Chapter 205 Listen to Me
Out in the stark, brightly lit hallway, the silence was agonizing. The heavy double doors of the infirmary were thick, but they weren't entirely soundproof. Every muffled, jagged sob that tore from Elana's throat echoed out into the corridor, hammering against her sons like physical blows.
Fennigan and Jax stood frozen just outside the room. Two massive, battle-hardened werewolf warriors—an Alpha and a Beta who had just survived a war, a bunker explosion, and a deadly toxin—were completely paralyzed by the sound of their mother breaking down.
They wanted to help her. Every protective instinct in their blood screamed at them to push the doors open, rush back to her bedside, and fix whatever was hurting her. But they knew Elana. They knew her pride, her fierce independence, and the absolute humiliation she was feeling at being trapped in her own body. She didn't want their comfort. Right now, she wouldn't have it.
Jax pressed his forehead against the cool painted cinderblock wall beside the door, his large hands curled into tight, trembling fists at his sides. He closed his eyes, unable to stomach the sound of his fiercely unbreakable mother completely falling apart.
"What are we going to do?" Jax whispered, his voice cracking under the crushing weight of his helplessness. He turned his head to look at his brother, his silver eyes wide and desperate.
Fennigan was staring blankly at the linoleum floor, his broad shoulders slumped in defeat. The soot and ash from Damon's bunker were still ground into his skin, making him look like a ghost of the immovable Alpha he was supposed to be.
"There's nothing we can do," Fennigan said. His voice was flat and hollow, stripped entirely of its usual commanding rumble. He slowly dragged a heavy, calloused hand down his exhausted face. "You heard what Veda said, Jax. The frostbite is already in her nervous system. It's up to her body now. It's up to her wolf."
Jax pushed off the wall, his Beta energy flaring with a sudden, desperate frustration. He couldn't just accept defeat, not when it came to the woman who had raised them.
"There has to be something," Jax growled softly, pacing a tight, restless circle in the middle of the hallway. "Fenn, we can't just leave her in a wheelchair for the rest of her life. There has to be a specialist, a different healer, another type of magic—something. I'm not just going to sit here and watch her give up without a fight."
Fennigan reached out, his massive, soot-stained hand clamping down hard on Jax's shoulder, instantly stopping the Beta’s frantic pacing. His grip was an iron anchor, forcing his younger brother to stand still and look him in the eye.
"Listen to me," Fennigan commanded softly. The Alpha rumble in his chest was gone, replaced by the steady, grounded weight of an older brother who was holding the world together by a thread.
Jax’s jaw clenched, his eyes burning with unshed tears, but he stopped fighting the hold.
"We have to let Mom do this her way," Fennigan said, his voice thick with his own suppressed grief. "She has been the strongest person in this pack for thirty years. She never bent, she never broke, and she never asked for help. Tonight, the man she loved ripped her life apart, and now she can't even feel her own legs. That is a total, absolute loss of control."
Fennigan squeezed Jax's shoulder, nodding toward the heavy double doors where the muffled sound of their mother's weeping still echoed.
"If we go rushing in there right now trying to fix her, trying to manage her pain, we are just taking away what little agency she has left," Fennigan explained gently. "She needs to mourn. She needs to be furious. She needs to feel sorry for herself for once in her damn life without us hovering over her like she's broken glass."
Jax swallowed hard, his Adam's apple bobbing as he looked down at the linoleum floor. He hated it. Every instinct in his blood hated leaving a pack mate—especially his mother—in pain. But he knew Fennigan was right. Elana's pride was as vital to her survival as her heartbeat.
"So we just do nothing?" Jax whispered, the fight draining out of him.
"We stand guard," Fennigan corrected him, his silver eyes dark and resolute. "We make sure she is safe. But we only give her help if she explicitly asks for it. Or..."
Fennigan paused, his expression hardening into a fierce, protective mask. "...or if we see she is falling into a despair so deep that she can't pull herself back out. If the darkness starts swallowing her whole, then we step in. But until then, Jax, we let her grieve."
Jax let out a long, ragged exhale, the tension slowly leaving his broad shoulders. He gave his brother a slow, reluctant nod, accepting the agonizing reality of standing by while their mother wept on the other side of the wall.
The harsh, agonizing sobs eventually began to slow, giving way to quiet, exhausted hiccups that echoed softly in the sterile room. Elana lay there for a long while, staring up at the acoustic ceiling tiles, letting the last of the poison—the grief, the betrayal, and the sheer terror of her paralyzed legs—drain out of her system.
She had allowed herself to shatter. But she was Elana. She didn't know how to stay in pieces for long.
Taking a deep, shuddering breath, she placed her palms flat against the mattress. With a heavy grunt of effort, she channeled all of her formidable willpower into her upper body. Her biceps trembled, completely overcompensating for the dead weight of her lower half, but she pushed through the strain. Slowly, she dragged her torso upright, shifting her hips and hauling herself up until she was sitting firmly against the pillows.
She reached over to the bedside table, pulling a handful of scratchy hospital tissues from the box, and aggressively wiped the dampness from her cheeks and the mascara smudges from beneath her eyes. She tossed the crumpled tissues onto the tray and waved her hands rapidly in front of her face, fanning the flushed, puffy skin to cool it down.
She took one last, steadying breath, locking the vulnerability away in a steel box deep inside her chest. Her armor was back in place.
"Boys!" Elana called out. Her voice was raspy and completely wrecked from screaming, but the unwavering, authoritative crack of the former Luna had returned.
Out in the hallway, Fennigan and Jax instantly snapped to attention. They pushed through the heavy double doors, their massive frames hesitating just inside the threshold. They braced themselves, unsure if they were walking into a storm of fury or an ocean of grief.
Instead, they found their mother sitting upright, her back perfectly straight. She looked utterly exhausted, her eyes red-rimmed and bloodshot, but she leveled them with a dry, remarkably steady smile.
"Alright," Elana said. She pointed a finger at her towering sons. "I am drawing a line right here. No more long faces. I don't want to see a single ounce of pity in those silver eyes of yours, do you hear me?"
Jax blinked, his jaw falling slightly slack, while Fennigan let out a slow, breathy exhale, the tension bleeding out of his broad shoulders.
"We are going to take this exactly one day at a time," Elana continued, patting the unmoving blankets over her legs with a practical, dismissive thud. "If this paralysis is just temporary, then we focus on healing. And if it's permanent... well, then we'll just have to change all our future vacation plans to strictly accommodate ramps and elevators."