82

82
“We won’t!” Tina insists. “We’ll go somewhere far away.”

Elsa shakes her head. "You say that. But will Noah go with you? What if he decides to go after Sophia again?"

Tina's silence is all the answer I need. I pull away my hand, but Noah grabs it. His eyes meet mine, a vicious agony in them. He’s trying to say something. His lips are moving, but his tongue is too swollen to form the words properly.

However, he doesn’t give up, his hold on my hand tight to the point of being painful. "I-I -I wun-won't!”

I look at him and then back at Tina. “Are you willing to swear a blood debt to me? You will never enter the South Alliance. You will never interfere in the affairs of any of the three alliances. Can you promise me that in the form of a blood debt?”

Tina nods her head, fiercely. “Yes. I'll take Noah, and we'll go somewhere far away. You will never see us again.”

Noah also manages to nod.

I looked toward Elsa. I don’t know much about blood debts aside from what Alex and Logan told me. “Is that enough? If they simply say so?”

Else understands what I’m trying to ask. "Yes. They just have to say it verbally. The blood debt will now be in effect the minute you remove the dark magic from him and save his life.”

The power of words can be incredible.

Deciding to take Elsa's word for it, I begin the process of removing the dark magic. But as I do, I sense something else within Noah. His wolf. It's not reacting like it should.

I don’t know what it means, so I keep going. However, at some point, I find myself stopping and looking at Tina. “How long ago did Karina do this?”

“She reached out to Noah a week after the banquet. Why?”

My brows furrow together. “I…There’s something wrong with his wolf. It’s weaker than it should be. I have a hard time trying to sense it."

It's almost as if Noah's wolf is dying.

My unspoken words reach Tina, and her eyes widen, “That's not…it can't be. If Noah's wolf dies, he won't survive. That can't happen. You're wrong! You're trying to kill his wolf, aren't you?”

Her explosion startles me and she shoves me back, standing protectively over Noah. “I knew I shouldn’t have trusted you. You just want to get back at him for what he did to you. I won’t let you…”

Elsa grabs her daughter by the arm and pushes her aside before putting her own hands on Noah’s chest. She closes her eyes and after a couple of minutes, she looks up with a heavy sigh. “Sophia hasn’t done anything. Karina did. Noah’s wolf is indeed dying. The only reason it’s still alive is because of your mate bond. And if you don’t trust me, you can ask Marlene. I can bring her in here. She doesn’t even know you. She has no reason to lie to you.”

Tina looks at the two of us, finally realizing we aren’t lying to her. Her hands tremble. “Why?”

“The dark magic that Karina used was probably always intended to kill Noah’s wolf,” Elsa tries to explain to her daughter, her voice weary. “It is a painful process. She might not have realized that your mate bond would keep his wolf alive.”

I study Tina. “Why weren’t you able to figure this out? I thought you could do both dark and light magic.”

Elsa startles. “What? You’ve been practicing dark magic?”

I look at Elsa. “You didn’t know she could practice dark magic?”

The older witch looks confused. “Any witch can practice the dark arts, but over time, you lose the ability to practice what we call ‘nature magic’.”

“I never lost that ability,” Tina mutters. “And I don’t know. I’ve been running around trying to save him. And it’s not like his wolf began to die immediately after he was cursed. When I checked him, he had been fine.”

Elsa looks stunned and then sorrow fills her eyes. “The child of a shifter and a witch is an abnormality. I blame myself for the number of ways your soul is torn.”

I’m about to tell her that her words are a little harsh, but Tina just shrugs. “I don’t mind being different. But I can’t save Noah. What use is it, being able to practice both kinds of magic, when I cannot even save my own mate?”

Her voice is filled with frustration.

“I can get rid of the dark magic,” I tell her. “But I can’t save his wolf. I don’t know how to do that. I’m sorry, Tina.”

“Nobody can do that. The damage to Noah’s wolf is too grave,” Elsa informs her daughter, sympathy in her voice. “It won’t hinder him much in life, but there’s a chance that he might never be able to shift again.”

Tina’s eyes turn glassy and she looks toward her mate. Sinking her teeth into her lower lip in an attempt to control her tears, she whispers, “I don’t care whether he has his wolf or not. As long as he’s by my side, nothing matters to me. Please save him.”

I exchange a look with Elsa before returning to Noah’s side. He has been oddly silent throughout this conversation, and when I glance at his eyes during the removal process, they look resigned. He probably already suspected something like this. After all, his wolf is a part of him. He would have sensed when things started going wrong.

I catch him glancing at Tina with guilt in his eyes, and I sigh internally. I don’t want to feel bad for the two of them, but I can’t help it.

When I’m done, I step back. “He should be fine by tonight. But there is something I want to ask him. During the banquet, why was my mother sharing her powers with him? I thought she had already been doing that with Robert?”

“I can answer that.” Tina sits down by her mate’s bedside. Noah is unconscious now, but his body is no longer twitching from the pain.

“We stumbled upon your mother a long time ago. We were still young. Noah didn’t realize what she was, till he overheard his father discussing the Silver Wolf. Robert did not discover that Noah had stumbled upon his little secret till Noah managed to understand how much power your mother could give him. He began to threaten her. He would tell her things about you, and she believed him. He soon began to tell her that he would hurt you if she didn’t give him the same power as she was giving his father.”

Elsa makes a choking sound. “That’s why Grace became so weak. The Silver Wolf is not meant to share power with anyone beyond her mate. It would already have been hard enough to share her powers with Robert, but Noah was an additional strain.”

Tina doesn’t respond. There’s not even an apology on her lips, not that I would believe her even if she did.