Page 24

Chapter Twenty-Three

Talia

W aking up after passing out is always a jarring experience for me.

It's less terrifying wondering what happened to me now that I've been out of that prison for a while, but it's far more terrifying wondering what happened to the people I love. My mates, Helen, the pack as a whole.

Shooting upright, I stare at the walls of Drayton's room in confusion.

There's no way for me to truly tell how long I was out for. Alaric is passed out beside me in bed, not moving an inch. He looks to have no injuries on him that I can see, yet I can't help but worry that something is wrong.

What the hell happened with the Croises?

I remember staring down one of them as I stood in front of an unconscious Helen, but everything is kind of blurry after that.

Drayton and, I think Forrester, were there with me, but that leaves Penn, Wes, and Alaric completely unaccounted for around the time I passed out.

Wait, why did I pass out?

Nothing feels injured on me either, and I can't even recall being in the meadow with my peryton after the fighting. It could be because I was in my peryton form when I passed out, since that's never happened to us before.

I can still feel her in my mind, sleeping in the glow of the meadow, which is reassuring.

I just don't know why I wasn't there with her.

"Oh thank god. You're awake," Penn says from the now open door.

He rushes towards me and pulls me into his arms. The motion seems to wake up Alaric at last, who pushes up onto his elbows with a gentle, tired smile.

"We were worried about you, kitten." Alaric moves onto his side to face Penn and me, the blankets falling off of him slightly to reveal his very naked, very beautiful chest. "Do you feel alright? Does your leg still hurt at all?"

"Huh?" I mumble, my eyes still fixated on his chest. There's a dusting of dark blonde hair that my hands are itching to caress. "My what?"

Penn adjusts us with a laugh, placing me between his legs as he leans back against the headboard. "Your leg, baby girl. You were shot yesterday."

That shocks me out of my staring, okay drooling, episode.

"Shot?! Is anyone else hurt? Are you both okay? Oh god," I cry out.

I glance between the two of them in panic, searching with my magic to see if either of them need to be healed at all. Both men remain calm throughout my freak out. They seem to realise that I need a magical moment to verify that they are in fact okay. A sigh escapes after I find no wounds on either of them or the other three men I can now feel lurking around the house.

Well, that's new. My healing senses have never spread that far before.

"You scared me! You couldn't have added that everyone else is fine?" I admonish both of them with a deep exhale.

'We didn't realise you had no memory of being hurt," Alaric replies with a wince. "If we knew, kitten, we would have absolutely started with the fact that everyone is okay.

"

Nodding my head in acknowledgment, I lean into Penn and reach out a hand to Alaric, who takes it and starts rubbing my knuckles gently.

"I just assumed that I had passed out from using too much magic or something.

If I'm being honest, everything feels a little hazy from the end of it all."

Wes and Drayton walk in the room as I'm talking, a frown marring both of their faces.

"You don't remember the end of the fight?" Drayton asks. He sits down at the end of the bed, taking my feet into his lap.

"Not really no," I answer with a shrug. "I remember standing in front of Helen and using my magic to shield her while I waited to see what the Croises thug was going to do, but then it's a bit of a blur and I can't actually piece it together at all."

"I wonder if that was in part because of how much magic you ended up using. After you were shot, a large explosion of magic burst out of you and swept across the packlands. It healed any and everyone that was injured, including some of the humans who weren't able to run away after we took out most of them," Wes explains as he leans against the wall of the bedroom. "We felt it all the way at the packhouse. It healed everything from broken bones to the smallest papercut."

"Oh," I squeak out, twisting my fingers together in my lap. "My magic has been doing a lot of strange things since leaving the prison. Do you think it's because of the goddess?"

"It could be," Wes surmises with a shake of his head. "I don't think it is, though. In part it could be that the goddess awakened something deeper in you when she gave you the task of being one of her Champions. I think the bigger part of this is, though, that you never really tested the limits of your magic before now. You hid it away to keep your captors from getting their hands on it, but now that you're free, it's most likely that you're able to use it openly and find your limits, now."

"Even when I showed up in the cell beside you, you started doing things with your magic that you had never experienced before." Penn rubs my shoulders and rests his head on top of mine while he speaks. "You finally felt a sense of safety with our mate bonds and it allowed you to let go and use your magic the way you've always been able to."

Sitting in silence for a few minutes, I let their words really sink in for me. I never much thought about all of the things I could do with my magic while I was in that prison cell. My peryton and I sometimes talked about it in the meadow, but even then I never wanted to dive too deeply into what I could do in case I slipped up while I was awake.

Maybe that is why I keep feeling like I'm doing these amazing, unknown things all the time; because everything is unknown when it comes to my magic. I knew I could heal, yet beyond that, I never allowed myself to try anything else. My fear of being killed for my magic has hindered me in discovering the true depth of my magic. They did more damage to me than I originally understood.

I ask the question that's bothering me the most aloud to my mates. "What if I can't do my part as a Champion of Adessa because I don't even know how to actually wield my magic?"

"Then we train with you until you know every in and out of your magic," Forr says from the door, determination shining in his eyes even from back here. "They held you captive and stole twenty-four years of your life from you. We won't allow them, or the fear they instilled in you, take your future and the future of all shifter-kind away as well."

"How are you all going to train me? We don't exactly have another peryton shifter to base our magic trials off of."

Wes looks at me with a smile and a wink. "The same way we found out about the upcoming war and the destiny that you hold in it. Lots of research and legends."

"Do you think we can actually do this? Find out what I'm fully capable of?" I twirl my hair anxiously between my fingers as I shift my eyes between all five of my mates.

"Of course we can," Alaric responds first, drawing my hand away from the teal strands twisted around my fingers. "I'm also going to teach you how to defend yourself. You're a gentle soul, kitten, but the world is far from gentle. We need to know that you can take care of yourself until one of us can get to you in an attack."

"Okay," I whisper with a nod. "I can do that. Fighting isn't my first instinct in a bad situation, but I can see why I would need to know how to. You can train me in magic and self-defense. I don't want anything like what happened yesterday to happen again."

I drop my eyes down, the image of Helen trying to protect me and getting knocked out flashes across my mind. I should have learned how to defend myself the moment I was free, but I put far too much onto my mates. If one of them got hurt, or worse, died, while trying to protect me because I couldn't even throw a proper punch, I would never forgive myself.

"Is your mom okay?" I ask in a soft voice, adjusting my head to look at Penn.

He squeezes me tightly and kisses my temple before answering. "She's as bright-eyed and bushy-tailed as she's ever been. You not only protected her, you healed her as well. We've been fighting her off with a stick to keep her from smothering you in motherly affection while you were passed out. I guarantee you'll be able to see her soon with your own eyes."

Forrester laughs heartily, the sound sending strange vibrations throughout my whole body. I want to know why he's laughing, but I don't want him to stop doing it to respond to me. Instead, I just watch him with wide eyes and a surprised smile.

"Yeah," he says with a chuckle. "That's part of why I came to the room. Helen is here and she's demanding to come back here or for Penn to come out if Tal wasn't awake yet. She's like a dog with a bone and I don't see her leaving anytime soon now that our girl is awake."

Our girl. What a one-eighty from how he was just yesterday. I'm not just his mate or the guys’ mate, I'm their mate.

If I had more time to swoon, I would turn into a happy little puddle of lovey dove gooeyness. As it is, my mate's mother is demanding to see us and I could never turn Helen down.

"Then let's go see her," I answer with a smile.

Drayton swoops in and picks me up out of Penn's arms with a devilish wink. Penn protests behind us, but is quickly drowned out by Wes and Alaric teasing him for being possessive. Forrester steps back into the hallway, more of his previous coldness and unease seeping back into his stance.

It seems the work to repair the relationship between him and Drayton will take quite a bit more than the general truce and pledge to do better that we established yesterday.

I make a mental note to add trying to heal Forrester to my list of things to do sooner rather than later. We can call it magic training if it would help him feel more comfortable with it. I just don't want these two brothers to be lost and separated by the shit from their parents for much longer. Both Drayton and Forrester need this healing and I'll be damned if I can't make it happen.

"Talia!" Helen shouts as soon as we enter the living room. Dray places me on my feet, but I'm quickly swept up in a tight hug. "Oh sweetie, I was so worried about you. I'm so sorry that I couldn't fight off those awful humans and keep you safe."

Helen's voice gets choked up at the end as she starts crying and running a hand down my hair. I squeeze her back just as tightly, trying my best to reassure her that everything is alright.

"You didn't need to protect me," I assure her quietly. "They were there for me and you were extremely outnumbered. What you did, stepping in front of me against them was far more than I ever could have asked of you. Thank you for everything."

"You are my daughter by mating, Talia. I would lay down my life for you just as I would for Penn. I adore you, sweet girl. Don’t ever scare me like that again!”

A laugh escapes and I quickly try to hide it, but it’s no use. Helen pulls back from the hug and shakes her head at me with an exasperated sigh. A smile pulls up her lips, however, before she can hide her own amusement. Helen wipes the tears from her eyes and grasps both of my cheeks.

“You sweet, cheeky girl. The goddess couldn’t have picked a better mate for my son.”

“Mom,” Penn whines from behind me. “Please release my mate and stop getting all sappy with her.”

“Only if you promise to come to dinner tomorrow night,” Helen responds, her hands not moving an inch. I awkwardly stand there, my cheeks being squished as everyone talks around me. “That means all of you!”

“Unfortunately, Alaric, myself, and Wes all have a meeting tomorrow afternoon with some of the local packs which means we won’t be available,” Drayton speaks up from somewhere over my shoulder. “The others should be free, however.”

“I will wrangle Forrester and Talia to your place, Mom. I promise,” Penn says and I can hear the almost inaudible groan of Forrester somewhere on the opposite side of the room. “Now please release Talia. The poor woman looks like she’s being turned into a puckering fish with how much you’re squishing her.”

“Oop! I’m sorry, Talia.” Helen releases my cheeks immediately. Embarrassment tinges her cheeks pink and I can’t help the explosion of laughter that comes out at the sight.

“That’s okay. I didn’t mind being smushed. At least not the whole time,” I say between bouts of giggles. “We will see you tomorrow for dinner. Thank you for coming to check up on me.”

“Of course,” Helen replies with a clap of her hands. “Tomorrow! Dinner will be at six, don’t be late!”

After she rushes out of the house, Penn pulls me against him and nuzzles into my hair. “Has anyone ever told you how perfect you are?”

“Only all of you almost all the time,” I tease with another giggle.

“Good,” Alaric grumbles from beside me before leaning in to kiss me softly. “That means we’re doing right by you. You should always know how beautiful, special, and perfect you are.”

“Hey! Way to steal my moment, asshole.” Penn smacks Alaric in the arm and pushes him away from me.

“Now, now. No fighting with our mate in the center,” Drayton chastises them with a shake of his head. He pulls me away from the two of them which gives Alaric an opening to playfully tackle Penn and put him in a headlock.

Drayton just shakes his head once more and carries me out of the living room and into the kitchen where Forrester and Wes are chatting quietly. He settles me down on the counter and I can’t help the happy tear that falls from my eye at how chaotic and amazing it is to have a family like this.

My peryton brushes against my mind with a feeling of euphoria at the thought. Our world is full of danger and we still don’t know the whole picture, but I know that we absolutely have something worth fighting whatever is in store for us. These men, this life; there’s nothing I wouldn’t do to protect it at any cost.