After Rosalie had collapsed in my arms, we were quick to get out of my tent. The howls of Henry were getting louder as we ran over to Taylor's tent. Well, as quickly as we can when I am holding Rosalie and Noah is carrying both of our children. Gwen manages to balance all of our stuff without dropping it.

Taylor had seemed to know that we were coming, because he was waiting outside his tent, under the slight covering that is in front of the entrance.

"Bring her in," he says, voice only wavering slightly when he sees his trembling and bleeding daughter. The howl comes again, much closer. His eyes survey our surroundings as he holds the door open for us to duck inside. "Gwen, can you hand me the blow dart?"

A few seconds later, as I am carefully setting Rosalie on the cot that Taylor uses exclusively for medical examinations, I here a distinctive whoosh of air. Only a few seconds later, something rather large thumps down on the ground outside the tent.

Taylor ducks his head inside the tent. "All of you, come out here and help me drag him inside."

It takes all of us straining in order to drag Henry inside the tent, his wolf form four times heavier than him as a human. His wolf is huge, when he is standing, his shoulder would be level with my chest. His fur is the same color of his dark brown hair, completely drenched from the rain outside.

Once he is settled in the middle of the tent, Taylor easily plucks out the dart that he had shot at his son-in-law. Usually, those things are dipped in poison, in order to paralyze infected and humans to make them easier for us to kill. The poison on this dart though seems to be one that completely knocks out the subject.

"He'll be out for a while," Taylor says, walking over to his daughter. She is still trembling profusely, muttering something under her breath, but it is impossible to make out. "Noah, can you hand me the book on my desk, the red one."

Not knowing what to do, I walk over to where Noah had set the babies, in front of the woodstove. They are both fast asleep in the basket they are sharing. Bending down, I carefully brush my fingers over Elias' head, bending down to brush a kiss on his head. He snuffles in his sleep but doesn't wake up.

"Here."

Noah's voice has me looking up and stepping away from the babies. He hands the book to Taylor, and I watch as the older omega flips through it. His brows are scrunched in concentration as his eyes flit across the pages, obvious looking for something familiar.

"Here it is," He sets the book down on the stool next to the bed, smoothing out the pages when the book tries to close. "Matty, I need you to grab these things from my cupboard."

He begins to list off a bunch of herbs, and I repeat them in my head the entire time I walk over to his cupboard full of the ingredients he uses for his treatments.

When I get back, I see that Rowan somehow had found us here, five little kids surrounding him. Taylor doesn't miss a beat in getting the kids settled and having Rowan change into clean clothes.

"Matty, Rowan, come here."

Rowan is quick to join me by Taylor, wrapping me in a tight hug. "Are you all right, love?"

Closing my eyes, I bury my nose in his neck, giving a small nod. "Yeah, We're fine."

Reluctantly, I step away from Rowan, knowing that we need to complete this ritual as soon as possible.

"I just found this ritual earlier this morning. I was trying to assess the risks with the benefits, but we have run out of time." He looks up at us, brown eyes solemn. "I want the two of you to realize the large risk that comes from this ritual. Side effects range from a small headache to seizures to coma and even death. But if we don't do the ritual, all three of you," he looks in between his daughter and the twins, "will eventually go mad, and since you will be too focused on mating, you will eventually die of a combination of sleep deprivation, dehydration, and starvation."

His words have fear settling in my stomach, and I automatically reach out for Rowan, wrapping my fingers tightly around his and giving him a squeeze. He looks over at me and must see the fear in my eyes, because he takes a deep breath, giving a small nod before turning back to Taylor.

"Let's do this."

Taylor's stoic mask breaks for a second, revealing his relief at Rowan's words before it is back up. He nods. "Okay."

He looks down at the book again, finger moving across the page. "Alright, let me mix this concoction. In the meantime, Rowan, I need you to move Rosalie next to Henry." He immediately does what Taylor says, and the omega looks over at me. "Matty, can you please grab the knife that I have hanging outside?"

Despite the weird combination of words, I do as he says. Indeed, there is a knife hanging by a piece of twine, completely drenched from the downpour."

Taylor takes it from me, carefully setting it down on the table next to the bowl of ingredients.

He talks as he mixes, explaining the reasoning behind all the ingredients.

"The honeysuckle represents the devotion of a mateship, what is supposed to become of this relationship. The carnation represents the rejection of the mateship, and the marigold represents the grief of the wolf." He crushes another dried flower, sprinkling it over the mixture. "The lily represents the death of the mateship." He picks up a new stick, carefully using it to mix the ingredients while pouring in a few drops of water. "The cedar of this mixer symbolizes the healing that we hope to come, and the water the washing away of pain. And finally, daisies for the new beginnings that are to come."

He stops mixing then, carrying the bowl over to the three wolves gathering to gather on the ground. "The blood of the mates, so that the concoction will work for the three of you."

The sharpness of the knife makes it so that there is little pain with the initial slice. Henry and Rosalie are too out of it to protest, and Rowan barely winces at the slash to his arm.

Taylor mixes it again, pouring in a little more water, before carefully pouring the concoction into three different cups. Despite all the ingredients, there is only about a tablespoon of it for each of them to swallow.

Taking one of the cups from Taylor, I carefully pour it down Rosalie's throat. Rowan grimaces when he takes his, and Henry huffs in his sleep, but Taylor manages to get it down his throat.

At first, nothing happens. The tent is silent as we all wait for the other shoe to drop. Rosalie is the first to change, her trembling stilling and her murmurs dying away. She is completely still, and Taylor and I manage to get her on the cot.

Just as we are settling a blanket over her, Rowan starts to groan. I am over by his side in a second, rubbing his back as he clutches at his head.

"Shit, shit," the words are barely whispers. "Fuck, my head is going to explode."

"It's alright, love." Miraculously, I am able to keep my voice steady, despite the fear coursing through me. "You're going to be alright."

"I can't." He groans again, his whole body shuddering before his body just collapses to the ground.

"Rowan!" I cry, shaking him in an attempt to wake him up. "Love, wake up."

A hand settles on my shoulder. "There is nothing we can do for him right now, Matty. We just need to let him get his rest."

"Are- Are you sure?"

"I can't be sure of anything with this ritual, but the best thing we can do right now is let all of them rest."

Not knowing what to do with myself, I sit back on the ground. Taylor eventually slips away, his gentle voice coming from the other room. He must be talking to the children that Rowan had brought back with him. Where they even came from is a mystery. They seemed to be human too, which is strange. We had all thought that the virus that was responsible for the infected had turned all uninfected humans crazy.

It seems that we were wrong.

Eventually, I am pulled away from where I am sitting next to Rowan by Elias crying. Looking up, I see that Noah is sitting on one of the chairs in front of the fire, already nursing his daughter. Gwen is busy rocking Elias, but I can tell that he is hungry.

"Give him here."

She pulls me up from the ground, not handing me Elian until I am settled on the other chair, across from Noah. Elias has worked himself up, so it takes me about a minute to soothe him enough that he is able to latch. His eyes flutter shut, and I just watch as he nurses. My heart clenches, seeing so much of Rowan in our son. It is crazy. The only thing that I can see that he got from me is his nose, and the dark tufts of hair on his head. However, there is a good chance that his current hair will fall out and lighter hair will grow in. That is what happened with all of my younger siblings.

My exhaustion catches up with me, and I somehow manage to drift off to sleep. I am only wakened by Tate coming back to the tent. Taylor immediately goes over to him, pulling him into a tight hug. This is the first time that I see what really must be going on in the omega's head. Around Tate, he is like an open book.

Tate consoles him, dropping kisses on the top of his head. The two of them escape into the back room, and I can hear them talking, most likely about the young kids that we are going to have to find a place to stay.

The small nap O took doesn't seem to have helped with my exhaustion. My eyes still feel so heavy, and I barely have the energy to get up from the chair.

Elias is fast asleep against me, suckling periodically as he nurses in his sleep. He doesn't even startle as I unlatch him, carefully handing him over to Gwen.

"I need to get Rowan back to our tent."

"I thought we were all supposed to go to the caves?"

"It's safe now," a familiar voice says. Turning, I see that Tate has come back from the other room. "All of the humans were killed off. Most of the fighters have returned. Only a few stayed to take out the remaining infected." He goes to stand next to Rosalie, dropping a soft kiss on her forehead before adjusting the blankets. After a minute, he looks over at me. I'll help you get Rowan back to your tent. I think he will be more comfortable for him there, and that's important."

Nodding, I grab all of our stuff, my movements sluggish despite how quickly I try to move. "Thanks, Tate."

With the help of Tate, we are able to get back to my tent safely. The village is alive again, people returning to their tents from the caves. It is nice, but I am not in the right mental space to appreciate it.

Noah is hesitant to leave, but once Beckett comes to get him, he has no choice. He pulls me into a tight hug, before finally leaving me alone in the tent with my family.

After making sure the fire is stoked, I strip out of my wet and dirty clothes. The bed feels better than ever as I crawl beneath the sheets. Elias is fast asleep, laying in between my and Rowan. I don't really care for having him sleep with us, too worried about accidentally rolling over him in my sleep, but I can't bear the thought of putting him in his crib right now.

All I want is my family, and looking over at Rowan, I just pray that he makes it out of this whole ordeal alive.