Chapter 79: The Healer’s Diagnosis
Dr. Sarah Chen POV
The needle slipped from my shaking fingers and clattered onto the stone floor of my healing room. I’d been the Silver Peak Pack’s head doctor for twenty-three years, but I’d never seen anything like what was happening to Lily Carter and Caleb Silver.
"Another seizure!" I shouted to my helper as Lily’s body went rigid on the examination table. Her back arched impossibly high, and a horrible keening sound left her throat - not quite human, not quite wolf.
I grabbed the syringe I’d dropped and quickly filled it with moonflower extract. The ancient medicine was our best tool against supernatural injuries, but I wasn’t even sure it would help with whatever was wrong with these two.
Caleb sat in the corner, watching Lily with empty eyes that should have been filled with fear. Any mate would be frantic seeing their lover in such pain. Instead, he looked like he was watching a stranger.
"Hold her still," I directed Marcus, who had insisted on staying despite my protests. The Alpha’s face was gray with fear as he pressed his daughter-in-law’s shoulders against the table.
I injected the moonflower straight into Lily’s neck. Within seconds, her seizure stopped, but the comfort I felt quickly turned to horror. Where the needle had entered her skin, black veins appeared, spreading outward like toxic spider webs.
"What is that?" Marcus demanded.
I’d never seen anything like it, but somehow I knew exactly what it meant. "Shadow poison," I whispered. "But that’s impossible. Shadow dogs were destroyed centuries ago."
Marcus stepped back, his face going even paler. "Sarah, are you certain?"
Before I could answer, Caleb suddenly stood up. "I need to go," he said in a flat voice. "I have pack duties to attend to."