Alpha King’s Lost Luna by Aubrey Pepper

Chapter 36 The poison

CA SSANDRA

As my assistant walked toward me, my mind ached with a million questions. What were the results? Was this dire? Were we going to be able to save Asher after all?

Becky pushed her round glasses up the bridge of her nose. She was a beautiful girl- petite with short dark red hair and a pale, angular face full of freckles- and under normal circumstances, she had a pleasant demeanor. But tonight, her russet eyes were underscored by dark circles. She looked visibly worn out. Her lab coat had been hastily pulled on over her night clothes. I felt bad that she’d been awoken at this late of an hour.

“Ca ssandra,” she greeted me as she approached, and then her eyes fell to Asher. “How is the Alpha King?”

“Not great,” I admitted, and then I gestured toward the stack of papers in her hands. “You have the results?”

“Sort of,” Becky replied, and her eyebrows creased together. “But sort of not at the same time. I… I couldn’t identify the venom.”

My heart dropped in my chest.

“Oh,” I whispered, and when my lower lip began to tremble, it took all of my effort to keep from falling to the ground. The world spun around me a little until I took a long, deep breath.

“It doesn’t resemble any of the ones in our texts,” she continued on.

“Did you check the book in my laboratory?” I asked.

Surely the book that Emmett had recorded strange poisons in would have the answers we needed.

But Becky shook her head and frowned.

“Which one?” she asked.

I realized then that I hadn’t actually taken the time to show my assistant the book. Things had been so frantic and hectic around here lately that I hadn’t gotten

around to it.

“We need to go back to the lab,” I said. “I think there’s an answer in that book. somewhere. There has to be.”

but I shook my

peeled my gloves off and dropped them into the waste basket beside me. “I’ll just need to alert the guards before we

Becky nodded. “Right.”

double doors and stepped out into the hallway. The guards seemed

the chamber,”

one said, and the pair raised their staffs

go.”

a courteous smile, and then I turned to

time and traveled

were brighter than I’d anticipated, and after I took a moment to let my eyes adjust to the harsh light, I headed over to my station. The room was enormous compared to what I was used to back in my clinic in Wild Crawler territory. I’d been assigned my own workspace in the white-painted lab, fit with a

of bookshelves, and a small testing station that allowed me to

and scanned the rows until | found Emmett’s book. I held it aloft to show Becky, and after my assistant’s face

the results?” I asked Becky, and without any hesitation, she brought the papers over to me. Once they were in my hands, I set them on my desk.

nearly fifteen minutes to sort through the book until finally, something seemed promising. My eyes widened as

found something,” I

Emmett’s book that seemed promising. When I compared the composition of the venom to the description in the book, I found a

was plaguing

caught sight of a sentence that made me hesitate. It

was invented by a

I froze.

What?

in the empire of Wegalla. What did the

joke I didn’t understand. Either way, I didn’t have

save Asher.

and filled a spare kit with the other necessary things like gloves, syringes,

carry me.

an hour like this, but time. was of the essence. I figured no one had entered the Alpha King’s chamber while I was gone, but I didn’t want to waste

hallway, I was stopped in my tracks. Kane stood there against a

ssandra,” he greeted me with a tilt of his head. “Have you found