68, A challenge

Adina’s POV

The enemies in front of Adina parted to let a tall woman through. She was slender and had short midnight black hair and brown eyes that was filled with hatred and loathing.

“Diedre, I presume,” Adina smirked.

“Adina, cousin,” the woman smiled. But Adina could tell that she wasn’t pleased that Adina had known her name.

“It’s time to stop this, Diedre. You will never have my title and you most definitely won’t have my powers,” Adina said.

“Why would we stop when we are winning?” Diedre asked. Adina laughed, but it was a laugh void of all amusement.

“You are more delusional than I thought, cousin. Let’s stop this unnecessary killing and part ways,” Adina said.

“I’m not the one with a mate that is more dead than alive,” Dierdre smirked.

Both Colin and Adina growled at her.

“You may not be, but you are the one with a fast-depleting army. Do you think these are the only warriors that will fight in my name? Magical creatures from around the world is standing by to send us backup. You have no chance of survival,” Adina told her.

“You say that. But I know you are weak. You don’t have the strength to send waves and waves into their death. And you definitely don’t have the strength to let your mate die as you use your magic to gather more warriors rather than to heal him,” Adina’s cousin taunted her.

She was right, in some sense. Adina wouldn’t be sending thousands into their death, and she couldn’t sacrifice Sean. But Adina refused to see that as a weakness. Her compassion and ability to love was her strength.

“Your end goal here is to kill me, right?” she asked.

“Basically,” Dierdre nodded.

“Well, don’t be a fucking coward about it. Challenge me and get it over with. You call me weak, but you have to send thousands of wolves and vampires to do something that you should be able to do on your own,” Adina said.

“You want me to challenge you?” Dierdre asked. She seemed genuinely surprised by it.

“It would have been the honourable thing to do. If you are that much stronger than me, it would be a walk in the park for you. Instead, you send all these people and hide in the shadow for years. That is pathetic,” Adina taunted her.

‘Adina, what are you doing?’ Colin asked her in a mind link.

“Are you calling me a coward?” Dierdre shouted.

“Well, I don’t know what you call someone that hides in the shadows and let other do her dirty work for years, pretending to not even be alive, but coward is a fitting word,” Adina smiled. She was running out of time. If she was to save Sean, this needed to end soon.

“The reason I didn’t challenge you was because no one can match your magic abilities, it wouldn’t be a fair fight,” Diedre was fuming.

“Oh, sweet child, you should have said you were afraid of my magic. I will not use it, I will even swear to the gods not to use it against you in the challenge,” Adina said.

“Don’t call me a child, I’m older than you are,” Dierdre hissed.

“Sorry, did I hit a nerve? Well, how about it? You and me, head-to-head, no magic and I will even stay in my human form if you prefer,” Adina told her.

“I don’t care if you turn in to a mutt or not, but if you swear to not use magic, I will agree to it,” Deidre nodded.

“We both swear the no one else will help and that when a winner is declared this battle is over,” Adina told her.

“Agreed, winner takes it all and has the right to decide the fate of the looser,” Deidre said.

“Agreed,” Adina nodded.

“Adina, no,” Colin said.

“It’s the only way,” Adina smiled at him.

She wasn’t bothered by the fact that she couldn’t use magic. She didn’t want to waste her energy on her cousin.

The creatures created a wide-open circle for Adina and Deidre. Adina kissed Colin and stepped into it. As Diedre joined her, Adina put up an energy shield around them.

“W-what are you doing?” Diedre asked.

“Just making sure none of our dedicated friends tries to help us. This way it’s just you and me,” Adina said.

“Fine,” Deidre shrugged, but Adina saw she had counted on getting outside help. Adina smiled as they squared off.

Adina knew she needed to end this quickly. Sean didn’t have much time and the energy shields were draining Adina’s energy slowly.

Deirdre attacked first. She used her speed to surprise Adina. Adina had expected it and used her own speed to move to the side. She used the techniques Sean had taught her and her knowledge of weak spots on a vampire.

She extended her leg towards her cousin. At her high speed, Deidre didn’t have a chance to avoid it and tripped over Adina’s leg. She tumbled down, face first, onto the ground. Adina didn’t give her the chance to recover.

Instead, Adina threw herself down on Deidre’s back, letting her knee dig into the back of the vampire, knocking the wind out of her. Even though vampires didn’t need to breathe, it was still an unpleasant experience, and it would stun them for a moment if they were inexperienced.  

Sean had told her to avoid fighting a vampire head on. Their teeth were less of an issue if they couldn’t reach to bite you. Adina was therefore sitting on her cousin’s back with a firm grip in her hair, jacking her head backwards.

“Do you surrender?” Adina growled.

“Never. You don’t have what it takes to kill me,” Deidre laughed.

“I killed your uncle Cleatus. For my uncle’s sake, I wish I didn’t need to kill you. If you surrender, I will not kill you,” Adina told her.

 “I will never surrender. Do your worst,” Diedre smirked.

Adina changed into her wolf form and within seconds she had gripped the throat of Diedre. She registered the surprised look on her cousin’s face, as Adina ripped the head from her body.

There was absolute silence as Adina stood over the dead body. She brought down the barrier and shifted back. She summoned her bathrobe. Adina didn’t feel like being naked at the moment. Colin rushed to her, drew her into his embrace.

“You may never do something like that again,” he whispered to her. “I’m proud of you,” he said out loud. Adina smiled at him and then turned towards everyone else.

“This battle is over, the rogues and the vampires from the two traitor families are to surrender unconditionally. You will be taken into custody and your fate will be determined at a later date. To all of you that came to our aid. We thank you. There will be food, drinks and medical aid at the school and pack house. Our beta Mateo and gamma Jason are in charge,” Adina said.

No one seemed to object. She walked over to where Sean was on the forest floor. The sight made it hard to breathe, and the tears started running again. Colin placed a hand on her shoulder.

“Can I lift him up?” Colin asked. Adina could hear the same fear and anguish in his voice as she felt.

“Yes, gently,” she nodded.

Colin bent down and carefully lifted the limp wolf in his arms. Adina knew it would take too long to get to the hospital the usual way. She didn’t have the energy to spare, but she needed to use a portal one last time. She opened it and nodded at Colin. They stepped through it and she closed it the second they both were through to the other side.

They were standing in the waiting room of the hospital. Molly jumped as she saw them.

“Alpha, luna, what?” she said, then she saw Sean and her eyes grew bigger.

“This way,” she said, and took them into an examination room.

“Molly, I need you to get Doc and I need an IV drip with glucose,” Adina told her.

“Yes luna, James is on his way,” Molly said and when to get the IV bag.

“Will the IV help him?” Colin asked as he gently placed Sean down on the gurney.

“It’s not for him. It’s for me to give me more energy,” Adina told him. Colin looked at her with concern in his eyes.

“It will be fine. I need something for the silver,” Adina said.

Colin looked around and found a disposable basin, and placed it next to Sean. He then got a stool for her to sit on.

“Can you heal him while he is in this form?” Colin asked, and looked down at the wolf.

“Yes, but it would be better if he were in human form. I can force a change, but it will be…” The words got caught in her throat.

“It will be painful?” Collin asked, and Adina nodded.

“Do it,” he told her. He stood behind her and wrapped his arms around her as if she was the one needing protection.

Adina forced all the magic out of Sean. Without magic, there was no way to keep his wolf form, and he shifted back. But the act of removing magic and the lack of control of the shift made the experience excruciating, and even when unconscious, Sean screamed.

Adina flinched at the sound, and she felt Colin’s arms tightened the surrounding grip. Sean’s wound had started bleeding again as she had removed the magic that had stopped it.

As soon as she could, she placed the magic back to steam the bleeding and then let him sink into a painless sleep. She started pulling the silver out of his body like she had done with Mateo, particle by particle.

Adina could hear Doc entering the room, but she ignored him. She heard him talk to Colin, but she didn’t hear what they were talking about. All her focus was on Sean.

Colin’s POV

Colin had his arms around Adina. He was hoping it would ease some of the panic and pain she felt. He looked down at Sean. It looked bad, no; it looked worse than bad; he thought. The fact that Adina had said she didn’t know if she could heal him told Colin how bad it was.

Colin’s emotions were in chaos. He wanted to protect Adina from the pain. He wanted Sean to wake up. But he also wanted to punch him in the face. Who had told Sean to do something so idiotic?

Colin realised that being mated to two alphas was going to strain his nerves. One of them had jumped in front of a deadly weapon and the other had been jumping all over the world and then challenged a vampire to a duel.

Doc entered the room and spoke to Colin, as Adina didn’t even acknowledge his presence. Doc told Colin what he already knew. If Adina couldn’t heal Sean, there was little hope of him surviving. Colin growled at the idea and then apologised to his friend.

“No need, alpha. He is your mate,” Doc said.

Molly walked into the room, carrying what Colin assumed was what Adina had asked for. Doc looked surprised.

“Baby, Molly is back with what you asked for,” Colin gently told his mate and kissed her head. Adina looked up and smiled at Molly.

“Thank you, Molly. Doc, can you please help me put the IV in?” Adina asked.

“Luna, with all due respect. This won’t help him,” Doc gently said.

“I know, it’s for me,” Adina said, holding out her arm.

“For you?” Doc asked, and then it looked like he understood.

“Luna, you know that this isn’t going to give you what you need?” Doc asked.

“It will give me what I need to be able to save him,” Adina said.

“What are you talking about, baby?” Colin asked.

“You know how Sean always insists that I eat when I have used magic?” she said.

“Yes,” Colin nodded.

“It’s replenishing the energy that I have used. It’s like a workout. After you work out, you need to put food in your body,” Adina said, and Colin nodded.

“With me using quite a lot of magic today, I’m a little low on energy. Glucose is sugar. They will give it straight into my blood, which will give me an energy kick,” Adina said.

“But it won’t give you a stable base or any nutrients. Once the glucose stops, you will crash,” Doc pointed out.

“We will keep it going until I have healed Sean. Then we can get me some food. Sean can’t wait for me to load up on energy the normal way,” Adina told them.

“Baby, he wouldn’t want you to hurt yourself,” Colin said.

“Well, he jumped in front of a silver knife, so he doesn’t get a say in things,” Adina told him.

“Will it harm the pup?” Colin asked.

“Pup?” Doc asked. Both he and Molly looked at Adina.

“If my energy levels become low, it might affect the pup,” Adina nodded.

“Babe…” Colin said.

“Don’t. Don’t tell me to choose our pup over Sean,” Adina said in a quiet voice.

Colin’s heart ached at the tone in her voice. She knew the dangers better than he did. She had already considered them. Colin understood her. Sean had been the one constant in her life for so long. And if Colin was honest with himself, he couldn’t see a life without Sean. He nodded and Doc sighed.

Doc placed the IV in Adina’s arm and she went back to work.