Bound to the Alpha King novel · Chapter 11 of 24

Chapter 11: Fever

We carried him up to the Wolf Tower on a door.

Brack and two guards took the corners, and Embla walked ahead clearing the stairs with a drawn knife.

I walked beside him with my hand pressed over the silver hilt to keep the blade still.

They laid him on the big bed.

"Everyone out," I said.

"I'm not leaving," said Embla.

"Then hold the lamp and don't faint."

"I don't faint."

"You will."

I stripped my sleeves up to the shoulder and washed to the elbow in the basin.

Tobren stood in the door, grey and shaking.

"Tobren, boil water," I said. "Then bring every clean cloth in the infirmary."

"Hedda, I..."

"Later. Water."

He ran.

Rorik's eyes were half shut.

Sweat stood on his forehead in cold beads.

"Hedda," he said.

"Don't talk."

"If it goes wrong..."

"It won't."

"If it goes wrong, I want you out of the tower before."

"Before what?"

He didn't answer.

I took the bone scalpel from my pouch and held it in the lamp flame.

"On three," I said. "One. Two."

I pulled the silver blade out on two.

He bellowed.

Blood welled up black and slow.

I jammed both palms over the wound and pushed every scrap of warmth I had into it.

It hurt.

It felt like holding my hands in a forge.

Silver does not like to be healed around.

It fights.

I worked in thin, careful cuts, picking the tiny grey flakes out of the muscle one by one and dropping them in a dish.

Embla held the lamp and never wavered.

Hours went by.

The candle burned down and was replaced.

Brack stood guard at the door and said nothing at all.

Somewhere past midnight, Rorik's fever broke open.

He thrashed, murmuring.

I held his head in my lap and sponged his face.

"Father," he said.

"I'm here."

"I told you not to eat it."

"Shh."

"It was in the pie. I smelled it. I told you."

My hands stopped.

"He wouldn't listen," Rorik said, in the voice of a boy of twenty-two.

← Chapter 10 · All chapters · Chapter 12 →

Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend