Page 32 of Mated in Darkness

“There is magic coming,” Dean whispered, and my gaze went to his, then towards Riaz’s bright gold ones.

“Magic? With those witches?”

“They all look human, but they smell off,” Brendan snarled. “Like they came into contact with something I don’t recognize.”

“I don’t understand what’s going on,” I gasped, trying to feel for a pulse. “Is he dead? Is Jason dead?” I screamed.

“I can still feel him there, damn it, we’re losing him. And I don’t know what’s going on either. It was as if there was a magical barrier, a ward all on its own keeping you from us. That’s why we weren’t here. That’s why we didn’t come in time. We should have been here faster. We aren’t that far from the apartments.”

“Jason?” I whispered, looking down at him. His eyes were closed, his mouth parted, and I couldn’t feel him. Why couldn’t I feel him? This was my mate. He was supposed to be here,

“Kaylee,” Riaz snapped, and I looked up at him, my wolf bristling, wanting to lash out, wanting to do anything, but this was an Alpha, maybe not my Alpha, but he could kill me with one blink.

“What do we do?” I asked, feeling as if I was losing myself. Losing everything.

“We can turn him. There’s still time.”

In order to turn a human into a wolf, they had to be near death. It wasn’t with a single bite, and suddenly you would shift at the blue moon and live a happy little life in the supernatural. That’s not how real life works.

You had to be dead, with the saliva of a wolf’s bite over the majority of your body, as well as claw marks, with a brutality that meant that you were turning into a new part of yourself, joining a world that wasn’t one like you had come from.

I remember hearing the horror stories of how some of my aunts and uncles had been turned into wolves once they had mated into the Pack and needed to become something other than human for the mating bond to fully complete.

Others of my family and Pack had nearly been dead, and marking them, creating a mating bond is what had saved them.

Then it all clicked for me, and I knew why Riaz was saying it.

“If you turn him right now and someone finds out, they’ll kill Jason. Maybe even you.”

Because at the moment, unless it was for a mating, you could not save another person. You could not turn them. Because we were at the precipice of a new era in shifter politics, and right now, the humans were winning. Not for long, I had to hope, but for now, even if we saved Jason, he could still die if anybody found out he was turned.

And with the way things were going these days, they would find out.

“Mark him. Bite him. Try to turn him.”

“Kaylee. Is he yours? Is what I saw real?” I looked up at him then, my whole body shaking.

“He is my potential. He could be mine.”

The Starlight Pack Healer was near, kneeling by us, trying to stop the bleeding, and it was slowing, but only because Jason’s heart was slowing.

He was dying, and I couldn’t feel anything. I couldn’t keep up.

“Kaylee. If he’s yours, mark him.”

“You know that’s not how you complete the bond.”

“He’ll be mated, he’ll have a mate, and you can complete the bond later. It will give me the authority to change him. I don’t know if you are Alpha enough to do it. If you’re dominant enough. But I am.”

Riaz touched my face, and I snarled at him. He held his hand up, brows raised. The other wolves growled toward me, the balance of power standing on the tip of a blade. I had just tried to bite their Alpha, and I didn’t blame them. But nobody was going to touch me just then, not without fear of getting something bitten off.

“Kaylee. I don’t know if you’re dominant enough to have the power and the strength in your wolf in order to change him. I’m not saying you are weak. I’m saying I need to do this.” He looked at his Healer. “I’m right, right? It’s the only way?”

The Healer gave me a sad look. “I’m sorry. There’s nothing I can do. I don’t think a human doctor could do anything either.”

My wolf howled, and I whimpered, looking down at Jason’s pale face, his skin nearly gray.

“Okay. Okay. I have to do something.” I started shaking as I pulled him closer, my fangs elongating. “I don’t want him to die. He can’t die.”

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