"You have the flu," Mina stated once I woke up.

Surprisingly, I was in the room I had called mine for the past week or so in the Alpha Wing. It must have been a good sign I had not regressed to the medical wing. Everything was leading me to believe I was not indeed dying, but I just couldn't shake the feeling the exact opposite was occurring.

The flu? It sounded like a death sentence, but I could not know for sure. We knew of diseases and viruses that plagued the Outside. All of them had been eradicated from the Borderlands existence when the founding families were quarantined before sealing the Border. Of course, the Borderlands was not free of inherited diseases or cancer, but sickness was not something encountered in the Borderlands.

"The flu? Am I dying?" I asked in a sweaty haze. My hair clung to my face, and I did not have the energy to tuck it behind my ear. Each inhale made my stomach shake in disapproval. My throat was hoarse from repeatedly throwing up intermittently the last couple of hours before my body no longer could stay conscious.

"No, you're just sick," she said as she came over to my side to rest a damp cloth on my forehead."There's no sign you've ever been vaccinated."

My body relaxed from the contact of the cool cloth.

"Because I haven't," I responded weakly. It was getting harder to speak without my voice croaking and cracking with each word I said, but the thought of having anything — even water — digested made my body want to collapse in on itself.

"I ran your bloodwork," Mina started to say as she took a seat on the edge of my bed. She let out a sigh. "You're not from around here."

"What do you mean?" I asked, not knowing how she could get that information from my blood. How could my blood tell her where I came from?

The Borderlands was not too far away from Theo's pack, so I couldn't imagine my blood would be too different than an ordinary Outside human's blood, right? My mind was swirling, and I couldn't process anything clearly with the unrelenting pounding in my skull.

"Your blood showed an unusual genetic marker. I had never seen it before, so I compared it against the genetic database our alliance packs share. There was a match." Mina gulped before continuing. "It matched the same genetic marker Eva Longshire has. You're from the Borderlands."

My blood ran cold, and the world spun — from my illness or the news Mina knew I was from the Borderlands, I was not sure. Before I could respond, my stomach lurched, and I threw up, just barely managing to turn my head and lean over the side of the bed. My stomach long ago expelled everything that had been contained within.

"You should have told us, Sage," Mina scolded me, as she began cleaning up the clear liquid I had thrown up. "Your body is not equipped to deal with the diseases outside the Borderlands. You could have died if you caught something more deadly than the flu. Most escapees from inside the Border die from disease. You're lucky you're not one of them."

My heart beat erratically in my chest at her words. Tears threatened to overpour, as I squeezed my eyes shut. My brain was slow to process what I had realized: the Council did not prepare me for the diseases I would encounter on the Outside.

At first, I hopefully thought maybe it was because they wouldn't have known about the dangers of leaving the Border, but I quickly shook off this notion. They did know about the diseases that plagued the Outside because it was written into the rules which all Borderlands follow. We must alert the Council of any sign of illness because an illness spreading throughout the Borderlands would mean a breach in the Border.

If there was anything left in my stomach, I would have expelled it all at the reality the Council did not think I would succeed in the proposition they gave me. They could have given me the proper information to have the best likelihood of saving our homeland, but instead, they had only put hurdles in my way. If I had been told of the deadly diseases that lurked on the Outside and if I had not been made to endure a car crash, I was certain I would have been able to start my search for a witch.

Snap out of it, I told myself. The Council obviously did not have enough time to inform me of everything I would encounter. If they did have the time, they would have told me about it. Simple as that.

The thought of not having the proper support from the Council only made my stomach tumble more. Soon, the tears that threatened to make an appearance were because the pain I endured was so overwhelming. My body contracted, trying to throw up once again, but this time all I could do was dry heave.

Mina informed me there was not much they could do for the flu. While she was able to supply me with fluids and a fever reducer, my body would have to ride out the flu — there was no cure for it. My body was putting up a fight, but it was a miserable existence going through the flu when you had never gone through so much as any illness before.

I tried to sleep off my symptoms, but my body was not so compliant. My mind was screaming for relief from the pain rippling through my stomach, but the pain had my brain so occupied it could not focus on anything else.

I imagined I was quite pitiful, tossing and turning over in the bed, trying to get comfortable even if it was just for a couple minutes. Despite my attempts to suppress any groans, the pain was too all encompassing for me to not hiss as I tossed and turned.

So caught up in just trying to breathe without dry heaving, I didn't notice Mina left the room and, in the meantime, someone else walked in.

"Why didn't you tell me?" Theo's voice was distant, almost uncomfortable.

I tried to sit up, but my stomach protested. Instead, I settled for just looking up at Theo while pushing back into the plush mattress below me.

"How could I?" I mumbled back to him in a raspy voice, frustratedly.

"How could you?" His tone was almost mocking. "You're my mate for fucks sake, Sage."

His anger caught me off guard. His ember eyes were staring daggers into my soul, making my body want to crawl under the covers to hide — if only I had enough strength to do so. Not being able to bear his stare, I abruptly turned my head to the side.

"I didn't ask for this," I breathed out sheepishly, my arms pressing firmly into the mattress beneath me. Fortunately, this movement helped battle the turmoil in my stomach, allowing me to breathe a little lighter.

"And you think I asked for a mate who was raised to hate my very existence?" He pushed further, and I couldn't decipher what he wanted from me.

"I'm sorry. Theo, I'm sorry you got such a terrible mate, but I can't just suddenly be the person you need me to be. As you said, I was raised to hate your existence. I was raised to basically kill myself if I ever found out I even had a mate," the words I spoke were true. Despite having turned my head away from his gaze, I could feel his stare puncturing into my soul.

"What do they tell you that makes you hate us so much?" He asked, his voice laced with a tinge of pain.

I found it hard to swallow, my throat drying up even more at his words.

He wasn't supposed to know, is all I could think. He wasn't supposed to find out about me being from the Borderlands. I was going to try and fit in, find a witch, and then return to the Borderlands. Theo was never supposed to find out about me being from the Borderlands. Never. I knew it wasn't practical to think Theo would never find out the truth, but I knew it would complicate things — it would complicate everything.

"That you live and breathe for death, especially for the death of humans," I whispered, knowing he would not take my words lightly. The Borderland's beliefs were harsh, but that did not mean they weren't true.

"Have you seen any evidence of that, Sage?" Theo inquired, as I could hear him move closer. Before long, he was at the side of my bed, his feet in my line of sight.

Weakly, I shook my head, looking up at him. While I had watched a fight between two Werewolves last night, I had never seen one impose any violence on humans. Theo even apparently freed Gracie and Natasha. Of course, he could have just been feeding me lies when he said he freed them, but he did not even pretend to have malice for humans.

"What else?" He tilted his head to the side.

"They say if a werewolf has a human mate, they will only want them for their body, for their bond," I said even quieter than last time, the thought of being intimate with Theo invading my thoughts.

"Any evidence of that, Sage?" He raised up his eyebrow, folding his arms over his chest.

Again, I shook my head. Theo had not tried to complete the mate bond. He even said he restrained himself from marking me. I didn't know why, though, and I couldn't be sure that he did not have an ulterior motive.

I continued. "They said if you fall under the spell of someone like you, it's all just an act."

"Why did you leave the Borderlands if you feel this way?" His face scrunched up, and he took a seat at the side of my bed.

His question was valid, but I could not think of a good answer. I could not just tell him I was in the search of a witch. My gut was telling me he would never allow me to go back to the Borderlands. He would not approve of me trying to make the Border stronger. My family would forever be locked away from me, out of reach.

"To find my Ma," I reasoned with a half-truth; this way, I was not completely lying to him. "She left the Borderlands when I was eight. Pa could never move on, no matter how hard he tried to convince me he had. I need to find out what happened to her. For him. Not that I've been able to get very far in searching for her. I don't even really know where to begin," I confessed, closing my eyes to brace myself for Theo's response.

The cloth Mina placed on my forehead was no longer cold, and I could feel my body heating up. A shiver ran over me, and despite the sweat dripping off my body, I was cold.

My body tensed, waiting for an answer. Yet, I was met with silence. Apprehensively, I opened my eyes to see Theo smiling oddly.

"What?" I asked, confused by his toothy grin.

Silence.

"What?" I repeated.

His smile grew wider before he finally dared to break the silence: "I think I know of a way to make both of us happy. I'll help you find your mom if you let your guard down and try to accept the mate bond."

My life seemed to be filled with propositions — propositions that would be unwise to refuse. And, for that, I knew my answer immediately.

"We've got a deal."