Page 133 of Her Tortured Beasts

A few hours later, well after the academy breakfast service, I wake up hungry and Lyle has food waiting for me on a foil-wrapped plate. He plays the mother hen, making me sit in his lap as he feeds me avo toast and cherry tomatoes. Then I brush my teeth and shower in preparation for a visit with Raquel.

The others are all in class, so I go with my mates to the medical clinic. It’s slow going, because I insist on hobbling along the entire way, so Lyle takes the time to counsel me.

“It may be disconcerting to see them,” Lyle says. “They’re administering pain relief because it became clear Raquel was uncomfortable.”

“I saw them chained in the dungeons of Drakos Estate,” I say darkly, the memory painfully sharp now. “Nothing could be worse than that…or meeting Ruben’s regina.”

Savage freezes, swivelling around to stare at me. His face darkens as he realises what this means. That Xander has consorted with his enemies.

“When you slaughter a mated beast, it’s best to slaughter the entire pack,” Scythe rasps. “Otherwise, the others tend to come after you.”

Ice trickles into my heart at that. Of course they’ve done this before. It’s easy to forget your mates’ occupation when they’re giving you sweet kisses and feeding you avo toast. “She would have killed me,” I say carefully as Scythe holds open a door. “I got out of there just in time.”Xanderhad gotten me out.

“Our hit list is long,” Savage sighs, cracking his knuckles as we head inside the medical centre. “But my urge to murder them all is longer.”

I grumble something dark under my breath. How many enemies do I have, exactly? I need a journal or a planner of some sort to keep track of them. I can get Minnie and Stacey to help me with a colour-coded spreadsheet.

Hobbling into the medical centre, some of the healthcare staff passing by give me worried looks. But if dragon healing couldn’t completely fix my leg, then they certainly aren’t going to be able to help me, and I’m not up for talking about it.

Scythe leads us into the section where they keep the private rooms for more sensitive or unstable patients and knocks on a door. A chair scrapes and footsteps hurry to the door. It opens to reveal an older nurse, her silver hair tied back into a bun. Her sharp eyes take us all in.

Lyle asks her for some privacy and she grants it, taking her notes with her. It’s not until I step into the room that it hits me.

The room, Raquel lying effectively comatose on the hospital bed with multiple monitors and IVs running reminds me of my mother under Naga House.

My breakfast threatens to depart my throat and I clutch at my chest, turning away for a moment. It’s too soon. And this is my fault. I lunge for the bathroom door, and barely make it in time to the toilet, managing to twist my right leg in the process. I heave and scream into the toilet, waving Lyle away when he tries to comfort me.

I don’t deserve the help, not when I made this happen. Savage pulls my hair off my face and I allow it. Someone hands me tissues, which I clutch as I stare unseeing into the porcelain. I think of all the possibilities, all the times I could have tried to save my friend, tried to make a difference somehow.

“You were a prisoner there,” Savage says softly. “You couldn’t have done anything.”

I wipe my face, the acidic burn in my throat sharpening my focus. “I did this,” I say firmly. “If I hadn’t left, Raquel wouldn’t have come after me.”

Savage exhales heavily. “I was with them, Aurelia. This is on me.”

I frown up at him, pushing to my feet. “What?”

For the first time that I’ve known him, Savage averts his gaze, and watching him closely, I see that his neck is slowly turning pink. His voice is tight when he says. “I took Raquel to Drakos Estate and they never even thought to say no. I…saw the trap too late and couldn’t get them out in time. They screamed, but I couldn’t— I couldn’t?—”

Fuck.

I pull my wolf into my arms. Savage has taken this personally.

“He comes here every day,”Lyle says into my mind,“to see how Raquel is. He managed to find a specialist and they’ll be coming from interstate in a few days to do an assessment. He’s really trying, angel.”

And I’d just made this worse. “I’m sorry,” I say to Savage. “But this will always be on me.”

I take his hand and we head back into the main room, where I sit next to Raquel’s still body, taking their hand in mine as Savage sits next to me, his face solemn.

After ten minutes, the nurse returns to do Raquel’s half hourly observations, so we have to leave. In silence, I squeeze Savage’s hand and he squeezes mine back.

After the medical clinic, my leg seems to hit the end of its threshold for working properly and Lyle ends up having to hover me through the academy hallways. I feel like a ghost, my toes floating two centimetres off the wooden floor, passively travelling through the hallways. It makes me want to shift intoa bird, but some of these hallways in the oldest part of the academy aren’t wide enough for outstretched wings.

“The headmistress isn’t feeling her best these days,” Lyle says as we get into the elevator that will take us to the executive offices. Lyle has apparently taken up his old office again, but his old apartment remains unused as he’s been staying with his bond-brothers. “Something about the bonding plane being darkened.”

My gut roils again when I hear it. I haven’t actively used my phoenix powers since The Collector’s house, but think I understand what Lyle means. And I can’t help but feel this is also my fault.

The effects of what happened between Xander and me feel like sinister tentacles that have stretched out in every direction. So many people have been affected by it.

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