His Serum, My Soul's Escape

My fated mate, Caspian Thorne, is the most celebrated Alpha-to-be of the Sterling Crest Pack. His blood can heal any supernatural wound and has saved countless pack members. To others, he is a miracle walking among us.

But he has a childhood sweetheart and research partner, Jocelyn Croft.

If Caspian is famous for his healing bloodline, Jocelyn is infamous for concocting forbidden poisons. For years, she studied the Soul-Eater agent while he developed the gene serum. They worked so closely together that the pack slowly stopped distinguishing between danger and experiment.

Until the day she tested a new type of Soul-Eater agent on me, corroding my inner wolf.

When I awoke, Caspian was sitting by my bed, preparing the gene serum for me.

"Rowan, don't blame Jocelyn. My mentor and I both spoiled her. She knew I could heal you, so she was just conducting her research. She never meant to hurt you."

He said it so casually, as if I'd just caught a cold, and not as if my inner wolf was decaying, my spirit on the verge of shattering.

Before I could respond, someone burst into the room, shouting that Jocelyn had been injured in an experiment. Caspian immediately shot up and rushed out, his steps hurried, almost frantic. He never noticed that a key stabilizer was missing from my serum's formula.

And just like that, the gene serum that was supposed to save me became a poison that steadily accelerated my death.

It was then that the voice of the Moon Goddess echoed in my mind.

[Only by dying at the hands of your fated mate can you break free from the bloodline's shackles and return to the human world. But are you sure you want to do this?]

I lowered my gaze, looking at the auto-injector in my hand, filled with the deadly liquid. Caspian had prepared it himself. The same hands that had saved countless lives had just mixed the final serum that would end mine.

"I'm sure," I said softly.

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1

When Caspian pushed open the door, the medical lab had just finished calibrating its latest temperature-controlled equipment. The gene serum, shimmering in a precision syringe, caught the lab lights and scattered them into cold fragments. He took off his lab coat, the faint scent of disinfectant still clinging to him.

"Rowan, were you waiting for me? Can't even get an injection without me, huh?" he teased, that familiar, gentle smile playing on his lips.

I watched him in silence.

After all these years, I was finally going back to the human world. But the excitement I had imagined never came. My chest felt hollow, a space long since emptied of everything.

Seeing my lack of reaction, Caspian took a step closer. "Come on, you need to take it now. The serum is most effective when it’s fresh."

I forced a smile, picked up the auto-injector, aimed it at my arm, and pressed down. The cold liquid instantly flooded my veins. The sudden movement made me bend over, coughing violently. I must have looked pathetic.

Caspian didn't seem to mind.

He chuckled softly, pulling out a tissue to gently wipe my forehead. "Slow down. Your mate is the best gene scientist in the pack. You can have as much serum as you want. You're being so good today. You didn't even make me do it for you."

As the serum coursed through my veins, a pain like spreading ice shot through my body.

I let myself lean into his arms and murmured, "It's okay. Soon you won't have to worry about me anymore."

He stiffened, his smile slowly vanishing.

"Are you still angry about Jocelyn poisoning you?" he sighed, the calming, woody scent of his pheromones wafting from him. "My mentor and I spoiled her over the years, but her heart's in the right place. Since you're fine now, can we just let this go?"

I listened, then suddenly laughed. "What if… I had really died?"

He looked at me as if I had said something childish and absurd, an impossibility.

"With my bloodline's gift, how could you possibly die?" he said.

That's right.

My mate possessed the strongest healing bloodline in the entire pack. There was no injury he couldn't heal.

Over the years, Jocelyn had tested countless poisons on other werewolves. The side effects included blindness and nerve damage; some even had near-death experiences where their inner wolves almost collapsed completely. No matter their condition, Caspian could always save them.

Even when I was poisoned by the Soul-Eater agent, he was absolutely confident he could save me. But this time, he was destined to be wrong.

I thought about what the Moon Goddess had said to me in my dream last night. She said Caspian still loved me. She told me that if I couldn't bear to leave, I only needed to point out the error in the serum.

If I did that, he would blame himself. He would be driven mad by guilt and spend the rest of his life making it up to me.

I couldn't help but shake my head, half-amused, half-annoyed. What good was his guilt to me? Right now, I just wanted to go home.

"But haven't you already given up on returning to the human world?" the Moon Goddess murmured, her voice still echoing in my ear.

I fell silent.

Yes, Caspian's love had once been so intense that I thought it impossible to die by his hand. I had thought I might as well stay, since there was nothing in the human world worth holding onto.

But I forgot one thing. Times change, and so do people's hearts. No matter how solemn the vow, it cannot withstand the test of time.

I shook my head. "No. I want to go back. And please, sever our mind-link."

It was fine. I only had to inject the poison for another month. I could wait.