At that moment, his sanity returned. Asher stood to excuse himself, but the wily witch simply threw herself against him, landing them both on the bed as she giggled and straddled his waist.
The door to her room blew open with a bang, but it was no natural breeze that had done so, he’d could smell the ozone of magic. Nobody was there, but several passing students saw them in a compromising position, Shawna draped over him and moaned as she ground herself against him.
Asher had had enough. He sat up, causing her to slide off him and onto the floor where she landed with a curse and a scowl. The near call had caused adrenaline to rush through his veins. His heart was pumping, his chest heaving. He probably looked more aroused than angered, but Asher was going to take whatever help he could get.
How he had made it to the female witch dorms instead of the male shifter ones on the other side of the campus, he didn’t know, but he knew he had to get out of there fast.
He didn’t even bother putting on his shirt, holding it balled in his hand as he strode down the hall and out the door onto the path. People everywhere stopped to look at him, but he wasn’t in the mood to preen at the attention. Oz hadn’t been kidding when he’d warned Asher, and he felt a fool for not listening and accepting his help. He owed Oz a solid.
Every day he walked to Melody’s cottage, where he was told that there was no change. Melody was still unconscious, feverish and incredibly weak.
For a week, Shawna and her hellcats stalked him, finding him no matter where he hid, and draping themselves around him and all over him, giving him no chance to get away without using force. Shifters craved touch and the women knew it. It was obvious they were trying to lure his wolf to them by giving him what he wanted most.
Only, the thing he wanted most was her, Melody. After being connected to her even for the briefest of moments, Asher knew that nobody else would ever match up to her. These other witches were pathetic, thoughtless and weak. His wolf wanted to slash them and rip them with his claws. However, one thing that had been drilled into him since he was a pup was that witches were to be feared and treated with the utmost respect, so Asher hesitated to push them away.
It was a mistake. Shawna took it as encouragement, telling anyone who would listen that he was simply in shock from having his first bond severed, and that once he recovered, he was going to challenge her instead. He had found a better witch.
She was only partially right. He was in shock.
Losing his bond to Melody had been the worst pain Asher had ever felt, and it wasn’t just physical pain either. It was like someone had taken a knife to his soul. He felt detached, isolated, and afraid. It was akin to losing a parent, even though his bond was so newly forged. It was a deep connection already, speaking to experience on Melody’s part and the strength of her magic, of her suitability for him, and of his need for her.
By the end of the first week, Asher was at his wit’s end. Turning his anger on Ryan when he was turned away again, not even permitted to enter the cottage.
“If she doesn’t want to see me again, let her tell me to my face, but don’t let her hide behind you like the coward that she is!” he roared at the other wolf.
The next instant, Asher was nearly smothered in the ozone stench that announced magic, before he was hit with a force that pinned his arms to his sides, his legs together, and prized his jaws apart, stuffing a pocket of air in his mouth so he couldn’t talk.
Nick was standing just behind Ryan’s shoulder, dark circles under his eyes, and a frown on his face that would make a lesser shifter soil themselves. His eyes blazed golden with long vertical slits for pupils, telling Asher that this dragon was barely holding his shit together. Ryan stepped back out of the way to let Nick do what he wanted.
Rather than being flung across the green verge like Asher expected, he was dragged inside and held still at Melody’s bedside, where her pale and profusely sweating form lay far too still. Every now and then she took a shallow breath, but it seemed to take so much effort that Asher’s bones ached in sympathy. There was a tube leading away from her nose, and taped to her face. Oz sat there with a syringe full of a green mixture, and as Asher watched in growing horror, Oz pushed the plunger, the thick goop travelling up her nose and out of sight.
“It’s a feeding tube,” Nick whispered quietly. “It goes down into her stomach. It’s the only way we can keep her alive, the fever is not natural and is burning through her, although the wounds themselves are not infected.”
Nick pointed to the foot of the bed where a clear plastic bag hung full of yellow liquid. Some more trickled in from a hose that disappeared under the blankets and Asher realised that it was her urine. It was like a hospital room in there, except more homely.
The gag was removed from his mouth.
It was only then that Asher realised how dark it was, and how much his shifter sight was compensating. “Why is it so dark?” he asked, also whispering, seeing it seemed to be the thing to do.
In the deepest shadows of the room, something stirred, and Asher’s eyes strained to see who it was, until they sat forward. It
