Page 225 of Lana Pecherczyk

Blake.

Blake.

Chapter

Seventy

River burst through the healing center doors with Blake limp in his arms. Bright white walls stretched before him. People were clustered at the far bay. Aeron, Jasper. Ada, kneeling. All were focused on a patient behind drawn curtains.

“Help!” he shouted.

They glanced over.

“River?” Ada’s eyes widened. She glanced behind the curtain, then back at him.

A hand appeared on the fabric and dragged it back. Trix’s surprised, mottled face emerged—dark curls to her sweaty skin.

River’s stomach dropped. Her legs were bent, spread. She was about to give birth.

Shit.Fuck.

“Blake’s dying.” The confession scraped his throat raw. “I feel it through our bond. She’s fading.”

“Get her to bay three!” Ada pointed beside her, whispered something to her mate, then turned to Trix and continued talking.

It was all lost to the blood roaring in River’s ears as he rushed Blake to the empty bay.

“Hear that, Blake?” His voice cracked despite every effort to steady it. “That’s Ada. We’re in Helianthus. You’re going to be fine.”

Jasper jogged over and cleared instruments from the bed, making room. River barely registered that the king was out of his fancy royal attire and in loose, training gear when he placed Blake down.

Her dull, dark hair fanned across a white pillow. No rainbow shine remained, not even with the afternoon sun filtering through a nearby window.

A feather drifted from his molting wing and landed on her chest. He flicked it away, but another followed. They were everywhere.

“What happened?” Jasper asked, voice gruff.

“She just started feeling sick.” River rubbed his face. Tried to stop the emotion. “We thought it was the Donna’s bat-shit paste, but…”

“Guano?” Ada arrived, wiping her hands on her apron.

“It’s not supposed to be toxic,” he replied.

“No. Not on Well-blessed humans.” Ada’s lips flattened. She placed her palm on Blake’s forehead and closed her eyes to concentrate. Her frown deepened. “Tell me everything.”

River paced alongside the bed, tugging at his hair, trying to piece it all into order. Still, all he ended up doing was spewing verbal diarrhea that made little sense. Ada and Jasper kept stopping him for explanations he couldn’t provide.

“You’re not making sense.” Jasper’s steady hand found River’s shoulder, avoiding his wing. “You need to calm down. Sit.”

“Don’t tell me to calm down!” He shrugged off the king’s touch. “She’s mymate!”

“I know that,” Jasper ground out, “but you’re rambling and?—”

“It’s not the guano.” A toneless voice drew every gaze to where Cloud stood in the shadowed doorway, shoulder propping it open, wings shifted away. His leather uniform was shredded in places from acid and talons, but his wounds had healed. Exhaustion was carved into every line of his bloody face. “She has a fever. The mortal kind.”

“You came back,” Ada said, blinking at Cloud. “What happened to your clothes?”

Violence rippled off her mate in waves. His upper lip peeled back, revealing elongated wolfish fangs. His guttural voice was too close to a beast’s for comfort. “You have a lot of fucking nerve showing up here, crow.”