My vision tunneled into a pinpoint. Draven’s massive hand crushed my windpipe, but his glowing red eyes suddenly locked onto his own chest. An angry red bruise shaped exactly like his fingers flared across his own throat.

I thrashed, dragging my nails down the back of his hand. My fingernails dug deep, tearing his rough skin. Warm blood welled up from the fresh scratch.

A sharp tearing sound ripped through my own hand.

"Ah!" I shrieked.

The exact same bloody gash split open across my knuckles. Searing pain sliced through my nerves.

Draven recoiled, releasing me instantly.

I collapsed onto the damp stone, clutching my throat and hacking violently. Oxygen rushed back into my burning lungs.

"What trick is this?" Draven demanded. He stared at the bleeding scratch on his hand, then glared at my identical wound.

"It's the Moon Witch's curse," I rasped between coughs. "Pain sharing. We're bound."

"I share nothing with anyone," he spat. He dragged his thumb over the cut on his hand, pressing hard.

Fire shot through my knuckles. I hissed, yanking my hand back. "Stop doing that!"

"You feel it," he muttered, stepping closer. His red eyes narrowed. "Every strike. Every wound."

"Yes," I said, backing away on my hands and knees. "So if you snap my neck, yours breaks too."

Draven scoffed, a dark, rumbling sound in his chest. "A century in the dark, only to be chained to a pathetic Omega."

"I didn't ask for this either," I snapped, wiping blood from my chin. "My Alpha threw me down here to die."

"Your Alpha is a coward," Draven said.

Heavy boots pounded down the stone corridor outside the crypt.

"Over here!" a voice shouted from the tunnel. "Kael wants her body! Check the pit!"

"They're coming," I said, struggling to stand. My knees shook, buckling under my weight.

Draven didn't look toward the tunnel. He reached up, his hands wrapping around the thick silver chains still impaling his collarbones.

"Don't," I warned, my eyes widening in horror. "If you pull those—"

"I will not wear another man's leash," he interrupted.

He yanked the metal forward.

Agony exploded across my upper back.

Phantom hooks tore through my shoulders and scraped bone. I screamed, my legs giving out completely. I crashed to the floor, splashing into the puddle of my own blood.

"Stop!" I begged, clawing at the empty air behind my back.

Draven ignored me. He gritted his teeth, planting his bare feet firmly on the stone, and gave one final, brutal heave.

The chains tore free from his flesh with a sickening wet crunch.

White-hot fire consumed my vision. I curled into a tight ball on the wet floor, gasping for air that refused to reach my lungs. My back burned as if it had been opened to the spine.

"Get up," Draven ordered. He tossed the bloody silver chains aside. They clattered heavily against the altar.

"My legs won't move," I whimpered, trembling uncontrollably from the phantom wounds.

"You will stand," he commanded, his Alpha tone vibrating through the stone.

"My back is torn open!" I yelled, tears streaming down my face.

"My back is torn open," he corrected, pointing a massive, blood-stained finger at my face. "You merely feel the echo. Now stand."

Three guards sprinted into the crypt, their silver-tipped swords drawn.

"The beast is loose!" the lead guard yelled, raising his blade. "Kill him!"

Draven stepped over me. He moved faster than my eyes could track. He grabbed the lead guard by the face, his huge fingers wrapping entirely around the man's skull, and twisted. Bone snapped loudly in the confined space. The man dropped like a stone.

The second guard lunged, thrusting his sword at Draven's chest. Draven didn't even dodge. He caught the blade with his bare hand.

Blood poured from his palm. My own palm split open instantly, bleeding in the exact same spot. I cried out, grabbing my wrist.

Draven ignored his bleeding hand, yanked the sword forward, and drove his elbow into the guard's throat. The man collapsed.

The last guard hesitated, his eyes darting to the broken chains on the altar.

"Run!" the guard shouted, turning back toward the tunnel.

Draven didn't give him a chance to retreat. He reached down, hauling me off the floor by my waist, and hoisted me over his broad shoulder.

"Put me down!" I choked out. The pressure against my ribs sent another wave of nausea through me, compounding the burning pain in my back.

"Quiet," he growled.

He bent his knees and launched himself upward.

His fist drove through the cracked stone above the altar. The rock shattered instantly. Rainwater, mud, and debris poured into the crypt. Draven vaulted through the jagged opening, carrying me out of the suffocating dark and into a raging storm.

Cold rain battered my face. Thunder shook the ground beneath us.

Draven sprinted through the dense forest, his bare feet tearing up the muddy earth. Every step he took jolted my battered spine, sending fresh spikes of pain radiating through my chest.

"Where are we going?" I yelled over the howling wind.

"Away from the cage," he answered flatly, dodging an ancient oak.

Barking echoed through the trees behind us. Kael’s hounds.

"They have our scent," I said, my teeth chattering. "Kael won't let you leave his territory."

"This is my territory," Draven snarled, leaping over a fallen log. "He is merely trespassing."

The howls grew louder, multiplying. Dozens of dogs were on our trail.

"Put me down, I can run!" I argued, bouncing against his shoulder.

"You can barely stand, Omega," he retorted, not slowing his pace.

"My name is Lily."

"Your name is a liability."

Draven burst through the tree line and skidded to a halt.

I raised my head, wiping the rain from my eyes. A sheer cliff dropped off into total darkness just feet away from us. The roaring sound of a violent river echoed from the unseen bottom.

We were trapped.

Draven turned around. Dozens of orange torches flickered between the trees, cutting through the heavy rain. The hounds snarled, their chains rattling as Kael's guards dragged them closer to the edge of the woods.

A violent spasm racked my body. The phantom agony in my collarbones flared, sharper this time, as the freezing rain seeped into Draven's open wounds. I gasped, clutching his broad back to keep from sliding off his shoulder.

"Just drop me," I whispered, my voice barely audible over the storm. "I'm slowing you down."

Draven looked down at me, the red glow of his eyes piercing the dark.

"Shut up," he said, his voice colder than the rain. "If you die, I won't survive either."

"They have us," I yelled over the roaring river behind us.

"Stand still," Draven commanded.

Kael's guards burst through the tree line, raising heavy wooden crossbows. The tips of their bolts gleamed under the torchlight.

"There's nowhere to run, beast!" the captain shouted, aiming directly at Draven's chest. "Hand over the Omega, and Alpha Kael might let you die quickly."

"I do not negotiate with dead men," Draven replied, his voice a low rumble that vibrated through the muddy ground.

"Fire!" the captain shouted.

Draven spun, grabbing my waist and hauling me against his chest. He turned his broad back to the tree line just as the crossbows twanged.

A sickening thud echoed over the storm. Draven grunted, his frame jerking forward from the impact.

At the exact same second, a white-hot spike drove through my left shoulder.

I screamed, my knees buckling. I clawed at my own shoulder, feeling nothing but wet fabric, but the agony ripped down to the bone. It felt as though a burning coal had been shoved under my skin.

"Wolfsbane," Draven snarled, his voice thick with sudden strain.

I looked at his back. A silver-shafted arrow protruded deep from his left shoulder blade. Thick, black blood pulsed around the entry wound, hissing as it touched the rain.

"They're reloading!" I choked out, fighting the burning paralysis spreading through my left arm.

"Hold your breath," he ordered.

Before I could argue, he threw us backward.

We plummeted off the sheer cliff. Freezing wind whipped my face, followed instantly by the brutal impact of the river.

Ice-cold water swallowed us. The current tore at my clothes, spinning me upside down. I thrashed, desperate for the surface, but a heavy arm clamped around my waist, anchoring me to his side.

A submerged log struck my ribs. I opened my mouth and swallowed river water.

Draven kicked against the raging rapids. We broke the surface, gasping for air.

"Keep your head up!" he roared over the rushing water.

Before I could nod, the churning white water dragged us under again. The river battered us against smooth stones and jagged roots. Draven never let go. His grip on my waist felt like iron, even as the poison surely pumped through his veins, weakening him by the second.

Finally, my boots scraped against rough gravel.

Draven hauled us out of the shallows, dragging me onto a muddy riverbank. He collapsed onto his back, his chest heaving.

"Draven," I coughed, spitting out muddy water.

He didn't answer. The black veins around the arrow wound had already spider-webbed across his neck, standing out sharply against his pale skin.

"Hey," I said, shoving his uninjured shoulder. "Do not pass out on me."

"The poison," he rasped, his jaw clenched tight. "It is meant for Alphas. It burns the blood. Turns it to ash."

"Then let me get it out," I demanded, pushing myself up on my right arm.

"Leave it," he said, turning his face toward the mud. "Run. You are free from your cage. Go hide in the woods like a frightened rabbit."

"I'm bound to you, you idiot," I snapped. "If you die, the curse kills me too."

"A flaw in the magic," he muttered, closing his eyes.

"I'm not dying in the mud because you're too stubborn to accept help."

I reached down to my right boot, fumbling with the wet leather until my fingers brushed the cold steel of my hidden medical knife. I pulled the small blade free.

"I have to get the silver out," I told him, positioning myself over his left shoulder.

"You will tear your own arm apart," he warned, opening one eye to look at the knife.

"I'll manage," I said, though my hands shook violently.

"Your hands tremble," he mocked weakly. "You hold that blade like a pup holding a stick."

"Shut up," I warned him.

I gripped the arrow shaft and snapped it off.

Fire exploded in my shoulder. I bit down on my tongue, tasting copper, and pressed the tip of the medical knife into his infected flesh.

"Do it fast," he ordered, his fingers digging deep gouges into the wet earth.

"I have to find the hook," I argued.

The skin was already necrotic, turning a foul, spongy black. I dug the blade in, slicing through the muscle to reach the deeply embedded silver arrowhead.

"Ah!" I cried out, tears spilling over my eyelashes and dropping onto his cold, rain-slicked chest.

Draven groaned, a low, guttural sound. "Stop crying, Omega."

"It hurts," I gasped, my vision blurring.

"Pain is a reminder you are alive," he shot back, his breathing ragged. "Cut deeper."

"I'm trying!"

"You hesitate. You fear the pain. That is why Kael kept you on a leash."

His words stung worse than the poison. Anger flared in my chest, cutting through the agony.

"He kept me on a leash because he murdered my father," I snarled, driving the blade further in. "Not because I am weak."

"Prove it," Draven challenged, his eyes locked on mine.

I twisted the blade, scraping directly against his collarbone. I wedged the steel under the silver hook and pried upward with all my remaining strength.

With a wet tear, the arrowhead popped out, landing in the mud.

"It is out," Draven breathed, his voice barely a whisper.

"Yeah," I wheezed, staring at the canopy. "I told you I wasn't weak."

He let out a dry, rattling chuckle that quickly devolved into a violent coughing fit. Black blood splattered his chin.

"You talk too much," he murmured.

A sudden, blinding heat wrapped around my right wrist. I lifted my arm. The silver crescent moon totem burned fiercely, flashing in rhythm with my racing heartbeat.

I rolled my head to the side. Draven's wrist flashed with the exact same blinding light. "The bond," he muttered, forcing his eyes open to glare at his glowing skin. "It feeds on the trauma."

I pushed myself up on my good arm, looking down at my left side.

The phantom wound hadn't bled, but the wolfsbane had transferred. Jagged silver veins pulsed beneath my pale skin, creeping out from my left shoulder.

"What is this?" I asked, my voice shaking as I touched the raised, metallic lines on my skin.

"The curse shares everything," Draven said, his gaze dropping to my arm. "Even the poison."

I watched the metallic lines stretch past my bicep, curling around my elbow.

Kael kept medical texts locked in his library. They said that once wolfsbane reached the elbow, it had entered the main artery. I had less than three hours before the silver reached my heart.