The Unmarked Mate

Chapter 36

James

It was finally time for Elestren to go back to Yew Tree Pack. They had changed her back bandages and she had changed in the dress I had chosen; it was peacock blue. It fitted perfectly but it had a deeper neckline than I had anticipated, revealing her cleavage in a mouth-watering way. It was fitted from shoulder to waist but then it flowed down to mid-calf. She looked stunning in it. She thanked Dr. Goodman good-heartedly and I did too. He patted me on the back, smiling warmly. We said goodbye to Alpha Raymond and Luna Florence. Then we took the car, Arthur was driving, Dr. Roger was on the passenger seat, and we sat in the back.

"Finally going home" she smiled.

"Not quite Dahlia!" scolded Arthur in a fatherly tone, "you're not going to be reckless like last time you hurt your back in a fight and you are going to the pack clinic with Roger here!"

"But..." she started.

"For once, please, listen to us" he interrupted with a pleading voice. She sighed.

"I will. If I'm being honest, I still feel tired. I have healed much better than I thought I would but I'm exhausted." She admitted. Good, she was listening to someone else's advice for once.

"What do you mean you've healed much better than you thought you would?" asked Roger intrigued as she was looking through the window.

"Well, the ribs you cracked while doing chest compressions were already broken when I arrived. Dear doctor Josef there gave me wolfsbane so I wouldn't heal but that didn't work, obviously, so they moved on to silver, and sleep deprivation and starvation... The whip had silver tips to the end of each string, and I had the shackles for what, two weeks even before being sent to walk on Dark Hedges..." she announced absent-mindedly as if it was nothing, still looking at the landscape through the window. The three of us exchanged an angry look, Arthur clenched his hands on the steering wheel up to the point his knuckles were white. And I was very tensed. Each time we discovered more about what had happened, it seemed even worse than before. I wandered how much she wasn't saying if she was telling that story so relaxed.

She opened a window to enjoy the fresh air as she had wanted to do since she arrived at the hospital. She took a deep breath and sniffed enjoying the smell of the coming winter. Roger shivered, but I'm not sure if he shivered because of the cold or the sudden realization of what she had said. She looked at him and closed the window.

"Sorry Roger. It's getting colder outside. It might even snow for my birthday!" she announced cheerfully.

"What birthday?" asked Arthur, happy to change the subject.

"I was born you know! I didn't just appear out of some mysterious wolf dent, howling into the night!" she joked. Arthur gave a small laugh; she had a gift for making him less stern.

"I had guessed that part, but when is it?"

"Winter solstice baby!" she announced proudly making the metal music sign with her hand. I chuckled, no one ever spoke to Arthur that way, everyone was afraid of him with the big scar on his face and his serious look at all times, and even the ones who weren't scared would never call him baby.

"Of course, the badass Alpha-Lycan is born on the longest night of all" he laughed, she had cheered up the mood.

Not long after that, we arrived at Yew Tree Pack. There was a small welcoming gathering. But it was a short one, Roger told everybody she would be back to party with everyone in a couple of days but for that to happen she needed rest. She spent three days at the hospital. She forced me to go see Malcolm and work. I told Tom and Malcolm everything we had learnt, I told them everything that had happened between us. They were happy for me. I wasn't allowed to sleep next to her, Roger strictly respected the visiting hours and I missed her. I wanted to hold her; I didn't want her to feel I was leaving her. The evening of the third day, as I was heading to the pack clinic in a hurry before the visiting hours would end, I saw her at the door with Dr. Roger, she was wearing the yellow dress I gave her.

"Okay, I'm letting you go, but if your back hurts or anything, you call me, deal?" Roger told her.

"Deal Roger! Thank you for your help!" she answered him with a smile.

"It was the least I could do, I'm sorry I couldn't be of more help with the silver scars though..." he confessed. I sighed; he had tried to find a way to help her heal the marks of the silver but he had failed.

"It's fine! We can barely see them!" Right after she said that, I stepped forward.

"You're being released! I guess I'm just in time to escort you!" I announced cheerfully. Her face lit up with a smile. I offered my arm, and she took it.

"Good evening, Roger!" she waved goodbye.