His heart hurt, so much so, he started to cry.
“Liam, what’s wrong, sweetie?”
Mommy picked him up but it didn’t stop the pain. It didn’t stop the weeping that started again inside his head, a dull muted sound that wouldn’t go away.
“My heart hurts, Mommy,” he whispered into her neck. “It hurts so badly and it won’t stop.”
He could feel his mommy’s fear as she felt his head and ran her hands over his body. He knew she wouldn’t find anything because it wasn’t his pain he was feeling.
“Liam, tell me where it hurts, honey,” she asked, as she took him into the sitting room and sat on the sofa to cuddle him.
The sound of the front door made Mommy sigh with relief. Daddy was instantly at her side, his already weary expression turning to one of concern.
“What’s wrong with him?” he asked urgently, touching his son’s forehead but unable to find a fever.
Mommy bit her lip and shook her head. “I don’t know. He just keeps saying it hurts and pointing at his chest. I can’t find anything wrong with him though.”
“Liam, tell Daddy what’s wrong,” his father coaxed, cradling his face in his hands gently.
“Hurts here, Daddy,” Liam sniffed, his hand over his heart. “Always hurts here, but not this bad. Help her, Daddy. You have to help her.”
Mommy and Daddy shared puzzled looks as he tried to tell them what was wrong, his crying becoming stronger as the cutting feeling grew worse and worse.
“Help who, Liam?” Mommy asked gently. “Who does Daddy need to help?”
Big tears rolled down his face, his eyes pleading with them as he looked up at his parents. “Aunt Freya,” he sobbed. “She hurts so bad, Mommy.”
*****
The memory was a hard one to re-live. Liam wasn’t surprised to find his cheeks wet as he closed the dark door. He had chosen that moment because he knew that Reasa related to his aunt on a level he couldn’t understand. He wanted her to see how important Freya was to him and just how overwhelmed he could become by others emotions.
“You were just a toddler at the time.” Reasa’s voice was barely audible and if he didn’t have enhanced hearing, he might have missed the words.
“My abilities were closely attuned to my family when I was younger. I always had a special affinity with my aunt, in particular, and that was why I sensed her pain so keenly at the time. It was as I grew older that everyone else’s emotions began to overwhelm me and it became unbearable.”
His hand touched another doorknob; this gateway a darker blue it was almost black. “My deepest shame,” he whispered, before throwing it wide open.
*****
He screamed over and over, as his young body thrashed wildly in the hospital bed. “Make them stop! Make them stop! Make them stop! Make them stop! Make them stop…!”
“Mallen, do something!” His mother screamed, as she held him down on the bed, nearly blinded by the tears running down her face. “Liam, I’m here, darling. Mommy’s here!”
“I gave him enough sedative to knock out a full grown Were,” the doctor said, his tone frantic. “Rafe, I don’t want to give him any more. It could put him into cardiac arrest!”
“Annie?” The deep baritone of his Alpha filled the room, followed by the musical lilt of his sister’s voice.
“I can’t reach him. His shields are too strong, but there’s also something wrong with them. He’s keeping me from psychically entering his mind and yet, he appears unable to construct a defence against pure emotion. I believe he’s feeling every emotion within the pack and most certainly the full impact of all of our emotions in this room. We need to get everyone out and as far away from him as we can.”
“I’m not leaving my son!”
Mommy was crying and her heart was hurting as badly as Aunt Freya’s had once hurt. He could feel his Aunt in the room and he reached out for her because she was the only one who felt cool, where everyone else was burning hot.
“Liam?”
“Make them stop, Aunt Freya. Make them stop!”
“Everyone leave the room… now!” His aunt bodily picked up his mother up from the bed as she fought against her. “Ashleigh, your terror is leaking all over him, you have to leave now. I will protect him, but you have to go!”
He curled up, and covered his ears with his hands in an attempt to make everything go away. The feelings subsided a little and he could think a bit more coherently. He could hear his aunt talking to the doctor, could distinguish their conversation.
“The safe room may be a better place to put Liam.”
“You think he’s going rogue?”
“No, Mallen, I was thinking there may be some benefit to the padded room being some kind of external buffer to the emotions he’s being subjected to. No nephew of mine will ever go rogue. Not as long as I live.”
“That may work. I’ll talk to Rafe.”
The emotions muted a bit more, and then lethargy overcame him. Now that he wasn’t being overloaded with emotions, the sedative the doctor gave him was finally able to take effect. Liam sank down into a deep oblivion.
When his eyes opened again, he was in the safe room. They’d all seen it before, their Alpha showed them every aspect of pack life, including the fact that sometimes Weres turned rogue and had to be locked away for both their own safety, and that of innocent people. Had he turned rogue? Was that why they’d moved his hospital bed into the safe room?
Liam rose slowly and surveyed his fifteen-year-old reflection in the two-way mirror. There was a wildness to his gaze that frightened him, but apart from that he felt as if he was sane enough. In the back of his mind, he could still feel the pack’s emotions but it wasn’t nearly as bad as it had been before, when he felt as if his head would burst.
The door to the room opened and Elina stepped inside. She was on the cusp of turning from child into a young woman, but the expression in her eyes made her appear much older. Her customary smile was missing, and in her eyes was a bleakness that he could see but couldn’t sense.
“Elle? What’s wrong?”
“You almost died, Liam,” she answered in a voice that was devoid of all emotion. “You were able to reach out to Mother and it was enough that the doctor was able to get you sedated and bring you here. It helped for a little while, but then you went wild again.”
He frowned at her, fear coursing through his body. “I don’t remember anything after the hospital room. What did I do?”
“It doesn’t matter. You didn’t hurt anyone apart from yourself and you have healed.” Elina moved to sit down on the side of the bed and he followed her. He reached out to sample her emotions as he sat down beside her. He knew it probably wasn’t a wise thing to do, but her lack of inflection was starting to concern him. He didn’t like seeing his cousin so serious.