76. Defeated

*Patience, test my patience*.
*Say it, you should say it*,
*'Cause I'd say I was wrong just to make it fill all the spaces*.
*Waiting, always waiting*.
*If I gave you control would you say that (We could've saved it?)*
*I hope you find a way to be yourself someday*,
*In weakness or in strength*,
*Change can be amazing*.
*So I pray for the best, I pray for the best for you*.
*I wish you could be honest*
*Chasing, always chasing dreams*.
*Why'd you stick around, why'd you stay with me?*
*Hesitation is killing me too*.
*But I couldn't save it, I couldn't save it.*
*I wish you could be honest with me*


______

Seff saw herself lying on the shore of a river. But it was winter, the sand dusted with snow and the river frozen white-blue with ice. The whiteness—the rocks, the sand, the snow, her limbs and her hair—was turned vivid red by blood.
That wasn’t right. It was summer. Was she dreaming?
The scene dissipated as if seeing it in her mind’s eye. She felt herself return to her own body, which was difficult to sense if it was still attached to her head.
Her eyelids fluttered and she managed to see a golden figure standing above her. “Seff?” Kiran’s gentle voice whispered.
It was too much effort to keep her eyes open. Blackness took over even as she thought, *it’s Kiran. Of course it’s him. In my darkest times, he was holding me in his arms.*
*Kiran*, she thought,* I’m so cold*.
*Hold on*, he seemed to think back at her, *keep breathing*.
*My stomach… My stomach hurts*.
“Seff. Godsdamnit, Seff, *wake up*.”
“Don’t…swear…at me.”
A heavy sigh of relief filled her ears briefly. “Gods, Seff.”
“Kiran?” she mumbled, fumbling in the dark. “Am I still bleeding?”
He hesitated and her heart lurched. Snow was falling gently in the void. She whimpered, “Kiran?”
“I’m here.” She felt him take her hands in his and the snow faded. “No, you’re all healed now…”
“Oh,” she breathed with her own weak relief.
“You were bitten in the leg and slammed against a tree.” His deep tone was wary, a rare and scary thing. “Do you remember that?”
Seff thought hard, putting forth whatever energy she had left to focus on those claimed injuries and not the pulsing in her neck and belly. She told Kiran so.
“Oh, gods.” His voice cracked. “Zin…Zinnia?”
Darkness took her again, hard and fast.

Seff groaned as she woke, rubbing her eyes before blinking them open. Buttery light filtered through curtains over the windows and hanging on the frame of the four-poster she was laying on, tucked under thick covers.
She felt battered and bruised, but when she moved her extremities, she could feel them all. *Good, I’m not paralyzed*, she thought with a mix of comfort and exasperation. Though sore, she knew her werewolf healing did its job to seal her wounds from the fight with the Sun male.
A soft snore beside her made her start. She looked to her left to find Kiran slouched in a chair, fast asleep with his head lolled forward onto his chest. His gold skin was smeared with dried blood and streaks of mud, clothes in an equal state of dirtiness, his gold hair lank. Seff’s chest ached; even in sleep, he looked miserable.
*Oh, gods, and it’s all my fault*.
Seff chose to leave Kiran and Selene behind. She swore off the two Alphas. She wanted to control herself, not be controlled by them.
But he was so vulnerable now. There was no anger, no jealousy, not even a hint of his caustic charm. Just…sadness. Who would have ever imagined him so?
Suddenly she didn’t care about her own state. “Kiran?”
He jolted awake, whipping toward her, eyes already alert and scanning as much of her as he could. She offered a weary smile to assure him that she was alright. Only some tension left his shoulders. His gold gaze met the green of hers, brows knitting. “Seff?” he asked tentatively, as if wondering if that was actually her name.
“Yes?”
Then he fully relaxed, breathing, “It’s you.”
“Huh?”
“Nothing. How do you feel?”
“Achey,” she admitted. She was started to feel more aware: she was back in Kiran’s personal bedroom, wearing a full-coverage white slip, her hair tied back in a loose braid, and she felt the light tug and scrape of bandages around her upper thigh. Her hand touched her belly and then skated to her neck but she couldn’t have said why because she knew she hadn’t been hurt there. “What?”
Kiran’s eyes had watched every minuscule move. “Nothing.”
Seff narrowed hers. “You’re being strange. What’s wrong?”
“Plenty of things,” he said, voice sharpening. He rose to his feet only to hand her a glass of water off a side table. “Drink and tell me what you remember.”
She took the water but wouldn’t take his shit. “*Your* Alpha attacked me and Hawthorn, knothead. He threw me against a tree, bit my leg, and tried to push me in the river! There. Now you tell me why you’re acting like you care, because I know you hate me.”
Kiran’s jaw clenched and he looked like he wanted to hit something—vulnerable in sleep no longer. “I *do* care, Seff,” he roared. “The problem is that I care *too much*. Yes, I’m furious with you, but that doesn’t mean I hate you. I hate myself every godsdamned day for the things I’ve said and done to you, because you haven’t done a damn thing wrong. You’re right. We don’t treat you like you deserved to be treated and it’s a fucking shame.”
Seff’s eyes widened, rendered speechless. Kiran turned on his bare heel and stormed to the window, throwing open the curtains and letting the sunlight limn his hulking form in an angelic glow. Silence reigned in the space between them.
Before she could speak, he continued, voice now tight, “Selene thinks we should let you choose either of us—if you ever want to—on your own terms. We should let you have your own will. But if we…if we love you…then we must let you go.”
Seff was staring at Kiran’s back. She didn’t realize until now that he was wearing a midnight-blue robe. She had plenty of things she wanted to say, ask, and demand. But all that she could manage to speak was, “You two love me?”
It was so quiet she heard him swallow. “We think we do. We did…once.”
She was equally soft. “I wish you could be honest with me.”
Kiran’s shoulders sank. She was watching an invincible beast be defeated right before her eyes. She whispered, “If you do, I’ll consider staying.”
“It would not take long to consider.”
“We’ll see about that.”
He turned to her. The emotion on his face, the memories flooding his eyes, was staggering. Seff’s throat tightened. “I can’t tell you until I have proof.”