‘He remembered going under, trying to pierce the murky depths before coming up for air.’
UNTIL MY LUNGS GIVE OUT
Wayne Mallory & Rowena Callaghan
Werewolves were not meant to drown.
It was so mundane and stupid and human.
And yet, as he shook the water from his heavy, limp black hair, panting for breath, he looked down at the motionless form in his arms, seeing the paleness in her face, the lifeless, dripping lengths of rich, red hair, and felt the panic of realisation strike him again, like a weight in his chest, winding and crippling. Even as he lowered her to the ground, his motions driven by desperation and fear, he knew without checking that she wasn’t breathing. He checked anyway, laying one hand over her still chest, lowering his head to hover his ear over her blue lips.
Silence.
Giving his head another rough shake, frustrated, to get the hair away from his eyes, he called to mind anything and everything he had ever seen when something like this happened in those ridiculously cliché television shows or movies about one heroic near-miss or another, hoping against hope that he didn’t get it wrong as he linked one shaking hand over the other, pressing down over her heart, and pumping.
Footsteps crashed up behind him, and figures skidded and crouched near to him, Irina Bianchi’s dark mane swaying fiercely as she came sliding up on her knees, scuffing the hell out of her jeans as she stopped not far to his right, breathlessly looking from his frantic expression to the unmoving figure below him; Irina said nothing, too shocked, as he moved, pinching the unresponsive female’s nose closed and tilting her head back to breathe into her mouth and try to get her lungs clear again, quickly returning to the compressions on her chest.
Irina said his name as the others came to their own startled halts over and around him.
Wayne Mallory ignored her, counting in low, rushed whispers, as he pumped, trying to get her heart to respond to his efforts; to drive the water out of her lungs.
Memory flashed and ignited.
They had come to find a rogue, one who had called them for help, too frightened to come to The Hyperion. She had given them her location, in fearful gasps and pants, and one of their pack, listening in as their Alpha spoke to the rogue, had recognised the sounds; the rogue had been in labour.
Rowena Callaghan had refused to stay behind.
They had found the rogue, covered in her own blood, sobbing frantically; the team had broken up into pairs to search the riverside, racing up and down the deserted, litter-strewn backs of buildings and alleys and lanes that led towards the water, with its poorly guarded banks of concrete. The lone female had been watching something, and even as Rowena raced towards her, she had seen the cloth-bound bundle sailing swiftly away down the river. Seeing the state of the rogue she-wolf, the midwife had recognised instantly what had happened.
They had been too late.
The rogue had given birth, her child lost in the process or ‘born sleeping’, as many mortals liked to say to soften the blow, and she had cast it into the water. Distraught, she was hovering at the edge herself, her bare, cut feet millimetres from the precipice that would carry her down into the strong current and dark depths of the river that cut through the city.
Rowena had approached, trying to reach for the other female, pleading in gentle tones for her to step back and that they could help her.
Wayne had been rushing to catch up when it had happened.
Even as he’d come within ten feet, the rogue had thrown herself forward; the hand that had caught in her dirty jacket had either gotten snagged or refused to let go. The two females had gone over the edge, and as Wayne had shouted wordlessly in fear, skidding messily to grab at nothing over the hard ledge, blue eyes wide, he had seen the remains of the spray that had come with the splash of their landing and plunge under the depths.
He had practically ripped his jacket off before scrambling over that small ledge, throwing himself towards the swirling waters in as much of a controlled dive as he could manage with the panic building inside him. He remembered going under, trying to pierce the murky depths before coming up for air. He had gone under, again and again, each time going deeper and further.
And then, finally, after disappearing under the surface for what felt like hours, he had come up with the still body of the redheaded female.
How he had gotten back to dry land, Wayne couldn’t even recall. It didn’t matter. As he counted, pumped and then breathed, all in turn and shaky rhythm, the only thing he cared about was getting her lungs clear and her heart beating strongly again.
She was a werewolf.
Werewolves did not drown.