Nixon’s POV
"You are this pack’s lead healer, Nathan, yet you could not tell that my mother was being systematically hollowed out by common poison rather than the rot?"
My voice sliced through the damp chill of the subterranean chamber, a low, predatory rumble that rattled the iron sconces on the stone walls. The heavy scent of copper and old sweat hung thick in the air. The sentinels had only just carted my mother out on the leather stretcher, her frail body looking entirely skeletal under the linen sheets, leaving the room feeling vast, empty, and dripping with failure.
Nathan did not reply with words. His knees simply buckled. The wet, heavy thud of his joints colliding with the granite floor echoed against the low ceiling. He trembled so violently that his loose woollen robes rustle
