Honored Vow

called her. She was eating and drinking too much, and because she
    wasn’t shifting, her body wasn’t metabolizing, and she was going to be
    sick.
    She moved fast, padding over to me, came forward with her head
    lowered until I began to purr, and then she dropped down on the other side
    of me, her head sliding over my paws so she could rest her head close to
    me. My scent, the heat rolling off me, both were needed, wanted, and
    seconds later, feeling safe, sated, I heard her take a last shuddering breath
    before she passed out.
    Yusuke pushed against me on the other side, rubbing her cheek on
    my shoulder, wiping her scent all over me, and then ran her nose back
    through her own smell now on my fur. She trembled in pleasure before
    she, too, let out a huff of air and surrendered to unconsciousness.
    Normally I liked only Logan this tight against me, but at that moment,
    being sandwiched between the two panthers was finally chasing the cold
    from my limbs.
    The final trial seemed far away.

    Honored Vow

    213

    Chapter Fifteen

    THE hand stroking my fur, gently scratching my ears and under my chin,
    felt good, and when I let my eyes drift open, I found Crane.
    “Hey, you,” he said, smiling at me. “How ya feelin’?”
    I lifted my head to look at him and found that the two yareahs were
    gone and only I was there, alone in the dirt in the cold, dark, cavernous
    hall.
    “You think you wanna come back to our quarters with me? Can you
    stand?”
    When I rose, I found that my muscles were sore but solid. I noticed,
    too, that he was there with everyone I had brought with me.
    Mikhail was beside Crane, down on one knee, studying me. “You
    were so brave, Jin, and I’m so sorry that I couldn’t—”
    “You did everything you could,” Danny said, cutting him off,
    moving forward, turning from my sylvan to look at me. “If the others
    hadn’t chimed in with shit they didn’t know, you would have never taken
    one lash, Jin.”
    I waited.
    “Danny helped,” Mikhail said, his hand in the younger man’s hair.
    “Each time I looked up at him, I remembered something he had said.” He
    looked into Danny’s face. “You helped me save my reah and my semel.
    I’ll never forget this.”
    Danny nodded, unable to speak, only reaching up to wrap his fingers
    around Mikhail’s wrist. He never wanted the attention to end, of that I was
    sure.
    “Jin.”

    214

    Mary Calmes

    I turned my head, and there was Yuri, smiling softly.
    “Can I carry you back to the ger? I would love to if you let me.”
    I shook my head, looking for Domin. When I saw him, I shifted fast,
    startling Andrian and Danny as I walked the few feet to stand before my
    maahes.
    “Is Logan alright?”
    He was a study in contrasts: his awe at my shift, his concern for
    Logan, the furrow of his brows as he delivered bad news. “Jin, Logan
    needs to shift soon, alright? He was really close to it earlier, and if he
    had….”
    I knew what would have happened if he had: he would have been
    executed in front of my eyes.
    “Watching you take those lashes was more than he could bear.”
    I nodded, turned, and shifted. Padding around Domin, I headed
    toward the entrance of the hall toward the enormous cave opening.
    “Wait.”
    I turned and looked over my shoulder and saw Taj stripping out of
    his clothes.
    “I’ll go with you, my reah; just don’t outrun me tonight.”
    As I waited, I saw how uneasy I was making everyone. They were
    all worried about me, even scared. I was usually more communicative;
    that I couldn’t be was frightening.
    Once Taj joined me, we ran out into the icy wind and swirling snow
    together.

    I RAN leisurely and enjoyed being free instead of lashed to a post. Once
    we got back, I slipped into the ger in my panther form, rushing to the area
    by the stove and lying down. When Danny came close, I got up and
    moved to the other side, away from him.
    “What did I do?” Danny asked Mikhail when he called him over to
    him.
    “Nothing, he’s just in pain, leave him alone,” my sylvan answered
    from where he was sitting, crossed-legged, off to one side of the sleeping
    area.
    “I thought the shift healed him?”

    Honored Vow

    215

    “Not all of it, and not the inside.”
    He rose and walked back over to my sylvan, sitting close, his hand
    on Mikhail’s thigh as he looked at him.
    “You have to understand that it’s different for Jin and Logan to be
    apart than it would be for you and your mate.”
    “I know that the