Page 69 of Vows Forged in Blood

I want to open my lips, to do fuckinganything, but I can’t. I just can’t. My body bows violently as another wave of agony spears through me, completely out of my control.

“Damnit, Alaric, I know you can do this! If anyone can, it’s you.” Elias is close on my other side and I imagine they’re sitting on either side of the furs beside me. “Comeon…”

The thing against my mouth—Dahlia’s wrist, maybe?—presses harder against my lips.

“Fucking drink, Alaric. This is not a request! You will not leave me, do you understand?” Dahlia’s voice is hard and I can imagine her green eyes blazing with determination.Myfirebrand. “We’ve only just gotten started, you and I. We have so much more we need to do. You haven’t even fucked me properly yet, gods damn you.” I hear Elias huff out a pained laugh and I want to smile. I want to laugh. I want to pull her to me and hold her in my arms and do all manner of unholy things to her.

But I can’t. Fucking. Move.

Suddenly, her lips are at my ear, whispering low. “I haven’t even gotten to tell you that I love you yet, Alaric. But I do. I love you so much that it hurts, but in the best possible way. It’s the kind of love people write terrible sonnets about and minstrels sing awful songs about. It’s the kind of love that can move mountains and make the impossible possible. So, it’s going to fix you, do you hear me? It’s. Going. To. Fix. You. But you’vegotto drink, Alaric. Fucking do it.NOW.”

She loves me.

And somehow, I force my lips apart and my teeth to unclench. Her blood drips over my tongue and down my throat and…the pain recedes the tiniest fraction. A drop in the ocean, but still, it recedes.

“Yes, that’s it. Keep going, Alaric. Please…”

I swallow as more blood trickles into my mouth. And again, the pain ebbs ever so slightly. Somehow, I push back against it with more force now, Dahlia’s blood, her mere presence, giving me more strength to fight. Dahlia presses her wrist harder against my lips.

“Come on, Alaric. Drink!”

My fangs slide out without any actual command from my mind, some baser instincts taking over. I sink them into her flesh, tearing and sucking, blood pouring down my throat now in great mouthfuls. I drink and drink, every drop chasing the pain away little by little. I suck harder, taking more and more. The pain fades as Dahlia’s blood battles the poison in my very veins.

“Dahlia, are you alright?” Elias asks quietly.

“I’m fine,” she pants. “Don’t you dare fucking stop, Alaric. Take everything that you need. Take it all,” she whispers, “as long as you make it through this.”

I obey, tearing her flesh wider, taking more and more. Part of me knows I should stop. Part of me knows that I’m acting like an animal. But right now, those parts aren’t in charge and I can’t stop. So I don’t. After an eternity, the pain all but disappears and I release Dahlia’s wrist, collapsing back against the furs. I still can’t open my eyes. I still can’t move or speak, but I can breathe and I somehow know that the poison is gone, that I will be alright.

“There,” Dahlia breathes, relief heavy in her voice. “It…worked…” she adds, but it sounds like she’s struggling to speak.

I hear Elias gasp her name and then a soft thud, but the darkness drags me under before I can even wonder what’s happened.

I come fullyawake with a choked gasp, bolting upright atop my furs. Elias is there, hands on my shoulders, holding me steady.

“What…” I croak, my voice rough—from screams, I assume. I clear my throat and try again. “What the fuck happened?” Everything is a jumbled mix of sights and sounds that aren’t making much sense.

“The bastards found silver. Coated the arrowhead in powder and shot you straight through the heart with it. Well,almoststraight through the heart. If it had been a clean shot…well, we got lucky.”

I reach up automatically to run my fingers over the spot, remembering the pain of the arrow piercing my flesh, of the silver burning me from within. The wound is completely healedand I shake my head in confusion, trying to force the nonsense in my mind to fall into line, desperate for clarity.

“But how…”

“Dahlia,” Elias says simply. “She felt your pain and knew to come. I don’t know how, but she did. She rode like the devil himself was on her heels, that bastard horse of yours running faster than any should have been able to. Somehow, they made it in time. She healed you, Alaric.” Memories start to solidify in my mind like puzzle pieces clicking together. Hearing Dahlia’s voice, her demanding that I drink, her…telling me that she loves me. My heart clenches and I exhale a ragged breath. “Amate’sblood is the only thing that could have possibly saved you from this, Alaric,” Elias adds quietly. I blink and remember him whispering that he was sorry to have spilled my secret…Oh gods, she knows.

“Where is she?? Is she ok?” Ah gods, I’d taken so much. That thud I’d heard, it must have been her collapsing.

“She’s fine,” he assures me, trying to keep me in the bed. I shove him away and he flies across the room, righting himself at the last minute to remain on his feet. We both freeze, wide-eyed. I’ve always been strong, but I’ve never been able to throw Elias around like he’s a child’s doll.

“Holy shit,” he breathes. “All that blood…”

I feel it as he says the words, the nearly limitless strength coursing through my veins now.Holy fuck, how much had I taken?A mate’s blood is always more potent, but I’ve never taken more than what was necessary from Dahlia. To have so much of her blood flooding my system right now is having…interesting effects. This is one reason that mated vampires are considered so fearsome—not simply because the instincts to protect their mate are so strong that their brutality is unmatched, but because they are literallyphysicallystrongerbecause of the blood shared. I feel like I could take on the entirety of the Revenant army myself…

Fuck. The battle. What had happened after I’d been taken out? Are we holding on? I shake my head, trying to focus on one thing at a time. The most important is Dahlia. I can feel her easily now that I let myself focus for a moment—breathing and whole on another pallet of furs beside the fire. I rush to her side, moving faster than I’ve ever moved before (save the time that I teleported, of course). I brush the hair back from her face. She looks so pale, light bruises beneath her eyes.

“What’s wrong with her?” I ask Elias, though I try to be quiet as not to wake her.

“She’s alright, just…recovering. You, ah…well, hells, Alaric, you drained her nearly dry.” I clench my jaw, trying to hold back the bile rising in my throat. I’d almost…killed her? “Don’t worry,” Elias adds quickly, “you didn’t. She’s completely fine. Ajax was a human healer before he was turned—he’s checked her out and we’ve given her the tonic that her Keeper brought to replenish her blood. Oh, yes, her Keeper and guard arrived an hour or so after she did and Takara brought the tonic with her…” I meet his gaze, the question in my eyes. “She just said she had a feeling it might be needed…so, I think yes, she knows.”

---