"Is Dex being a dick?"

Serena wiped her eyes with the back of her hand and shook her head. "No, Gav. He’s not."

"Yes he is. He just walked away from a bleeding girl calling his name."

She hiccuped at that.

Gav stood, sliding one arm under hers, and lifted her like she was made of tissue paper without comment, which was the kindest thing he’d done all day.

She leaned into him harder than she meant to. Her forehead pressed against his shoulder and stayed there for three seconds before she caught herself and straightened. Gav pretended he didn’t notice.

"Let’s get you back into your natural habitat."

"What’s that supposed to mean?" she clipped, more sharply than intended.

Gav let out a laugh. "Irritated you is the best version of you."

The I.V. stand was on its side. The bag had split. Blood pooled across the stone floor, dark and spreading. Their blood. Dex’s and Fin’s. She stared at it and her chest caved.

They had bled for her and she had spilled it. She didn’t deserve either of them. The thought wouldn’t leave. It sat in her throat and refused to go down.

Her eyes welled again, tears falling.

"Hey." Gav snapped his fingers in front of her face. "Stop looking at it like that. It’s blood, not a crime scene. Bed. Now."

He pointed at the bed and didn’t move until she got in it.

He grabbed a towel, cleaned the blood off the floor, and tossed it in the bin like it was nothing. The kindest version of Gavriel Sterling was the one who cleaned up her mess and pretended it didn’t happen.

He looked up, noticing her watching.

"It’s just blood, Serena. They’ll make more. That’s how blood works."

"Thanks, Gav." Her voice cracked.

Gav’s hand found the top of her head. One touch. Brief. His palm against her hair for two seconds before he pulled it back and shoved both hands in his pockets like he hadn’t done it.

"What are Gammas for?"

"What the ancestors said about you. I wasn’t surprised. It’s all true."

His eyes were bright. He blinked once, fast, and looked at the ceiling. Then at the window. Then anywhere that wasn’t her face, because whatever she’d said had landed somewhere he didn’t let people see, and he was not going to let her see it now.

"Serena... I..." He stopped mid-sentence. "I am the best Gamma in Skardos and don’t forget it."

She let out a wet laugh.

"Your wolf. What was so special about it?" he asked. "You and Elara were talking about it once."

"My wolf isn’t magical or anything. She’s a white wolf. My mother’s was that as well."

"Dex will get over it. It was a shift. You’ll have plenty of them."

She looked down again, tears falling.

Gav’s hand came up and hovered near her shoulder. He didn’t touch her. He held it there for a full second, deciding, then pulled it back and sat down in the chair beside her bed instead. Close enough that his knee pressed against the mattress. Close enough that she could feel him there without looking.

✦✦✦

Fin stood at the end of the corridor for a long time.

Every instinct he had said to keep walking. This was not his man. This was not his problem. This was the prince who had marked his mate, who had kissed her in front of him, who occupied the other half of a matebond Fin had never agreed to share. There was no version of this that made sense for him to be here.

Dex was sitting on the floor fifteen feet from the infirmary door. Back against the wall. Knees up. Head between them. His hands were in his hair, fingers locked, knuckles white. He hadn’t made it far. He hadn’t been trying to.

Fin walked over and sat down beside him. He looked at the far wall.

"She was going to tell you today."

Dex didn’t respond. His breathing was controlled in the way that meant it was being manually operated.

"It happened in the forest outside my quarters. Her body was burning and her wolf was fighting to surface and there was nothing either of us could do except let it happen."

Fin paused. Let the silence hold for a few seconds.

"I had to command a shift from her. It was the only way to get her through it without the silver tearing her apart from the inside. She was on the ground, Dex. Shaking so hard I could hear her teeth."

Dex’s hands tightened in his hair.

"There were no bones. No cracking. No drawn-out rebuild. Just light. White light, and then she was standing there. A white wolf."

Fin exhaled through his nose.

The corridor was quiet. Somewhere deeper in the castle, a door opened and closed. Footsteps faded.

"It mattered to her that you heard it from her."

Dex still hadn’t moved. His head was still down. His hands were still locked in his hair. But his breathing had changed. Rougher. Less controlled. The manual override was failing.

Fin looked at the wall for another long moment. Then he said the thing he had not been planning to say. The thing that had no strategic value and no tactical purpose and existed only because it was true.

"She screamed your name, Dex."

Dex’s head came up.

"During the shift. She called your name."

Fin turned his head and looked at him for the first time.

"Your name. Not mine. In the worst moment of her life, the person she wanted was you."

Dex’s face was wrecked. Red eyes. Wet. Jaw locked so tight the muscle was jumping in his cheek. He looked like a man who had been holding a door shut against a flood and someone had just kicked it open from the other side.

He didn’t say anything. He couldn’t. The sound that came out of him was not a word.

Fin stood. Brushed off his pants. Offered his hand.

Dex stared at it.

Then took his hand. Fin pulled him up.

They stood there for one second. Two. Eye to eye. Two men who loved the same woman and had never once said a civil word about it.

"Thank you," Dex said. His voice was destroyed.

Fin nodded once.

They walked back to the infirmary together.

Serena looked up when the door opened. Her eyes were swollen.

Gav was sitting in the chair beside her, holding a towel, looking between the two Alphas with an expression that said he had questions and was choosing survival over curiosity.

Dex crossed the room. He took her face in both hands, pressed his forehead to hers, and closed his eyes.

"I’m sorry."

"Dex, you don’t have to—"

"I’m sorry I wasn’t there. I’m sorry I walked out. I’m sorry I made you chase me when you can barely stand."

His thumbs moved across her cheekbones, wiping the wet from under her eyes.

Somewhere deep inside Dex’s chest, behind the guilt and the grief and the exhaustion, Aegon lifted his head.

Hyran stepped in without knocking.

"Wards are updated and fixed fully. She can stay the night again."

Fin’s throat bobbed. He looked at Serena for a long moment.

But he’d already made the decision. Before she could beat herself up over something else. Before she was forced to hurt one of them. Before more tears came.

"You’re staying here. Don’t argue. I’ll be back tomorrow."

Dex looked at Fin. One look. Brief. No words. It said everything neither of them had the words for.

He gave Serena’s hand a squeeze then stood from the bed, and walked to the window, giving Fin space without making it a thing.

Gavriel on the other hand didn’t move.

Fin crossed the room. He leaned down and pressed his lips to the top of her head.

"Don’t chase anyone else down a hallway tonight."

Fin left. The door closed. The room settled into the kind of quiet that only exists after too much has happened and no one has the energy to process any of it.

Dex hadn’t moved from the window. He was looking out at the courtyard where Velkaris was still lying, one golden eye fixed on the infirmary glass.

"Gav."

"Yeah."

"Can you give us a minute?"

"I better not find you in the hallway Frostborne." Gav stood without a word, squeezed her foot through the blanket, and walked out.

Dex eased onto the bed, careful of her ribs and back.

"I love you, Dex," she whispered. She pressed her lips gently to his cheek.

He turned his head, and brushed his lips against hers. "I love you so goddamn much, baby."

His voice cracked on the last word, and his eyes were red.

"Will you stay here tonight?"

Dex laughed. "Absolutely not. We are going back to our quarters."

✦✦✦

Aegon had not shut up since they left the infirmary.

Aegon: If you bump her ribs on the doorframe I will never forgive you.

Dex turned sideways through the door.

He set her on the bed. Pulled the blanket up. Adjusted the pillow. Moved the water closer. Checked the bandage on her shoulder. Checked the wrapping on her ribs. Looked at her back where the spike had gone through. Looked at her face.

Aegon: Is she comfortable? Is the pillow right? Her ribs, Dex. Watch the ribs. The left side. No, YOUR left. Careful.

Dex: Aegon. I am holding her. I can feel where the ribs are.

"Dex, I’m alright."