Inside Rauvan’s shelter, Odette lay on a spread of rough hide.
Rauvan stood over her with his arms at his sides, staring at her unconscious body like stillness could force her blood to explain itself.
Now that no one was watching him, the mask on his face grew harder.
Not softer.
He did not like what her scent was doing to him.
He did not like how the Blood Prowl Direflow kept pressing against his ribs, like it was trying to reach through his skin toward her.
He had looked calm in front of the pride because control was the only language most beasts understood.
But here, alone with the female, his control felt like it had teeth marks in it.
He could feel it.
Under the mud.
Under the baboon blood.
Under the crushed leaves and old fear.
Something was buried inside her.
His jaw tightened.
The muscles in his forearms flexed without permission.
He could feel his own blood running hotter, thicker, like it was trying to reach for hers.
Control was slipping in small, dangerous ways.
He had never found ancient blood outside his mother.
Never in hollow females.
Never in unmated birds dragged behind thorn walls.
Never in a creature so wounded she could barely breathe, yet still so guarded that even unconscious, her fingers twitched like they wanted a weapon.
Rauvan turned his head slightly.
“Water,” he ordered.
“Soft hide.”
Outside, there was sudden movement.
He heard Pearl’s voice almost at once.
It was breathless and pleading.
“Let me bring it.
Please.
I can bring it.
She knows me.
She might be less frightened if she wakes and sees me.”
Karesh answered flatly.
“No.”
“She is hurt.”
“She is in Rauvan’s shelter.”
Pearl lowered her voice, but Rauvan still heard the tremble in it.
“Then at least tell him not to press too hard on her ribs.
Her side is hurt, and her hand, and her neck, and maybe her knee too.
She keeps pretending she can move, but she cannot.
She is very stupid that way.”
There was a short silence.
Then Karesh entered with a hollowed gourd of water and a folded soft hide.
His face held no expression, but Rauvan saw the faint tightness near his mouth.
That meant Karesh had listened to every one of Pearl’s nervous words.
Karesh placed the things down and left.
Rauvan knelt beside Odette.
He did not remove her clothes.
The hide strips over her chest and waist were torn, dirty, and stiff with blood, but they still covered what needed to be covered.
Rauvan had no interest in treating her like a mate.
Or like prey.
He needed to find the source of the scent.
That was all.
He dipped the hide into the water.
When he brought it to her throat, his fingers brushed the side of her neck.
Her skin was hot beneath the mud — feverish from pain and blood loss.
The moment his fingertips touched her, a low, involuntary sound moved through his chest.
Not quite a growl.
Not quite a purr.
Something in between that he immediately swallowed.
He was careful near the fresh cut she had made.
Blood rose again in a thin line.
The fresh blood scent hit him harder this time.
Rauvan’s nostrils flared.
His pupils tightened until the pale blue of his eyes looked almost silver.
For one dangerous second, his hand stilled against her throat.
He could feel her pulse fluttering under his thumb — weak, fast, alive.
The Direflow surged so strongly that his free hand curled into a fist on his thigh to stop himself from gripping her harder.
He forced himself to keep wiping.
But his breathing had changed.
It was deeper now.
Rougher at the edges.
He checked her collarbone.
Her shoulder.
The upper part of her chest where bruises had darkened under the mud.
No old mark.
No mating mark.
No bite scar that could explain a hidden bond.
Every time the soft hide moved over her skin, he felt it.
The curve of her shoulder.
The dip of her collarbone.
The way her body was built — long, graceful, stubborn even in unconsciousness.
He told himself he was only searching for marks.
But his eyes kept returning to the line of her throat, the shape of her mouth, the way her lashes rested against her dirty cheeks.
He checked near her ribs, then her waist, then her injured knee, then her ankle where dried mud had caked thick around scratches.
Nothing.
His frustration rose coldly.
He could feel the blood.
It was there.
It was on her, inside her, under her skin.
It was hidden the way old roots hid under a riverbank.
But there was no clear sign.
He reached toward the back of her neck.
And suddenly Odette snapped awake.
Her eyes flew open.
Bright amber burned through mud and pain.
They locked onto his face with pure, wounded defiance.
Before Rauvan’s fingers touched her, she jerked her head back and bared her teeth at him.
It was not a human gesture.
It was pure beast.
Weak, wounded, half-conscious, and surrounded by his scent inside his own shelter, she still bared her teeth at him like she had enough strength left to bite through his hand.
Rauvan went completely still.
For a long, heavy moment, neither of them moved.
The only sound was her ragged breathing and the slow drip of water from the hide in his hand.
Her gaze was fierce.
His was unreadable.
But something electric passed between them in that silence — something that had nothing to do with words and everything to do with the way her blood was calling to something ancient in his.
Odette breathed fast through her teeth.
Her body shook from pain.
Her crushed hand trembled against the hide.
But her eyes stayed locked on him.
She looked ready to faint again.
She also looked ready to rip something from him with her mouth if he came too close.
Rauvan’s gaze sharpened.
He had never seen a bird beast female like her.
He had never seen eyes like hers.
Even covered in filth, they burned.
Even weak, they refused to submit.
Something hot and possessive moved through his chest.
He wanted to see what those eyes looked like when she wasn’t in pain.
He wanted to see them without the mud.
“What are you doing?” Odette asked.
Her voice came out rough and low.
“Checking you,” Rauvan said.
Her eyes narrowed.
“For what?”
“Your scent.”
Odette’s lip curled despite the pain.
“You carry females into your den to smell them?”
The words were weak, but the distrust in them had claws.
Rauvan understood it, though he did not like the accusation.
But who could blame her when she had seen baboons.
She had seen Gorran.
She had seen elders and hollow males.
To her, male hands meant danger first and answers later.
“The mud, baboon blood, and leaves make you unreadable,” Rauvan said.
“Your neck is wounded.
Your scent is wrong.
You must be washed.”
Odette stared at him like he had spoken nonsense.
His voice had dropped lower.
Rougher.
Like it took effort to keep it steady.
Odette heard it.
She saw the way his eyes kept flicking to her mouth, then back to her eyes.
She felt the heat of his body so close to hers.
It made her skin prickle in a way that had nothing to do with fear.
“I can do it myself.”
Rauvan looked at the hand she could barely lift.
Then at the ribs she kept protecting.
Then at the knee that had swollen badly.
Then at the neck wound still bleeding in thin red threads.
“You cannot lift your own head,” he said.
“I can wash myself.”
His eyes held hers.
Then, without speaking, he moved the hollowed gourd closer to her.
Odette looked at it.
Then at him.
Then back at the gourd, like she thought it might bite her.
He did not leave.
That was the worst part.
He stayed.
Close enough that she could feel the warmth radiating off his skin.
Close enough that every time he moved, she caught more of his scent.
It was doing something to her — making her chest feel tight, making her painfully aware of how small she was compared to him, how easily he could break her… and how gently he was choosing not to.
She looked around the shelter and took in everything.
The curved roots overhead.
The dark stone wall behind him.
The hides under her body.
The faint claw marks near the entrance.
The heavy scent of a male predator everywhere.
He was too close.
Too calm.
Too hard to read.
He did not have Gorran’s eager hunger or the baboon’s filth, but that did not make him safe.
Sometimes the most dangerous beasts were the ones who did not rush, because they already knew nothing could stop them.
Odette reached for the gourd.
Her arm trembled badly.
Water spilled over the rim before she had even lifted it properly.
The movement pulled at her ribs so hard that her face went white beneath the mud.
She clenched her teeth and tried again.
The gourd nearly dropped onto her stomach.
Rauvan watched.
His face said nothing.
His eyes said she was an idiot.
Odette hated him a little for that.
“I can do it,” she hissed.
“You have proved that badly,” he said.
Her eyes flashed.
For one breath, Rauvan thought she might throw the water at him.
Instead, her strength failed first.
Her hand sank back to the hide, and she turned her face away with stiff fury.
Rauvan almost found her anger more interesting than her blood.
Then he reached towards her and took the gourd, preparing to wash her himself.