My Second Chance Mate is a Barbarian (Sera and Fenris) novel Chapter 79

Sera

I watched Kael. His chest heaved sporadically. He was choking on the blood flooding his windpipe.

"Hold his shoulders down!" the healer yelled at Yvara. "The bone is completely displaced."

I knew exactly what that meant. Taya’s arm had healed crooked because her wolf biology kicked in before the bone was set. Kael’s neck was broken. His accelerated healing was already trying to fuse the vertebrae back together. If it healed like that, with the bone jutting out of his throat, he would be permanently crippled, or the bone would sever his artery completely during the healing process. He needed his neck realigned immediately.

The healer grabbed Kael’s head with both hands. Kael let out a muffled, agonizing shriek through the blood in his mouth.

I looked around the room.

I saw the cracked door. I saw the two guards standing in the hallway, watching their Alpha's brutal handiwork. I saw the blood expanding across the floorboards.

I walked past Yvara and the bleeding elder. I stepped right up to the threshold of the door.

"Come inside," I told the two guards. My voice was completely flat.

The guards exchanged a confused look. They looked past me at Fenris. Fenris gave them a single, sharp nod.

They stepped into the council chamber.

I grabbed the heavy iron rings on both doors and pulled them shut. The cracked wood groaned, but the latch clicked into place. The room was sealed.

"What are you doing?" Yvara asked. She kept her weight pressed down on Kael’s thrashing shoulders.

I turned around. I looked down at the healer. His hands were covered in gore. He was frantically trying to twist Kael’s head back into a straight line. Kael’s eyes were wide open. He was staring blindly at the ceiling, completely consumed by the pain.

"What are you doing, Sera?" Fenris asked. He stepped closer to me.

I swallowed the dry lump in my throat. I looked at the two guards standing by the door. I looked at the healer. I looked at Yvara. I looked at Fenris.

"It is a good thing the North is primitive," I said.

I took a breath.

"We end it right here."

Yvara slowly took her hands off Kael's shoulders. She stood up. She wiped her bloody palms on her leather pants.

She stared at me. Her dark eyes were calculating.

"You want to execute a sitting elder in a closed room," Yvara said. Her voice was pure gravel. "How do you explain a dead man to the rest of the council? They just watched him walk in here. They know he was alone with us."

I looked at the cracked wood of the heavy oak doors. I looked at the blood on the stone.

"I have an idea."

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