Hazel’s POV
Blood.
That was the first thing I smelled when we stopped running. Not pine, not dirt, not the river we’d been following for an hour.
Blood. His blood.
Alaric leaned against a boulder, jaw clenched so tight I heard his teeth grind. His left leg was at the wrong angle. His shirt was gone, shredded when he shifted, and his chest was a map of bruises and cuts. The worst one ran from his ribs to his hip. Still bleeding.
“Let me see,” I said. He didn’t look at me. “It’s fine.”
“It’s not fine. You’re bleeding.”
“I’ve had worse.”
“You keep saying that.” I dropped to my knees in front of him. My hands shook. I balled them into fists to stop it. “And you keep lying.”
That made him look at me. Grey eyes, usually cold, were bright with pain and something else. Something that ma
