Born of Blood

Chapter 20

"Alpha!" Jacob shouted, his heart galloping from his chest.

Scarlets screams reverberated around the wooden room, covering the sound of the storm raging outside the building growing into its own warning siren. The few lights in the room flickered in an out and Doctor Novache wasn't positive that it was solely the storms doing. He quickly shuffled to place himself between the traumatized woman and the enraged Alpha before him, holding his arms out as if to steady both of them, the lights flickering around him reminding him he didn't have his readers on.

"You said she was dead!" He roared, his muscular arm lifting to point accusingly at the elder doctor, his eyes swirling a deadly blue.

Orion stared at his mate, curled into a ball on the small hospital bed, reeking of fresh rain and full lavender, her body next to a red spot that Orion could scent as pure death. Her body was only covered by a thin white sheet soaked from her hair that completely covered her face. Her knees were tucked tightly beneath her and she rocked on the bed, her screams dying on her lips before beginning all over again like a wave crashing into the shore over and over again.

"She-she was!" Jacob stuttered, his eyes as large as saucers as he feared the mans convulsing body, rage tinting his dark tan skin beet red, his muscles shaking with the need for his Beast.

Orion took a step forward, his heart thumping in his chest as the mate he had only truly seen for a moment before being whisked away by his care team, sat right in front of him. He could see her toes, uncovered by the thin white sheet, she was missing her little toe on her right foot. Her toenails were dirty, covered in soil and they looked wet; but they were square and tiny, and Orion hated himself for thinking it, but cute. Her arms holding her sheet were covered in thick purple scars; Orion recognized the wounds, they were easily from a whip, and though he could see her arms were almost totally scar tissue he felt nothing but emptiness staring at them. A void, a hollowing never ending guilt that he hadn't been there to stop them from bubbling on her skin, to protect her from the pain. Her knuckles gripped the sheet so tightly they were stark white, feathering her to the world her was obviously not currently in.

"Alpha, I just came to the cabin to collect my medical bag when I found her outside the wing in the middle of this storm. I don't know how to explain it." Novache could see the pupil of his Alphas eyes dialate as his chest rose and fell like a raging bull.

His muscles in his arms flexed, the tension in his body building to the point Jacob feared a famous involuntary shift from his Alpha at any moment. He knew standing in the middle of his mate and him was a death sentence, especially with the impending shift that would come, but Jacob had seen the terror in that woman's eyes as she remembered her past. If he lived to help her, he would devote himself to it.

His Alpha deserved it.

Orion could see her fingers were covered in scars, but they were thin and nimble. Her fingernails were overgrown and broken, but he knew her hands were like a sculptures, the missing pieces to Praxiteles Aphrodite. And though her hair covered her face, he couldn't help but notice the richness of its color. A deep brown, melted dark chocolate with an Auburn undertone in the flickering bulbs of the room. The lights showed how dirty her hair was, caked in grime and dirt from an unknown origin, but the way the wet strands reflected the fluorescent light kept him from caring; he wanted to run his fingers through it.

Orion had been taking steps toward his mate, too consumed by taking in his living breathing woman to realize the closer he got the worse her screams became. Their sound increasing, a tremor building to her crescendo, her arms dropping the sheet to reveal her chest as she backed farther onto the bed to get away from this man. Orion stopped his trek at the sight of her chest, the light pattern of burns over his skin only making him want to feel their typography. His beast burned in his lungs, it's growl merging with his body, his vocal chords trembling to explode its hurt and rage and need to the world. He hated his mates injuries, he wanted to feed on the flesh of all who had contributed to her agony of life, and he hated her fear. He could smell her tears, feel the room vibrate with with her cries, and with Jacobs hand on his chest, he felt rage at her terror.