Where The Ice Gives Way Chapter 44

**Charlotte**

The warmth of the house hits me the second Blake carries me over the threshold, and for a moment, my brain can’t match it to what I know. The smell of clean soap. The faint smoke from a fire that must have been going earlier. The quiet hum of a heater. It feels wrong to be warm when my leg is still screaming, when the taste of rot is still stuck in the back of my throat, when I can still hear my own howl echoing in my bones like it didn’t come from me. Blake moves fast, careful but urgent, arms locked around me like he’s afraid I’ll vanish if he loosens his grip. My blood dots the blanket wrapped around my back, and I see Mara already clearing space, dragging quilts and throws from the couch like she’s done this before. She’s laying them down on the floor in a thick nest right in front of the fireplace. “Here,” she says quickly. “Right here.” Blake lowers me onto the blankets, and Shanti whimpers the second his arms leave us. The sound comes out of my chest before I can stop it. It’s small and broken, and it makes my ears flatten with embarrassment even though I’m a wolf right now and embarrassment feels like a human thing. “You’re okay, pretty girl,” Blake says, voice low. The mate bond answers instantly, warmth spreading through my ribs like someone poured honey into my chest. Blake’s hand slides to my back, palm pressing through my fur, and the tingles return, a soft wave of peace washing over us. I don’t understand it, but I cling to it anyway. I want anything that makes me feel good right now.

Mara kneels beside me, her movements calm and practised as she checks the wound with her eyes first. “You’re going to need to shift back so we can look at your leg,” she says. My breath comes in faster. I shake my head without meaning to, ears pinning back. The thought of shifting in front of them makes my stomach twist. I don’t want him to see me like that, raw and exposed and breaking. Mara’s voice softens. “It’s going to hurt to shift, sweetheart, but we’ll be right here with you, okay?” I look at Blake, and his eyes meet mine, dark and steady, like he’s trying to hold the line while my body falls apart. I don’t want him to leave, but I can’t do it with him watching either. Blake seems to understand without me having to say it. He nods once and turns around, sitting on the blankets with his back to me, close enough that I could reach out and touch him if I needed to. “I’m here,” he says quietly. “I’m not going anywhere.” Shanti exhales a shaky breath. Then I let go.

The shift hits like a wave and drags me under. My bones start to change, and the pain in my leg doesn’t move right with it. Where it’s supposed to break and reset and heal, it just… snaps like glass under my skin. I scream. It tears out of me, loud and ugly, and I can’t stop it because the pain is bigger than pride, bigger than embarrassment, bigger than anything except survival. The world blurs as fur recedes and skin reforms. My lungs burn as the shape of my body twists back into human. The final snap in my leg makes me see white. I collapse onto the blankets, shaking hard, curling in on myself as Mara moves quickly, covering me with more quilts, blocking my bare skin from the cold air. I don’t even think. I crawl forward on instinct until my forehead presses into Blake’s thigh. He stiffens for half a second, then his hand comes back, gentle, cradling the side of my head, pushing hair out of my face. “Shh,” he murmurs. “It’s alright. You’re alright.” My breath comes in broken pulls, and my eyes burn, and I’m shaking so hard my teeth chatter. “Where’s Charlie?” I force out, voice raw. The second I say his name, panic surges up, hot and immediate. “I left him,” I choke. “I left him there, where those wolves were. I… I left him… with those wolves…” Blake’s body tightens, and his voice turns hard with control. “Rogues,” he says. “Feral wolves with little to no humanity left. They’re called rogues.” Mara’s hand rests on my shoulder, briefly grounding me. “Gareth will bring him back here,” she says. “He’ll be fine. Focus on you.” I try. I swear I try, but my leg throbs like it has its own heartbeat, and every breath hurts.

Mara shifts closer, lifting the blanket gently and sliding her hands to my injured leg with careful precision. The movement alone makes me gasp and curl closer to Blake, face pressed into his stomach so the sound doesn’t rip out of me again. Blake’s hand stays in my hair, fingers combing slowly like he’s trying to keep me here. Mara’s voice is quiet, more to Blake than to me. “It didn’t set right with the shift.” I hear Blake inhale deeply. I feel it where my face is pressed. “We’re going to have to break it again so it can heal properly,” Mara says. My whole body goes cold, and a sob tries to climb out of my throat. I clamp my jaw shut hard enough to ache. Blake’s fingers slide through my hair, steady and warm. “Lotty,” he says, voice low. The name on his tongue makes my chest pull, makes something soft and dangerous bloom under the pain. “I’m not going to lie to you,” he continues. “This is going to hurt.” I tremble. I don’t want to do this. I don’t want anyone touching me. I don’t want anyone seeing me like this. But I’m here, in their house, on their blankets, with his hand in my hair and the mate bond humming like a heartbeat, and Shanti is quiet inside me like she’s trusting them. So I wrap my arms around Blake’s waist and bury my face into him like he’s a shield. My voice comes out muffled against his shirt. “Do it.”