a baggy shirt, sweatpants, and dollar store flip-flops—but the fabric is so thin and cheaply made, it resembles paper. Then he leaves—passing other bloodied and chained werewolves on his way out.

Outside, silence washes over him. It’s a great reprieve from the assault of chaos inside, even as the crisp late night bites at his skin, wind slipping through his ‘clothes.’ The walk back is long and even more tiresome. His mind having nearly gone numb from the turmoil, if not for the one person he’s banking on seeing at home. But if he’s not there…that’s a reality he’s not yet ready to face.

Fortunately, the moment he trudges his way to the third floor, he can smell Lathan—as if his scent is leaking from their dorm and wafting down the hall to the stairwell, like heavy smoke. The familiar air ruminating in his lungs creates a knot in his chest that thrums he’s here, he’s safe, he’s mine, he’s love as he barrels toward the door.

Here. Safe. Mine. Love.

He tries the handle to find it unlocked. Pushing the door open desperately, his eyes land on Lathan, sat at his desk, scrolling on his laptop, squeaky clean as if nothing has happened.

But something did happen. And Lathan’s trench coat is missing. And his scent is thicker than ever, drowning Kylo’s lungs. And his muscles itch for him, ache for him. And standing in the doorway, he can tell something’s wrong.

Kylo throws himself inside the room, the door slamming behind him as he pushes off it to dart at the vampire—not thinking about how he must look, coated in dried blood from head to toe beneath his thin outfit.

Here. Wrong. Mine. Hurt.

Coming up beside him quickly, Lathan jumps, lifting from his chair with a loud gasp, but Kylo doesn’t slow. Wrapping his arms around him tightly, his partner winces, sucking air in through his teeth before settling into the embrace, hugging him back. When he does, Kylo can’t help but to nuzzle his head into his neck, whimpers rolling up his throat, disregarding the possibility of transferring blood onto Lathan’s clean body. He needs to rub against him, feel him, breathe him in, hands clinging to his back, as if it’s the last time they’ll ever embrace.

“Ky,” Lathan exhales.

One word—a nickname—is all it takes for Kylo to crumble.

The weight of worry and rage and confusion and terror that’s kept Kylo unmoored and on alert comes crashing down. His body trembles as everything catches up to him, which triggers Lathan to sit back down onto his chair, pulling Kylo onto his lap.

Kylo shrinks on him, gripping tighter than ever as a sob finally wracks its way out. He doesn’t want to move, doesn’t want to take his eyes off Lathan ever again, for fear of something else like this happening. He was so irrationally angry in W Block when he couldn’t leave to find him, more so than ever before. His instincts were screaming at him, clawing at him from the inside, to find Lathan and keep him safe. And here he is. Alive, safe, but hurt. He doesn’t know what happened, but he knows he’s in pain.

Sucking in a shaky breath, he pulls back to look at Lathan, assess him, talk to him.

But Lathan cups Kylo’s face first, examining him. “You’re okay? Are you hurt?”

He shakes his head. “No, I’m okay.” Kylo’s still sore, but the brunt of his pain is gone, and the rest isn’t as important as the man in his arms.

Lathan sighs with his answer, shoulders dropping. He wipes a tear from Kylo’s bloodied cheek with a thumb, still holding his face in his hands as he rattles off questions.

“Where are you hurt? And what happened? I was so fucking worried about you.”

A few seconds go by of Lathan just staring with an expression that’s too hard to read. Kylo’s heart drops with his silence, fearing it’s worse than what’s already covering his own body. “Lathan…what happened?”

“I…” Lathan shakes his head smally, then his hands slide from Kylo’s face to link around his lower back, keeping him in place. “Kylo, I can’t hear you.”

Kylo’s head inches back, not expecting that answer. His wide eyes flicker between the dark chocolate orbs holding his stare, searching for answers but finding none.

He can’t hear me. He can’t hear. He can’t. How, how, how, how.

His tired mind grasps at solutions to communicate with his lover. Then he pulls out of Lathan’s grip and hops off his lap to rush over to his own desk to grab a pen and a notebook. Frantically flipping to a random blank page, he walks back, pushes Lathan’s computer to the side, and hops onto his desk. Crossing his legs to provide a stable surface to write on, he scribbles down the most basic questions he can muster before flipping the book around to show Lathan.

what happened???

Lathan’s hand crosses his body to rest on his natural waist, cradling it. “It was a frequency,” he says. “Not everyone heard it, but it ruptured my eardrums. Apparently a lot of other vampires’ too.”

Kylo’s shoulders slowly slump, along with his brows, as he talks. Reaching out with his free hand, he runs gentle fingers over his ear as if hoping to heal them with his loving touch. Retracting his hand, he braces the paper to continue writing.

all wolves transformed?

Lathan nods. “At least whoever was at the game; I don’t know about the rest of campus.”

“Gods,” Kylo breathes, shaking his head before flipping the page to keep writing. When he shows him this page, he doesn’t make eye contact.

I hurt someone...

Lathan reads the written text, and Kylo can see him trying to find his eyes in his peripheral vision. “You remember?” he asks, reaching a hand to touch Kylo’s knee comfortingly, the other still lightly pressed to his side. Kylo only shakes his head again, writing a response.

the blood is everywhere

His heart sinks as he scribbles one more line, churning the nausea in his stomach.

in my mouth

He regains the courage to look at Lathan, whose jaw flexes as he reads. His dark orbs flick up to meet Kylo’s sad gaze, and he rubs his knee once more. “A lot of people were hurt. I was hurt. It’s not your fault. We’ll figure it out.”

Lathan’s words of comfort immediately cause Kylo’s brows to knit .

“You were hurt?” He asks the question out loud, and either Lathan manages to read his lips or put two and two together, answering promptly.

“Ah…yeah.” Lathan glances down at his hand on his side. “I was bit. But they let me go.”

“You were bit?!” he exclaims, throwing the notebook onto the desk before hopping off to search his body. I knew something was wrong. I knew there was more. He was bit. That’s what I’ve been smelling. His wound, his side. Oh, gods, is it bad?

Lathan sighs, not needing to translate Kylo’s frantic scanning. He stands from his chair and lifts the loose fabric of his T-shirt up to his ribs for Ky to see the damage. The punctures have been cleaned, sterilized, and stitched where necessary.

“I’m fine. I’ve dealt with worse.”

Kylo’s chest begs him to touch them, to kiss them, to heal them, but his logical mind knows not to dirty the freshly cleaned wounds. Instead, he grabs Lathan’s face, pulling it gently to kiss him softly before pressing their foreheads together.

Lathan’s shirt ruffles back down as he drops it. “I’m fine,” he says again. “We’re okay. That’s what matters, yeah?”

They both stay still, breathing in each other’s warmth for a few moments before Kylo slowly backs up, reaching for the notebook.

I'm so glad you were let go. I love you.

Lathan forces a delicate smile, but it fades as he speaks. “I saw the wolves fighting each other. I thought you…” He lo oks away for a moment, as if deciding against saying the words out loud: I thought you may have been torn apart. “Why did they let me go? Why would they?”

His question surprises Kylo, but then he remembers he never told him. Quickly jotting it down, he shows Lathan the answer.

vampire blood is gross + bitter

He shrugs with a partial smile, but Lathan’s mouth practically hangs open.

“What?” He stares at Kylo with raised brows. “You mean I taste bad ?”

“Yeah,” Kylo chuckles as he nods. “Tastes terrible.”

Until I marked you. Until I made you mine. Now you taste like cherries and the night sky.

Lathan’s lips lift into a genuine smile. He laughs, taken aback by the testimony. “That’s incredibly ironic.”

“No kidding,” Kylo laughs, choosing to keep his recent flavour profile to himself, turning back to the page.

shower

Lathan nods, but touches Ky’s face before he steps away. “I love you.”

Kylo returns the sentiment with a kiss planted on his cheek before sauntering over to his things, snagging his shower caddy, towel, and clean clothes. When leaving the room, he tries to push down the overwhelming sensations rising to the surface.

One screams about Lathan:

No. Don’t leave. Not him, not now, not ever. Don’t leave him. Lover. Partner. Unsafe. Deaf. Hurt. Pain. Danger. Mate.

The other screams about what happened:

Blood. Pain. I don’t remember. Shift. Time lost. I don’t remember. Death. Decay. I don’t remember. Forced. Changed.

Once again, it’s too much. It hurts to imagine Lathan being in danger—especially now that he can’t hear potential threats—but it’s equally as distressing to think about the poor soul that had to endure Kylo’s feral wrath.

So now he’s stuck in the hallway, paralyzed behind their dorm door.