“Skye,” he whispered, as if afraid speaking too loudly might make me disappear.
I turned my head slowly, painfully aware of the tubes and wires connecting me to various machines. When I saw his hand reaching for mine, I pulled my fingers away from his grasp and turned my face toward the window, avoiding his gaze entirely,
The pain that crossed his face was like watching something shatter. His shoulders slumped, his scent changing from joy to grief in an instant.
“Skye…” his voice cracked. “It’s all my fault. Everything that happened to you.”
He reached for something on the bedside table. “Look, I found your necklace. The Beta patrol found it in the bushes outside our house. Let me put it on for you, okay? It’s the one Mom gave you.”
I shook my head weakly. “I don’t deserve to wear it. I don’t want it anymore.”
My brother’s face crumbled, his trembling hands clenched so tightly that his knuckles turned white.
“Skye, don’t say that,” he pleaded. “I’m the one who’s unworthy. You did nothing wrong nothing! I was blind, stupidly trusting someone I shouldn’t have. I failed you in every possible way. It’s all my fault.”
He knelt beside the bed, bringing himself to my eye level, though I still wouldn’t look at him.
“I’m sorry, Skye. I’m so, so sorry!” His voice broke on each word. “I don’t expect forgiveness. I don’t deserve it.”
I lowered my head, saying nothing. The silence between us stretched painfully.
I couldn’t bring myself to say I forgave him. The words wouldn’t come, lodged somewhere beneath the mountain of pain and betrayal that filled my chest.
He seemed to understand, nodding slightly though his scent revealed his heartbreak.
“I know I made terrible mistakes – unforgivable mistakes. You suffered so much because of me.” He swallowed hard. “It’s okay if you can’t forgive me. I understand. I just want to take care of you now, to make amends however I can. I want you to get better, Skye.”
My brother, once the proud, confident Alpha, became incredibly humble. He moved around me carefully, watching my reactions for any sign of discomfort, adjusting to my every need. But I felt no joy at the change. It was too late, the damage too deep.
Day and night, he stayed by my hospital bed, attending to my every need before I could even express it. He learned my medication schedule better than the nurses, anticipated when I’d be in pain, knew exactly how to position my pillows.
He seemed to remember all my preferences, childhood memories, and the promises he’d made to me – things I had been slowly forgetting
+25 Bonus
through the haze of trauma and silver poisoning.
“Remember when you were six and caught that enormous trout?” he asked one afternoon, trying to fill the silence between us. “Dad was so jealous he pretended to be upset you’d used his special lure.”
Sometimes, seeing my lack of response, his eyes would well up with tears that he’d quickly blink away.
Two weeks later, when I was finally released, we returned home. All traces of Selene’s presence had been completely erased – her clothes, her photographs, her scent covered by fresh paint and new furniture. Even the pink sofa was gone.
The house looked like it had in my memories from before – before Selene, before the rehabilitation center, before our family fractured beyond repair.
I automatically started walking toward the attic stairs, but my brother gently stopped me with a hand on my arm.
“This is your room, Skye,” he said, opening the door to my old bedroom, exactly as it had been years ago my books, my posters, even my childhood stuffed animals arranged on the bed. “I’ll never let you be mistreated again, I swear it.”
I clutched my small hospital bag and shook my head. “It doesn’t matter where I stay. Once I recover, I’ll get a job and move out.”
My brother’s expression changed to one of panic. “Why would you move out? This is your home. It always has been.”
I shook my head again, finding the courage to finally look into his eyes. “No, it’s your home. I want a place where I won’t be thrown out at any moment. I don’t want to be sent back to that place ever again.”
The pain in his eyes was bottomless. “Skye…”
My brother’s eyes reddened with unshed tears. Without hesitation, he knelt before me on the hallway floor, his head bowed.
“Skye, nothing like that will ever happen again. I promise on our parents‘ graves. On my life. On everything I am.”
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