Chapter 27 · Blood Seal

The ward's still humming when I pull my hand back.

Cade's on the ground, breathing like each inhale costs him. His eyes are locked on me. Everyone else is staring too. The pack warriors, the elders who made it out, even Damon, half-propped against a tree with blood running down his arm.

I just shut down a killing spell that was about to wipe them all out.

"Why?" Cade rasps again. His voice is wrecked. "Why would you save us?"

I don't answer right away. My palm's still burning from where I pressed it to the ward stone. The mark on my wrist, the one he gave me, is pulsing hot. The bond's pulling at me, trying to drag me down next to him, trying to make me wrap myself around him and check every wound.

I ignore it.

Instead I reach into my jacket and pull out the vial.

It's small. Glass. The liquid inside is dark red, almost black. I've been carrying it for six years. Mira gave it to me the night she found me in the woods after the massacre. She said it was the last vial of alpha blood from Thornwood. My father's blood.