The Alpha's Cursed Healer

CHAPTER 4: THE CHOICE

ARIA WINTERS

My empathic senses flare and I feel someone’s dying nearby. It’s not that I can fully control the abilities yet. But it’s been six months of pure hell and agony, I’ve gotten used to living in hell.

Alarms start blaring in my head immediately. I should walk away, focus on surviving. But I can't ignore the feeling pulling at me, begging me to help. I try to run, but I can’t. It’s like the feeling itself is pulling me.

Eventually I give up resisting and follow it deeper into the woods until I find a massive black wolf collapsed in a pool of his own blood. There's a wound in his stomach that's still bleeding and he's barely breathing. I drop to my knees beside him and his silver-gray eyes flutter open, and for god's sake, they're filled with so much pain.

Through my empathic sense I can feel his thoughts, fading and desperate.

"Mate... where is she... need to find..."

Oh God.

This wolf is dying while searching for his mate.

And he smells like pine and smoke.

"No," I whisper, my hands hovering over his wound. "No no no, this can't be…"

Is this him? Is this the stranger who marked me?

If I heal him and he recognizes me he'll complete the bond. He'll trap me forever.

But if I don't heal him my mate might die right here in front of me.

I have seconds to decide and I don't know what to do and his eyes are closing and….

Oh God. Oh God oh God oh God.

I should let him die and save myself from this stupid bond. But my hands are already moving toward his wound because apparently I'm an i***t who can't let anyone die even when it would solve all my problems. I press my palms against his blood-soaked fur and reach for that empathic healing thing that just woke up today and I have no idea how to control.

The pain slams into me so hard I scream. It's not just the wound, there's poison in his system. His wounds are from a silver blade, and they’re tearing at my insides. Everything around me begins spinning. I'm absorbing all of it and it's killing me but I can't let go because if I let go he dies.

Silver light pours from my hands into his body and I can see the wound starting to close and the poison neutralizing but it's taking everything I have and I'm about to pass out and…

His eyes snap open and lock on mine, and the mate bond flares to life so intense I gasp.

He knows. He has to know.

But then he just stares at me with confusion in those silver-gray eyes like he's trying to figure out who I am and why his wolf is howling MATE at a complete stranger.

Oh s**t, the tattoo. It's working. He can feel the bond but he doesn't recognize me. f**k!

The wolf starts shifting and I scramble backward. In seconds, there's a naked man lying in the blood where the wolf was.

Holy s**t.

He's gorgeous. Tall and heavily muscled with black hair, battle scars running across his chest. Damn, I didn’t know scars could make a man look this hot. Even covered in blood and barely able to sit up he looks like the kind of man who could kill you with his bare hands.

"You saved my life," he says, his voice rough, and deep. "Who are you?"

Fuck. Should I tell him the truth? How the f**k am I supposed to explain that I'm his mate and someone drugged us both and I've been dying from an incomplete bond for the past six months?

If I tell him that, he'll probably want to complete the bond and trap me forever.

"I'm no one," I say, the words tasting bitter in my mouth. "Just a rogue healer. I felt you dying and I couldn't walk away."

He's studying my face like he's trying to solve a puzzle. "What's your name?"

"Aria."

"I'm Kael Shadowborn. Alpha of Shadowmoon Pack." He tries to stand and staggers. I move to help him on instinct. The second our skin touches the bond kicks in and he jerks back with wide eyes. "What was that?"

"I don't know," I lie again. "Maybe a side effect of the healing?"

He doesn't look convinced but before he can ask more questions my empathic sense flares and I feel someone watching us from the trees.

What the…

"We need to move," I say, looking around. "Whoever poisoned you might still be here."

"Poisoned?" His eyes go hard. "How do you know I was poisoned?"

"I could feel it when I healed you. Someone poisoned you first then stabbed you with silver in a spot that would make you bleed out slowly. This wasn't a random attack. Someone tried to assassinate you."

"Well, well, well." A voice cuts through the clearing and I turn to see Celeste stepping out of the trees with four pack warriors behind her. "The rogue w***e who ruined my mating ceremony is playing healer now? How convenient." She faces Kael. “Kael my love, are you alright?” She rushes over to him, wrapping her scarf around him. She kisses him on the lips, her red lipstick spreading all over his lips.

My blood runs cold.

"You know this woman?" Kael asks, looking between us.

Celeste's smile is pure venom and her performance is flawless. Tears well in her eyes immediately and her voice shakes when she speaks. "She's the one I told you about, my love. The one who tried to ruin our ceremony. I didn't want to say it in front of everyone but she's been obsessed with you for months."

"That's not true," I say but my voice comes out too weak.

"When she couldn't have you," Celeste continues, “She drugged herself and threw herself at you to trap you with a false mate bond. Thank the Goddess you rejected her."

Kael looks at me and I can see him trying to piece things together. "I don't remember any of that night. I was told I marked you, Celeste, during the ceremony, but I have no memory of it. The entire night is blank."

"You were celebrating, my love.” She slips into her innocent girl mode like a snake, grabbing his face and kissing him again. “You'd just become Alpha. Of course you don't remember every detail."

But I am putting it together now. Kael doesn't remember marking me because someone erased his memory. The same someone who just tried to kill him.

"Wait.. she's covered in your blood, Kael!" Celeste points at me with fake horror plastered on her face. "She must be the one who poisoned you! Arrest her!"

"What? No!" I take a step back but the warriors are already moving. "I healed him, I didn't hurt him…"

"Then how did you find him out here?" Celeste demands. "How did you know exactly where he'd be?"

"I felt him dying, I have empathic abilities that let me sense…" I cut myself off because s**t, I just exposed myself.

"Empathic abilities?" One of the warriors looks at me with disgust. "You're one of those freaks the Council hunts?"

"Search her," Celeste orders. "I guarantee you'll find evidence."

The warriors grab me and one of them shoves his hand in my pocket and pulls out a vial filled with dark liquid.

My stomach drops.

"I found something," the warrior says, holding the vial up. He sniffs it and yells. “It’s poison!”

"I've never seen that before in my life," I say desperately. "Celeste planted it, she's setting me up…"

"Of course you'd blame me." Celeste's tears are flowing now. "You've always been jealous of me, Aria. Always wanted what I have. And now you've tried to kill my mate just to get close to him."

Kael steps close to me and the mate bond screams between us and I can see confusion flash across his face. His wolf is going insane, I can feel it through the bond, but he doesn't understand why.

"You poisoned me?" he asks coldly, his chest hardening.

I meet his eyes. "No."

"Then explain how you found me. How you knew where I'd be."

I open my mouth to answer but Celeste cuts me off. "She's been stalking you, obviously. This is classic obsession behavior. She poisoned you so she could 'save' you and make you grateful."

The evidence is stacked against me. I'm a rogue who randomly found the Alpha dying in the woods. I'm covered in his blood. I have the poison in my pocket. And his supposed mate is testifying that I'm obsessed with him.

"Take her to Shadowmoon," Kael says and his voice is hard. "Lock her in the cells until I'm strong enough to interrogate her properly."

"No, wait…" The warriors grab my arms and start dragging me away.

I lock eyes with Kael one more time and the mate bond pulls so tight between us that he flinches. For just a second I see his wolf rising in his eyes, probably fighting him, trying to make him stop this.

But he doesn't understand why his wolf is going crazy over some rogue stranger.

The warriors are pulling me toward the pack border and I have maybe three seconds to decide what to do. Option one, tell him everything. The mating ceremony, the mark hidden under my tattoo, the empathic healing, all of it. Hope he believes me over Celeste, and risk the Council finding out I'm an empath, and him completing the bond against my will.

Or option two, stay silent. Go to the cells, figure out how to escape before he interrogates me, and keep my secrets but look guilty.

But then. I’ll possibly get executed for attempted assassination of an Alpha.

Option three, use my empathic abilities right now to make the warriors forget they're holding me and run. But I'm already weak from healing Kael and using that much power might kill me. And it would expose my abilities to everyone watching. And do I even know how to use the damn power?

Three terrible options and no good choice and I have two seconds left.

The warriors yank me forward.