Chapter 51: Chapter 51

“Move back, please. I don’t know what’s going to happen once I start,” she warned the others, who begrudgingly gave up on getting inside the room with force. The tension around her mounted fast, and the impatient gazes she felt burning in her neck didn’t help.

Elena brushed a lock of her hair behind her ear, focusing and laying her palms on the door’s surface. Steph’s magic stung her, but she fired back with her very own. A soft green glow spread over her hands, illuminating her face. He had used a spell that worked well against vampires—brute forces couldn’t move the door, but her delicate magic could. So she began to undo the spell, unweaving its threads one by one.

The ice magic angrily fought against her, hurting her fingers with coldness, but she didn’t falter. When the last bit of Steph’s spell faded, the sigil on the door disappeared. Elena let out a breath, folding her aching hands to warm them up.

“It’s done,” she said to the vampires who had been watching her. “All that is left is a regular lock. Can you break it, please?”

Dorian stood closest to it and promptly kicked the door in. A loud bang shot through the silence. Finally, the last barrier was gone. They headed into the pitch-black room, and Elena used her flashlight to see. Its light searchingly darted through the room, revealing cobwebs and dust. A stale, musty smell permeated the air. She scrunched her nose.

Her phone almost fell from her hand when she laid eyes on Ryder. He sat in a corner, not reacting to their presence at all. His eyes were closed, so at first, she thought he was dead—but the heaving of his chest eased her fear. Crying out his name, she crossed the room and fell on her knees in front of him, desperately touching his hollow cheek, cupping it, and tilting his head towards her.

“Ryder, can you hear me?” she asked. Her gaze was glued to his face, waiting for a reaction but receiving only apathy. “Something’s wrong,” she mumbled once she noticed a strange darkness in his familiar aura—it was poison from a plant she was all too familiar with.

The vampires scrunched their noses, recognizing the smell of the plant that lingered in the air. “He has been poisoned with wolfsbane,” Chump said, worriedly gazing at him. He found bloodstains on his ripped jacket, lifting the fabric to reveal even more blood on Ryder’s shirt. A bullet wound was visible, and it had turned black around the edges. Chump had no doubt who was responsible.

“Hunters,” he said. His voice was angry and cold, shaking with resentment. “He was ambushed by hunters.”

Hearing this, Edgar became alarmed as they could still be in the vicinity. It was a bad idea for all of them to stay in this room. Someone needed to return to the surface.

“Let’s go outside. If they return, we need to be prepared to face them,” he stressed, throwing Ryder’s distraught soulmate a long look. “You are the only one who can save him now, Elena. I’m counting on you.”

She didn’t answer, merely nodded. The vampires left the room reluctantly and returned outside to keep an eye on the area.

Elena knew how dire the situation was. Wolfsbane was very dangerous. The best way to save him was to let him consume her blood—she had no time to waste. Her thumb gently brushed over his chapped lips, prying his mouth open. She held her wrist to his mouth, but even now, he didn’t react.

“Come on, Ryder. Drink,” she coaxed, pressing her wrist against his canines. She winced when they breached her skin and drew blood. His body jolted. He groaned, and then she felt his tongue on her wrist, desperately lapping up the warm liquid.

It hurt significantly more than usual. The numbness didn’t kick in, probably because he wasn’t in his right mind, controlled by his thirst. His dull red eyes looked right through her. It was an eerie experience. Clamping down on her wrist, his teeth painfully dug into her flesh with no regard for her safety. He was driven by his instinct alone—the violent way he took her blood was entirely new to her. She sucked in a breath and squeezed her eyes shut, holding in a noise of pain. Elena had never witnessed him acting like this, so desperate to survive that he didn’t care about anything else. She wondered whether he realized whose blood he was drinking. It almost certainly hadn’t dawned on him yet.

He grabbed her wrist and held it in an iron grip, taking more of her blood. The stinging prevailed—she endured it without a complaint because it wasn’t hard to see how close he had been to death’s door. He was regaining his strength, and his body began to fight the poison inside of him.

Sweat gathered on her forehead. She breathed heavily, leaning her back against the cold stone wall and feeling feverish, dizzy. What she was doing was very dangerous, but she didn’t care. She wanted him to survive. Weakly raising her hand, she brushed his fringe aside, caressing his head.

“Take as much as you need,” she whispered.

Her voice penetrated the fog that had sunk over him. He gulped down the sweet blood in his mouth, recognizing its irresistible taste. As the last of the poison was eradicated, all of his senses returned at once. He heard heaving breaths, frantic heartbeats, and the whispering of his clan members outside. It was too much to take in at once. Ryder groaned, struggling to make sense of the chaos in his head, of all the different impressions that rained down on him.

His gaze settled on Elena’s ashen face and took in her parted lips and half-lidded eyes. She didn’t look very good—he froze, finally comprehending what he had been doing. Fear crept over him. Immediately, he removed his fangs and licked over the angry red incisions he had left, making sure the pain would fade.

Guilt overcame him. He never wanted to lose control like this, not in front of her. He had been so careful all this time, only to make a mistake when she had finally started to trust him. What if she didn’t want to be with him anymore? Doubts began to form in his mind, crowding his thoughts.

A low sigh reached his ears. She slumped in exhaustion, but he caught her before she fell and pulled her in, supporting her limp body with his arms. His hands locked in front of her stomach, securely holding her in place.

“Elena,” he whispered in her ear. “I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay,” she mumbled. The back of her head hit his shoulder as darkness threatened to consume her. “I missed you.”