Enslaved by the Alpha (Shifters of Nunavut Book 2)

by Rivard, Viola

  Astrid gave Shila a sympathetic smile. “Shila, you a doctor?”

  Shila shook her head.

  “Do you have any medical experience at all? No? Okay, what about any personal experience with colds or flues?”

  Shila was shaking her head so furiously she looked like she was having a seizure. “No, that’s why I came to you when Torok was sick. I was hoping that you would have human medicine.”

  “It’s just called medicine,” Astrid said. “And this is why you should keep it around. Now, is there anyone in the pack who has any sort of medical experience?”

  Both Shila and Eric said nothing.

  Astrid fell back on the bed and exhaled softly. “Well, it looks like I’m on my own here.”

  While Erik dismissed Shila, Astrid set to bundling herself up in layers of furs. They kept the drafty air out, but didn’t do much else. It felt as though her body was incapable of generating any heat, and she continued to tremble.

  Eric sat down beside her. She wanted to ask him to get under the covers with her, but he looked restless and didn’t appear as though he’d be willing to remain sedentary.

  “What do I do?” He asked her.

  Astrid didn’t remember him being this anxious the last time she’d been sick. Then again, that had been before she was pregnant, before they’d even been mates.

  She infused her voice with this much reassurance as she could muster and said, “There’s nothing for you to do; it just has to run its course. Once my fever breaks, we should be in the clear. Chances are, I’ll be better by morning.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY SEVEN

  Her fever had broken by morning, but it gave Erik only a small measure of relief. Malina had been in and out of the room all night, offering Astrid food that she wouldn’t eat and giving her water that she would inevitably retch up.

  He hadn’t stayed by her side all night, but he’d been with her more often than not. Halley had tried to come in several times, but he’d turned her away. If his brother ever did come back, the last thing he needed was Sten blaming him for his daughter getting sick.

  The dog had stuck around, and in spite of its smell, Erik hadn’t minded. It lay at the foot of the bed, watching his mate sleep. Whenever Erik looked at it, its tail wagged. More than once, he’d caught himself scratching the space between its ears.

  Astrid had woken a few times during the night and early morning. Usually only to express that she was cold or thirsty. Sometimes she’d slip right back into unconsciousness, which Erik preferred, because otherwise she’d be wracked with sickness.

  It was early afternoon when her eyes fluttered open again. This time, they were more focused and she looked directly at Erik, giving him a shaky smile.

  “You look awful,” she told him. “You should really go take a bath.”

  “Perhaps I will,” he said in an offhanded manner. He offered her a cup of water. “How are you feeling?”

  “Much better, much better.”

  Erik’s eyes narrowed in scrutiny as he watched her take a small sip and then move to set the cup aside. He intercepted her hand, pushing it back towards her face.

  “Drink more.”

  “Maybe later?”

  “No, ‘later’ was last night. You haven’t had anything to drink since before I came back from the hunt.”

  “I don’t feel thirsty,” she protested. She tried to push his hand away, but succeeded only in dropping the cup. She grimaced as the water spilled onto the bed. “That wasn’t on purpose.”

  Erik ran a hand through his hair. “Are you hungry?”

  She shook her head. “I’m still pretty tired, actually. I might just rest for a little while longer.”

  “Don’t you at least want to relieve yourself?” he asked.

  She paused thoughtfully. “No. I don’t have to pee.”

  That bothered him more than anything. Even being dehydrated, she should have had to have gone at least once in the past day. He wished Sten were back. His brother might not have been a healer, but having lived among humans, he knew a hell of a lot more than Erik about sickness.

  The dog had snuck its way up the bed to lay beside Astrid. She rubbed its back with a shaky hand, a far-off and troubled look on her face.

  “In high school, everyone thought my sister was a lesbian.”

  What? “What?”

  “It was my fault,” she said. “There was this boy, Justin Delany. He was so handsome, I mean, not like you, but he was cute for a teenage boy. Anyway, he was one of those guys that didn’t let his good looks keep him from being nice to chubby girls like me. I’d had a crush on him since middle school.”

  “Why are you telling me this?”

  She shot him a look of annoyance. “Got somewhere better to be?”

  Erik had a lot of better places he could be, but nowhere he’d rather be, so he remained silent.

  “Okay, so I kept my feelings a secret for years, but I had this fantasy that once we were seniors and above the politics of high school, that I’d go to my locker and he’d be waiting there to ask me to prom.

  “Lo and behold, a week before prom, it happened! He was there, waiting at my locker. I remember, I almost tripped over my feet to get to him. He caught me before I fell and it was like something out of a movie. And then, he asked me if I thought that my parents would be okay with my little sister going to senior prom with him.”

  Astrid paused to cringe at the memory. “I was so upset. I didn’t cry, I mean, I did later in the girl’s bathroom, but that’s not important. For a split second, I was so angry and jealous of Ginnifer that I told Justin that our parents would probably say yes, but he shouldn’t ask them because they didn’t know that Ginnifer was gay and it would put her in an awkward position.

  “I guess he told a few people and rumors started flying around. By the time she started her junior year, everyone thought she was a total lesbian. Other lesbians were asking her out on dates, and when she turned them down, they’d think she was stuck up. She got bullied a lot, guys would come up to her asking for advice on weird sexual things. She had a really tough time in high school because of it, and she didn’t do anything to deserve that. No one deserves that… Anyway, she never knew how the rumor got started, I was always too ashamed to tell her.”

  Erik had paid attention to the entirety of his mate’s rambling story, if only because he was glad to hear her awake and alert. Just when he’d stopped questioning what the hell her point was, she slapped him with it.

  “When my sister gets here, can you tell her that it was me, and that I’m sorry?”

  “That’s what this is about?” he asked, glaring. “You can tell her yourself.”

  “Sten and I kissed.”

  It was too quiet in the room, and her words had been too clear for him to have mistaken them for anything else. He sat perfectly still, even his mind seeming to grind to a halt.

  “Well, it’s more like he kissed me,” she said, refusing to look in his direction. “I didn’t ask him to do it or come onto him or anything, but I didn’t stop him, so…”

  “When?”

  “I dunno,” she said, appearing surprised by his calm reaction. “Maybe a few nights before you came back with Torok?”

  “After you became my mate?” he asked, his voice taking on a hard edge.

  Astrid braved a glance at him. Her cheeks were flushed, but the color was uneven and splotchy on her sickly pale skin.

  “Yeah, but it wasn’t sexual. He only did it to prove a point.”

  “And what point was that?”

  His anger was tinged with irony, as only yesterday he’d been contemplating receiving a massage from Ila under the logic that it wouldn’t be sexual, and so his mate shouldn’t be bothered by it. However, there was a huge gulf between him receiving a back massage and his mate kissing his brother.

  “That I love you,” she said, looking into his eyes now. She blinked several times, and then smiled. “There. I said it! It’s out there now, and you know what? No
matter what you think, I feel pretty good about it.”

  She fell back on the bed and stretched her arms up over her head. “What are you thinking? Did I freak you out?”

  Erik was no longer looking at her face. He was looking at her hand, the one that had been bitten. There was a rash on her palm, but what held his attention was the long red line that ran from the bandaged area, past her wrist, and down her arm. It was not the first time he’d seen a line like that, and while he wasn’t sure what caused it, he knew what was going to happen.

  Astrid followed his gaze to her arm, and her smile faded.

  “Oh…” she said in a small voice. “That doesn’t look good…”

  Erik covered her with a fur and stood, saying nothing as he left the room. She didn’t call out for him, which was good because he wouldn’t have gone back in. He needed to be away from her in order to think straight.

  He walked for a few moments, headed nowhere in particular. In his mind, he kept seeing the red line and what it would become—spider webs of darkened blood passageways, as poisoning set in.

  “You’ll be sorry when I get sick and die.”

  Erik’s gut twisted. This was his fault. Why hadn’t he taken the bite more seriously? Once again, he had forgotten how fragile humans were, and this time, it could cost his mate her life.

  He stopped and leaned back on the wall, wiping away the sheen of sweat that had gathered on his forehead. He tried to think of a solution—any solution, but kept hitting dead ends. He had never seen anyone recover from a blood poisoning, not on their own. She needed medicine, but the nearest human settlement was days away. Even running as fast as he could and without taking breaks, he wasn’t sure he could get her there in time. And that was assuming, given her weakened state, that the cold didn’t kill her first.

  The tunnel echoed with the sound of someone large approaching at high speed. Erik didn’t move, but like a wounded animal, he was prepared to lash out if anyone came too close.

  Sylvestre stopped a few meters short of Erik. He was panting for breath and there was an air of urgency about him that managed to momentarily pull Erik from his dark musings.

  “You’re not going to believe this,” Sylvestre said. “Sten’s back, and he brought Siluit with him.”

  ***

  When Sylvestre had said that Sten had brought the Siluit pack, Erik had failed to grasp the sheer scope of what he’d meant. Over the past year, Siluit’s numbers had been whittled down by skirmishes with the bears, and Erik had envisioned their current numbers as being somewhere between one and two dozen. What he found waiting for him ten kilometers outside of his den was a mass of wolves that rivaled the size of Erik’s own pack. He would have thought they’d come to wage war with him, had they not been almost exclusively juveniles and pups.

  Zane stood up at the front, his arm wrapped tightly around his mate. Astrid’s sister looked almost as pallid as Astrid had, though this was likely due to the long journey and the fact that she was still very pregnant.

  Sten stood beside them, and was the first to advance when Erik and Sylvestre arrived. His posture was tense and defensive, as though he were expecting Erik to punch him. Of course, Erik had every reason to do so, yet he had no inclination.

  Sten said, “Erik, hear me out.”

  Before Sten could take more than a couple steps, Zane stepped forward , stopping him with a shake of his head. “I appreciate everything you’ve done, but I’ll take it from here.”

  Zane approached until he was almost toe to toe with Erik. The cold wind whipped his dark brown hair to one side, and snowflakes clung to several days worth of beard growth. Erik looked him in the eyes, or at least, tried to. The other alpha kept his gaze downturned.

  Silence hung between them, and while there were likely hundreds of gears turning in Zane’s head, Erik’s mind was still. He felt nothing, even as Zane fell down to his knees before him.

  “One week,” Zane said. “We brought our own food. Let us stay here for one week, and when we leave, Ginnifer stays here until I can come back for her.”

  Erik stared down at him, feeling only vexation at how detached he was from this entire situation. He wasn’t angry with his brother and he didn’t feel smug about Zane. He wasn’t even pissed that they were wasting his time, valuable time he could have been using to figure out how to save his mate. If he felt anything, then it was that he felt glad for the distraction this offered, because if he’d been left alone in his own head for much longer, he might have lost his mind.

  He must have stared down at Zane for a while, because the other alpha eventually looked up, his eyes blazing with contempt.

  “What the fuck, Erik? Are you going to give me an answer, or not?”

  Erik took a step back, his body feeling heavier than usual. He flicked his hand in a vague direction and muttered, “Do what you want.” Then he walked away.

  He could hear the crowd of wolves begin to talk at once as he left, heading in the direction opposite the den. There was no point in him going back yet, not when his mate still lay dying and he had no solution.

  Erik didn’t get far before Sten caught up to him. His brother’s eyes were alight with concern.

  “Erik, I’m sorry. I tried to do what you said, but I just couldn’t. All those kids… I had to warn Zane. You can be pissed at me if you want, but maybe when you become a father, you’ll understand.”

  He looked at Sten, his throat constricting.

  “Erik, what is it? Are you… Is there something wrong with Astrid?”

  What he lacked in leadership capabilities, Sten had always made up for with his intuition. But Erik knew that when it came to dealing with blood poisoning, Sten would be as useless as he was.

  “I remember when I was smaller than you,” Erik said. “I followed you everywhere, trying to do everything just the way you did it.”

  “I remember as well. When did that change? When you realized you were big enough to kick my ass, or after the thousandth time you saw father do it?”

  “I never looked down on you for that. I admired how you always got back up and never let him break you.”

  “Thanks…” Sten gave him a pointed look. “Is this a very roundabout way of you telling me that I’m dead to you and that you want me out of the pack?”

  Erik would have grinned, but the muscles in his face wouldn’t cooperate. “No… I remember when it changed. After I won my first fight against you, you told me that our father killed my mother because she tried to strangle me.”

  Sten stopped walking. His mouth hung open and he looked stricken. “I didn’t think you even remembered that. I only said that because I was ashamed and humiliated. I wanted to hurt you, and it was the only way I knew how.

  “I made it up. Your mom would have never done that to you. She was obsessed with you. I remember, she wouldn’t even let me in the same room as you because she was afraid you’d catch my germs. She loved you, Erik.”

  It wasn’t a revelation. Erik had always had a sense that Sten had lied, but once the idea had taken root in the back of his mind, it had proliferated like a strain of weeds, almost impossible to completely eradicate.

  He turned, looking back towards the den. The Siluit wolves had already been reduced to a speck on the horizon.

  “Astrid is sick,” Erik finally said.

  “What, like a cold?”

  “She was bitten by an animal. It looks like an infection that’s spreading to her blood.”

  Sten slapped his brother on the back. “Then what the hell are you doing out here?”

  “What can I possibly do for her?” Erik asked, his lips setting into a grim slash.

  “If she was dying, you could stay by her side. She’s probably scared,” Sten said. “But I don’t think that’ll be necessary, at least not now. It’s a good thing I brought Siluit, because unlike us, they actually have a healer.”

  ***

  “And if I say no?” Zane asked with quiet fury. “Let me guess, you’ll try to take it any
way?”

  The members of Siluit—Erik had counted them all—included six capable adults, two elders, forty-eight juveniles of various sizes, three humans, and eighteen pups—none of which belonged to Zane. Who the fuck took in a whole bunch of pups that weren’t theirs? Alphas that wanted to lose their territory, that’s who. Of course, Erik had brought them all back to his own den, but once the week was up, he was not above dumping them outside individually and by the scruffs of their necks.

  Erik was in unusually good spirits, despite his mate’s rapidly degenerating condition. That was because according to Indigo, the one juvenile that didn’t seem worthless, Astrid would almost certainly make a full recovery. That was, as soon as she administered the last of Siluit’s course of antibiotics.

  They were in Astrid’s room. Ginnifer was crouched down beside her sister, dabbing Astrid’s head with a cool cloth. Astrid had woken when her sister had arrived, but her words had been incoherent and it hadn’t been clear if she’d even been aware that she wasn’t dreaming. She had fallen back into unconsciousness shortly before Indigo’s exam, and had remained there.

  Zane stood off to the side of his mate, his arms folded across his chest. On his hard face, Erik saw none of the male that had fallen to his knees only hours before. The moment he’d gotten his brood into the den, he had turned into the same arrogant and entitled asshole Erik had always known him to be.

  “I wouldn’t have to try,” Erik said. “You get in my way and our deal is off. You, your pack, and your mate are out the—”

  “You didn’t even know we had antibiotics when you let us in,” Zane hotly protested. “Is that how this week is going to go? You’re going to keep lumping demands on me and threatening my pack and my family if I don’t comply?”

  “There, it’s done.”

  They both looked down at Ginnifer, who was pulling a syringe from Astrid’s arm. Beside her, Indigo cast an anxious look up at Zane.

  “Gin… That was supposed to be for you,” Zane said gravely.

  Ginnifer was stroking her sister’s hair. “We don’t even know if I’ll need it. Besides, did you really think I was going to sit by and watch my sister die?”