Chapter 49 - Dancing with Death

Kai was over by Adalyn's side like a shot. He had seen her swaying and rolling her eyes from across the room.

Melody gasped loudly as she saw Adalyn hit the ground. Her wine glass dropped on the floor beside her and shattered in to tiny fragments leaving part of the ballroom hall silent.

“Adalyn, what’s wrong? What is it?” Kai lifted her head up to look at her before quickly scanning her up and down for injuries. He could see the panic in her as her pupils dilated.

Adalyn clutched at her throat desperately feeling the burning sensation there. She tried to talk but no sounds came out other than a few strained gasps. She could feel her throat swelling up. It felt like she had swallowed acid.

“Is she choking?” Melody asked alarmed.

Adalyn’s eyes started rolling to the back of her head as she started foaming at the mouth.

Kai's eyes darted left to right as he tried to make sense of what was happening to her. “What the hell happened Mel?”

Melody looked around panicked “I don’t know, she was fine just a second ago.”

Kai tilted her head up. He pushed his thumb in to her mouth to open it up and check for any obvious obstruction that he could see. The inside of her mouth was all blistered and red. His heart sank as he started to recognise some of the symptoms. The royal family were commonly the target of poisoning attempts and both he and his immediately family had been been trained to identify the symptoms and build up a tolerance to the most common types. “She's not choking. Did she swallow something?!”

Kai looked around for clues and spotted the broken wine glass next to her. The liquid had spilled on to the ground and was now starting to bubble where it reacted with the polished wooden floor.

“Fuck… I think she’s been poisoned” Kai rolled her over on to her side to try and drain out any fluid in her mouth that might have remained. “Adalyn! If you have any left in your mouth you have to spit it out." Her hands that were clutching at her throat were no longer frenzied and were now listless.

"Adalyn?" Kai called again realising that he wasn't getting any response from her this time.

Her eyes were now closed and her face was starting to turn blue as she got limp in his arms. He rolled her back on to her back again. “Adalyn? No, don't fall asleep! You have to stay awake!” He shook her to try and shake some life back in to her.

“Poisoned?" Melody repeated. A small crowd was now starting to gather in the ballroom as people in the room were alerted to the commotion. Kai’s mother Opehlia broke through the small crowd to get to them. “What’s happening, what’s wrong?”

“Kai thinks she’s been poisoned mother.” Melody replied shakily.

Ophelia notices the glass on the ground and how it was reacting with the wooden surface. “Okay, pick her up bring over here.” Ophelia starts leading the way through the crowd and Kai quickly scooped her up in his arms and followed. Melody followed quickly behind closely followed by some of Ophelia's guards.

“Lay her over here.” Ophelia motions towards a chaise longue and Kai laid her down on it. Her breaths were becoming more shallow. “Stay with me. It’s gonna be okay,” he soothed.

Ophelia pulled out a silver box from one of the cupboards and grabbed two vials from within it. She mixed the two of them together, shook it, then handed it over to Kai. “Give this to her, she has to drink it.”

Kai tipped her head up then poured a little in to her mouth. Where she was barely conscious, the liquid just ran out the other side of her mouth. “Adalyn, you have to try and swallow it, can you hear me?” Her head rolled back in to his arms as she became less responsive.

"No no no. Don't do this." Panicked, Kai bit off the cap of the bottle and glugged some of it in to his mouth. He then covered her mouth with his and used his tongue to force her mouth open before releasing the liquid in to her mouth. He then pinched the top of her nose and this reflexively forced her to gasp and swallow some of the fluid. She coughed a bit as some of it went down her throat.

"Good, that's it." Kai crooned softly to try and reassure both himself and her. Kai repeated this action several times until he completely empty the contents of the vial. She coughed and wheezed as the cooling sensation of the liquid started to ease her burned throat before she settled back in the chair again.

Kai stared at her desperately to analyse any changes in her condition. After a few seconds, he could see the blueish hue in her face starting to dissipate and her breathing starting to regulate a little.

“Adalyn…” Kai stroked her face to try and get her to respond, but she just laid there motionless.

"Is it working?" Melody asked from the side.

“As long as it’s administered early it should be effective. It will take a while for the poison to leave her system, so she might sleep for a while but she shouldn’t be in any immediate danger anymore." Ophelia replied.

A sigh of relief could be felt throughout the whole room. Ophelia watched as Kai clasped her hand with his. He smoothed his thumb over the top of her hand. She could tell from the way he was looking at her that she was someone very important to him.

“Kai, who is this girl? Ophelia asked tentatively.

“She’s his fated mate mother” Melody interrupted.

“Mel!” Kai whipped his head round to her. The fear and panic in his system had been replaced with anger in seconds. He couldn’t believe that Melody had just announced it to her.

“Mother should know Kai, maybe she can help?” She added.

“Help?” Kai released Adalyn’s hand then turned to face her. “Adalyn wouldn’t even be in this condition if it wasn’t for you! After everything I told you, what were you thinking bringing her to the palace in the first place?!”

Melody didn’t know what to say. She would never have thought something like this would have happened. And in public no less. “I…I just thought.”

“Well don’t think anymore! You’re interfering almost costed Adalyn her life!” Kai's eyes flashed black in anger and Melody looked at him completely astonished. She had never seen him this angry before, and certainly not with her.

Melody opened and closed her mouth without saying any words. She didn't know what to say. The last thing she wanted was for any harm to come to her.

“Kai that’s enough!” Ophelia intervened, “This isn’t the time or the place.”

Kai looked at his mother then gritted his teeth and turned back to Adalyn who was still unconscious. She was right, he didn't have time to be angry, he just needed Adalyn to be okay. He summoned Arrow through his pack mind link and asked him to meet him outside of his chambers. Kai rolled Adalyn's head in to the crook of his arm then scooped her up. She still wasn't breathing right, but the sallow colour of her skin had disappeared.

“I’m taking her back to my quarters." He walked over towards the back exit of the room and stopped for a moment before he exited. "Whoever is responsible for this will die. I don’t care who it is.” Kai didn't look back as he spoke.

Ophelia tightened her mouth. She felt annoyed herself that someone had tried to do something like that in her palace. She knew that Kai had every right to feel that way.

“Once I've sorted the commotion, I’ll head over with the royal physician to check her over. She might need some more of that medicine later.” Ophelia added.

Kai quietly acknowledged her then left.


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Arrow was waiting outside of Kai’s chambers when he came walking over with Adalyn in his arms.

“Is she okay?” he asked concerned. From the way she was laying so lifeless in his arms, he already knew the answer.

“Can you get someone to collect the evidence that I mentioned. Someone in that room is responsible for giving her that drink. I won’t be able to relax until I know who it is. In the meantime, can you keep watch along with some of your guards outside the room. I don’t feel like I can trust anyone around here at the moment.”

“Sure,” Arrow nodded.

Kai slipped inside his room and closed the door. He laid Adalyn down on his bed and just stared at her. He was angry at himself, that he allowed this to happen to her on his watch. He questioned everything. Everything had seemed to go quiet since she was first kidnapped and he worried that he had allowed himself to get too relaxed and too comfortable. Kai stroked her face then held her hand. "I'm sorry Adalyn." He was adamant that an attempt on her life wouldn't happen again. He'd have to up his efforts to make sure of that and his first priority was to get whoever gave her that drink.


A few moments later, there was a soft knock at the door. "Kai, it's me darling. I have the physician to look her over." Ophelia called from the other side of the door.

Kai didn't reply but Ophelia pushed opened the door to see him knelt beside the bed holding on to Adalyn's hand. She walked over to him softly with the doctor shortly in tow. She placed a warm hand on his shoulder and gave it a soft squeeze. "Come let’s sit over here while he takes a look at her."

Kai growled apprehensively seeing the doctor approach. The doctor stopped hesitantly just before he reached the bedside, sensing the hostile energy from Kai.

"Kai..." Ophelia appealed to him. "It's okay, you can trust him. You have my word."

Kai looked back up at his mother briefly to see the sympathetic look in her eyes. He didn't want to let go of Adalyn, but he knew that she needed to be looked over. If his mother trusted him, then he felt that he could to. As Kai stood up, he let Adalyn's hand slip through his, back on to the bed.

Opehlia led Kai through to the little seating area in his room and shut the sliding doors for a bit more privacy.

"I think we need to talk, don't we?" She started.