Read The Half Blood Luna by The Black Daisy
Chapter 21
Klaus’s POV:
We arrive at the pack hospital five minutes later. Ella went straight for the OR to be prepped for surgery, and I was taken to a private room next to the OR. There was a nurse waiting for me there, and started the blood draw process immediately. Joseph stayed outside to keep an eye on Ella’s condition.
When I was done, I went outside and stood against the wall next to joseph. We were standing outside the OR door.
About ten minutes later, a nurse walked out and headed towards us.
“Alpha Klaus, beta Joseph, Dr. Hunt needs you inside” the nurse motioned us to follow her inside.
My heart dropped. Did she d*ie before he could get started? I looked at Joseph and saw that he was thinking the same thing.
The nurse gave us sterilized medical gowns and face masks to put on. I took that as a good sign. If she were dead they wouldn’t bother with sterilization. Once we were done, we followed the nurse into the OR. I saw an intubated Ella, laying on the operating table. The knife was still where it was embedded in her chest. I looked at the heart monitor and saw her pulse dangerously low.
“Why haven’t you started the surgery yet?” I asked the doctor.
“There is something wrong. We gave her your blood and waited ten minutes for her heart to beat stronger, but it never did. For some reason your blood isn’t healing her alpha” Dr. Hunt answered.
“That doesn’t make any sense. Why would her body refuse my blood? A pure blood?” I asked incredulously.
“I could only think of one thing that would prevent the body from healing itself, even when injecting it with pure blood. She must have wolfs bane in her system. That’s the only thing that makes sense. I drew some blood from her and sent it to our lab for quick examination.”
I stared at Joseph in confusion and saw my expression mirrored on his face.
“Why the hell would she have wolfs bane in her system?” asks Joseph.
“Add that to the list of unending mysteries to seek answers for” I reply in a dry tone.
Dr. Hunt cleared his throat “Actually alpha, there is another mystery I am about to add to your list” he looked at the nurses and nodded at them. They turned her body to the other side giving me a full view of her back.
Not a single word can describe how I felt when I saw her back. Horrified? Shocked? Stunned? Agonized? Crushed?
Combine them all together and multiply them by a hundred and it still won’t nearly describe how I felt.
Her back was covered in different whip marks. Some tore her skin right open with deep cuts.
“Her back is not the only place with those marks. Most of her body is marked. However, only her back has those deep cuts that were probably caused by what appears to be a bull whip. I was present during the public whipping this morning, and I was pretty stunned to see her bleed through the shirt, now it all makes sense” Dr. Hunt said in a sad tone.
“Are you saying she was t*ortur*ed before the public whipping this morning?” Joseph asked in a shocked tone.
“I would say this happened about two nights ago. You can clearly distinguish between alpha Klaus’s marks and the old ones. His are pinker because they are still fresh. She should have healed from the first whip lashes the next night, but the fact that she didn’t, confirms that she probably ingested wolfs bane around the time those old lashes happened”
Two nights ago? Two nights ago, the pack wasn’t ours yet, it was still alpha Grey’s pack. She tried to run away the next night. Was it to escape from whoever t*ortur*ed her and not because she was running away from me? Or was it both reasons? My head was full of questions. Why wouldn’t she tell me this? Why would she let herself be punished when she was already put through hell the day before?
Dr. Hunt cleared his throat again “There is something else I am afraid”
I didn’t think this could possibly get any worse, but from the look on the doctor’s face, whatever he was about to say was worse.
“I did a quick v@gin@l exam and discovered multiple tears in her wall. She was r@ped repeatedly at the same time of the t*ortur*e”
Silence filled the room, but a hurricane, tornado, and a volcano were all swirling inside me. This was the most horrible way a female can ever be vi*olated. How she endured all that abuse was beyond my furthest understanding. The fact that she was still fighting to live after all that abuse and attempt on her life made my knees weak.
I punished her so hard this morning to prove a point to my new pack, unknowing that I was hitting her over already cut skin, causing her unimaginable pain. Still, she never screamed or begged me to stop. She didn’t even try to make me change my mind about the punishment. She kept her mouth shut. How could she do that? Be so strong? So brave?
“Alpha Klaus, I have a solution to start curing her body right away, but I need your permission” Dr. Hunt pulled me out of the very dark spot I was headed into.
“Whatever it is, you have it. I want you to do everything in your power to save her life” I told him firmly.
“We need to start her on some kind of blood dialysis. We will draw all her blood, remove any toxins in it, and at the same time inject her with your blood. You need to be connected directly, I am afraid we don’t have time to wait for multiple blood draws. I have to warn you though, the procedure will drain a lot of blood from you. It will make you weak for a couple of hours”
“Do it” I order him.
Everyone moves at once. Nurses start hooking her up to a machine, someone brings a chair for me to sit on, I take it and sit next to Ella’s head. I lift up the sleeve of my shirt and offer my arm to another nurse to start the blood transfusion.
The room falls silent as we all hold our breaths and stare at her heart monitor.
A few minutes later, we start to see a slight rise in her heart beat. We all breath a sigh of relief. It was working.
“I’ll give her a few minutes, but I need to start the surgery right away if I am going to stop the bleeding in time” Dr. Hunt informs me. I nod in agreement.
I turn my attention to her face, as the doctor begins cutting into her chest. She looked so peaceful. You look at her face and you can’t imagine how much pain she was in for days. How much hurt she must have endured. No one should have felt this amount of pain. No one should have their virtue taken away like this. All my anger at her was gone. I can’t believe I was going to her room to punish her. I felt beyond ashamed at myself.
I hold my hands in fists so tightly to fight the nagging urge to touch her face. To sooth her and tell her that she will be okay. That she will survive this.
The sudden alarm of her heart monitor indicating a flat line, made my own heart race crazily. No, no, no, no you cannot do this to me. Don’t you dare d*ie before I get you justice for what was done to you.
I stand up from my chair and look at Dr. Hunt. He was charging the heart paddles and screaming “clear” to everyone. He did it once, twice, and then one last time. My eyes were glued to the monitor waiting for the line to change. Come on Ella. Fight one last time.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
I collapsed on the chair fighting the dizziness that creeped up on me. Her heart was beating again at a good pace. I looked over my shoulder at Joseph and saw him steadying himself against the wall breathing rapidly, as if he was running for miles. He came to care for Ella so much in this short period of time. While my feelings were complicated, torn between hate for what her father did, doubt that she was in on it the whole time and lied to me, sympathy for what she has been through the last two days, respect for her bravery in enduring all that pain, and like for her challenging personality that resembled Kate’s.
My head was pounding and my concentration was starting to slip. I felt Joseph’s hand on my shoulder.
“Are you okay Klaus?”
“I am fine. Just a little headache”
“Is the bleeding under control doctor?” Joseph asks doctor Hunt.
“Yes beta. The hardest part is over. The knife made a tear in her heart wall, but I st*itched it and it appears to be holding. Give it a day or two, and it will heal completely. I am just about to close her up. Her other injuries will heal on their own, including her skull fracture, but it might take her a few days. She needs to rest” he motions for another doctor to continue in his place, and comes over to remove the needle from my vein.
“How are you feeling alpha?” asks doctor Hunt.
“I’m fine, just a light headache” I answer him firmly, although it was anything but light.
“I will have the staff prepare a room for you to rest in”
“There is no need. I will be escorting Ella until she wakes up”
“She will have to remain asleep for a day in order for her skull fracture to improve”
“A whole day? You can’t wake her up before that? I need to talk to her doctor”
“I am afraid waking her up before she is ready will have adverse effects on her healing”
“But you can wake her up right? Just for half an hour then you can put her to sleep again”
“Klaus it’s dangerous. Just let her heal for a day. She is not going anywhere” said Joseph disapprovingly.
“She is not, but whoever attacked her and whoever a*s*saulted her might get away or try to K*ll her again. I need her to tell me who did this to her”
“But…” Joseph was about to disagree with me but I cut him off.
“This is not up for debate. I need to talk to her as soon as possible. When can we wake her up doctor?”
The doctor takes a deep breath apparently conflicted about disagreeing with his alpha for the benefit of his patient. But he could see there is no changing my mind about this.
“I can’t wake her up before six hours of rest. And even then, she needs to be put back to sleep as soon as you are done talking to her. It will sit her back on recovery though I have to inform you, alpha”
“Thank you doctor Hunt. For everything”
At that moment, a nurse comes in and hands the doctor a piece of paper. He gives it a quick scan, then says “Just like I predicted. There was definitely wolfs bane in her system, the test result just confirmed it”
I look at Joseph angrily. Wolfs bane is forbidden in our pack. Whoever gets caught with it gets banned from the pack immediately, no argument about it. Using it against someone and depriving him or her of their natural ability to heal is a crime that will not be tolerated.
I whisper to Joseph “I need you to contact Marcel and have him gather everyone in the auditorium, as their new beta in charge, I need him to a*s*sert his power over them and warn them to turn over any possession of wolfs bane voluntarily, no punishment will be applied. However, if the person is discovered hiding it later he or she will be banned from the pack effective immediately. Do not mention anything about Ella”
Joseph nods and takes out his phone. I turn over to the doctor and staff and address them strictly.
“Whatever happened in this room will be forgotten as soon as you walk out that door. All you need to remember is that you treated a servant that was attacked with a knife only. There will be no recollection of her other injuries specifically, the abuse. If I hear one word about this, whoever is responsible will be dealt with severely. This girl went through a huge trauma and I will not have anyone treating it as gossip. Do we understand each other?”
Everyone answers in union “Yes, alpha”.
“Good, can someone show me to her room?”
A nurse steps out and I follow her to a room at the end of the hall.
Joseph was still talking on the phone outside the room.
I collapse on the black couch and almost immediately p@ssout with one thought in my head.
I need to know who tried to K*ll her and why, who abused her, and whether it was the same person or not.