More Than Just Baser Instincts.

Leonard's P.O.V.
The funeral was only completed out of routine, as no one cared for the man who was being buried. The only people who showed up for Gerald were some guards, Arianna, and myself. The rest were here for Christine, the poor woman who had been tied to such a terrible monster. She had passed peacefully in her sleep last night, her heart broken from the loss of her mate. Arianna and I mourned deeply for her, but we both had hopes that she was in a better place—a place where she could be happy with a mate who was not so consumed by avarice and power.

Arianna was crying over Christine's grave when a soldier grabbed my shoulder. I whipped around quickly with a warning growl in my throat, but his words made the colour rush from my face. Arianna turned to me still crying, but then she choked.

"What is it?"

I wanted to console her, but if what the soldier said was true...

I took off quickly, a silent apology in my head for leaving my mate so alone and confused when she needed me the most.

As soon as I entered the building, I saw nurses rushing to one room—and this room just so happened to be the source of an incredibly loud and rapid beeping nose. Screaming and shrieking filled the halls, and I had no choice but to run into the chaos: Elaine's room.

Elaine's eyes were open, but her jaw was hanging open as well. She blinked incredibly slowly, but she showed no other signs of awareness. Then I noticed the red substance dripping down her chin... Was it...blood? Surely enough, my body clenched as the smell filled the entire room.

Rory was in a nearby chair, crying but otherwise not hurt. My eyes jerked in all directions, searching for the source of all of the blood.

Then I saw Quince.

He was draped over Elaine's bed with his face in Elaine's lap. His body was completely limp. His arm lay in a puddle of red sheets. The nurses were crowding around him, taping up the various cuts and...bite marks. It looked as if he had literally tore out chunks of his skin with his own teeth.

"Quince! What did you do!" I screamed, losing all sense of myself. I had no idea how to react, what to do. I had never been so disoriented, so scattered, in my entire life.

If he died, what would become of his son? He would grow without knowing his mother or his father! This was the most selfish thing he had ever done, and I would never forgive this coward if he died.

But then a raspy, painful sound came from Elaine. It took me a minute, but then I realised what it was: she had just taken her first breath—a breath that was completely unaided by machines.

That...that selfish bastard had given up himself to save her.

"Quince," she rasped out, her voice breaking and hardly audible. Her hand was shaky as she pushed it across the bed until she came in contact with her mate's cold, pale hand. Tears dripped down her cheeks, but she couldn't even fully cry in sorrow. Her body wouldn't let her.

"Elaine, we thought you were dead!" I cried out, shaking my head furiously.

"Quince..."

She was a broken record. But then I realised that her eyes were glazed and focused on nothing in particular. She also did not seem to be aware of all of the confusion and chaos that surrounded her. She was blind and deaf. Her hand then moved away from Quince's, as if she thought she had not found him. Surely enough, she continued to search the bed for him, though she came in contact with him multiple times.

The nurses began dragging Quince away from the bed, but I made eye contact with him as he was dragged away. His gaze was hazy, but he still managed to speak.

He said, "Where's that superiority now?"

I didn't at all understand what he meant, but it did not really matter. This man would clearly give everything to have his mate live—even if it meant she would live without him. I looked back to Elaine, but she was still calling for Quince and glancing around the room in a hurry. It was a gut-wrenching sight. I tried to place Rory in her arms, but she never grasped him.

I hurried to her side and put the I.V. back in her arm, which Quince's had clearly torn out. What the hell had he been thinking? As I hurried to confront Quince, I passed my mate in the hall. I tried to tell her not to go in, but she wouldn't listen... It would only break her heart even more when she realised that Elaine just wasn't Elaine.

The nurses had patched the Transvaal up quite nicely. And I had to give him credit: despite the fact that he was as pale as a ghost, he still wore an angry scowl and looked completely pissed off at the world. He saw me, and he growled—but it was a weak sound.

"What did you mean? You asked me where the superiority was. What did you mean?"

"You looked like a scared child," he told me, his voice somehow not wavering—but only for that sentence. "I was only doing what any Transvaal would do in my situation. You wouldn't even bleed for your mate, but my people will die for theirs."

"You made her drink your blood, didn't you? That's disgusting."

He shook his head, but it was hardly perceivable.

"I've marked her three times now," he told me, as if I knew what was running through his mind. "She's mine."

"Everyone knows that at this point," I scoffed. "Your display is pointless."

"You were trying to take her." I tried to protest, but the idiot just pushed himself back onto his feet and ripped out his I.V. "You tried to take her. She's mine to protect, and she's mine to save when she does something stupid—and she always does." He started dragging himself towards me. "She keeps forgetting that she's mine to deal with, and she keeps forgetting that her problems are my problems. Right now, I have a mate in there that is like a child—unsure about the world around her."

He grabbed the collar of my shirt, which I only allowed because I was afraid I would break him.

But then he whispered, "I brought her back from the dead. And now, I'm going to give her all of her senses back, like I was trying to do when your nurses stopped me."

A chill ran up my spine, and I was frozen as he shuffled back out into the hallway. Did Transvaals have magic running through their veins?

It was not even three minutes later before the same chaos and confusion filled the hospital. But I stood perfectly still in the empty infirmary room, still just as stuck on his words. How was it even possible? For these past days, the only thing keeping Elaine alive was the machines. But I saw her move with my very eyes... I saw her dead, and then I saw her alive.

And even when she had just been reborn, her first instinct was to cry out for her mate—a mate she had not seen since coming here. Had she forgotten where she was? Or was she just so sure that he would come to her no matter where she went?

"Leonard! Come quick!"

My mate's voice brought me out of my stupor, and my feet carried me to Elaine's room. Tears were pouring down my mate's face as she pointed at the bed.

"By the gods," she whispered, throwing her arms around me as she wept. I glanced over her.

Elaine was sitting upright, holding Quince's head to her chest as she brushed her fingers through his hair. She was murmuring insults in his ear, two of which included "stupidest male" and "such an idiot." Quince, despite his lack of colour and the new I.V. shoved into his arm, wore a soft smile. His chest rose and fell with gentle, rhythmic breaths even with the new bloodstains all of the sheets and himself.

Elaine then turned to me, and I staggered backwards at the sight of her new, Olive gaze. I stumbled with my tongue, trying to think of words to describe this...this magic!

"Leonard, next time I decide to kill my father, keep this oaf far away." She pressed a chaste kiss to Quince's forehead, and his shoulders shook gently with suppressed laughter. Of all things, laughter. "I don't want him to try to kill himself over me again."

Quince rolled back to look at me, and his olive eyes sparkled with an "I told you so" glint.

"How did...?" I closed my mouth, unable to find words.

"Where's that superiority now?" Quince said yet again, and this time I understood.

Of all the Whites here... None of them could bring their mate back with their very soul like this man had.