“As a matter of fact, I believe it was your father and I.”
“Seriously?” I sat up in my chair. That couldn’t be a coincidence. They were the last before the termination, and their son was the first to begin it again? “Don’t you think that’s a little suspicious?”
“Who am I to say?” She threw her hands up. “I supposed I thought it had always been Clara, but now that I look back she didn’t Arrow until she’d switched packs. It was 20 years ago, and for a good ten of them we just assumed there weren’t Arrows occurring because no one was of age yet.”
“So you, Grammy, and Gramps visit the Ranch, causing you and Dad to Arrow. Then, he becomes Alpha, and the Arrows just stopped?” I had heard that Dad’s ascension to Alpha had been a rapid occurrence, but I hadn’t realized how strangely timed everything seemed to be.
“I don’t think your father’s ascension to Alpha stopped the Arrowing, if that’s what you think,” she said sternly, “and it wasn’t so rapid-fire like you make it out to be. Your dad didn’t assume the position of Alpha until weeks into our marriage when Pops decided to pass it down. For all we know, the Arrows could have frozen long before that happened.”
“I’m not saying his ascension is to blame, but I think everything has to be affected by each other in some way. It’s all too closely connected, it has to mean something!”
“You’ve read the histories, you tell me what it means.” She nodded to the scroll in my hand. I could tell she was a little irritated by my questions.
“I’m sorry, I don’t mean to bother you with all of this,” I said, leaning back into the chair dejectedly. She smiled tiredly.
“It’s not you I’m frustrated with. Since this all first started happening, your father and I read those scrolls until our eyes bled. Then he was gone, and suddenly I was both CEO of the ranch and Alpha. Everyone looked to me for answers on both that I didn’t have. I just miss having someone to share the load with.”
“Ma, I’m here for you!” I insisted, “I know I wasn’t always the most helpful, but I have your back now one hundred percent. I’ll take on any kind of work: clan or ranch related.”
“Thank you, son. I do appreciate you taking such an interest in these matters. I have to warn you, however, that your investigation will turn up nothing. I practically know our kind’s history by heart, and not once anywhere has a loss in Arrows been reported.”
“Nowhere?” I asked in disbelief. She shook her head ominously.
“I’ve done the research. They call Arrowing by other names elsewhere, mind you, but the process is essentially the same. We are the only clan in the world that this has happened to. Everywhere else the natural progressions for shifters haven’t faltered or paused in any way.”
I sat back as I thought about this. What made our shifter clan so special or flawed to warrant such an unheard of misfortune? It was if our very own nature was turning against us, weakening our numbers. I stood up and paced around the room as I tried to identify any dire sins we could have committed. It’s like Sophie had said about Beau: “I just don’t know what you could have done to deserve this.”
Suddenly it hit me. “Ma,” I said tentatively, “What if it isn’t something wrong within our clan that affected the Arrows, but something outside of it?”
“What are you saying, boy?”
“What I mean is: if a witch can tear a shifter from his pack, who’s to say a witch can’t tear a shifter from his soul mate?”
She sat up straight in her chair, “You think this was Beau’s witch’s doing?”
“Why not?” I paced around a little faster with excitement. “It’s a way of making us weaker, isn’t it? Our numbers stopped growing! If the Arrows hadn’t stopped, there’d be a lot more new shifters than just Liam running around the ranch, because there’d be a lot of younger parents.”
“Beau was here for fifteen years of the Arrow drought, un-Arrowed himself. Why would he subject himself to that, or stick around for over ten years during it before abandoning us?”
“He always hated us irrationally,” I thought out loud, “Maybe this was his plan all along: Weaken us with years without Arrows and when he felt we were the most vulnerable, escape and create a pack of his own with Ripped wolves to attack us. He doesn’t just want to be an alpha of a pack, he wants to destroy the pack that rejected him!”
“I think you’d better call Chloe,” she said with a serious nod, “She might have a better idea of how plausible this is, if this kind of magic even exists.”
I got my phone out to send Chloe a text. I knew what Chloe would say, because it was her that had introduced me to the anti-Arrow spell in the first place.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Sophia
I was sitting on one of the large leather armchairs in Noah’s living room, facing Noah and his friends who sat together on the long couch. Even Connall had squeezed himself in there, and I was surprised to see him humoring Benji and his idea for a “Q&A Session”. It was clear the kid felt guilty about the incident and wanted me to feel comfortable with the idea of shifters as much as possible.
“We’ll start with an easy one,” I began, “How does the first shift happen?”
“I’ll take this one,” Frankie offered, looking around at the boys before turning back to me, “It’s like a girl’s period. Benji stop groaning and grow up! It’s very much connected to puberty. You’re in the process of maturing into an adult, and it just happens.”
“Randomly? Isn’t that risky if you’re in public?” I could only imagine what would have happened if Benji had been grocery shopping when it first it him.
“It’s usually spawned by a heightened emotion,” Connall clarified, “Growing up we were taught to keep our tempers low when we were outside the ranch.”
“Sounds like a good way to make your kids behave well,” I joked. They agreed with a laugh and I thought of my next question. “You’re not at all affected by the moon?”
“No, that’s werewolves,” Milo clarified.
“Okay.” I nodded. “Next question: Noah showed me how you all heal really quickly. Any other superhuman abilities?”
“Strength,” Connall started.
“You saw that first-hand,” Benji said with a wink. He flexed his bicep and Milo punched him in the gut with a roll of his eyes.
“Apart from turning into a wolf, anything we can do is basically human, just amped up to a thousand,” Milo said, taking over the discussion. I moved on with a nod.
“As Alpha, can Adeline tell you what to do out of wolf form? Or do you only have to do what she says when you’re transformed?”
“Her Alpha commands are effective in either body,” Noah answered, “But she doesn’t like to assert her authority unless absolutely necessary.”
“That being said, ever since he first shifted Noah has had the cleanest room out of all of us,” Milo added, “There’s a reason for that.” I laughed, just trying to picture a grumpy young Noah being forced to clean his room. That was definitely an ingenious move on Adeline’s part.
“So being a shifter is genetic? You can’t be bitten or turned in any way?” I wasn’t just asking because I had a secret desire to be one myself, I was also asking because I wondered what it would happen if I had kids with Noah. Here I was, thinking about our kids when only the night before I assured my father I wasn’t even getting married.
“It’s passed down through bloodlines,” Connall said with a nod, “You can only be a shifter if a shifter came before you.”
“So there are clans, or packs, or groups of shifters located all over America? And no one has ever suspected a thing?”
“There are packs all over the world,” Milo clarified, “And we are very good at being discreet. There are rules in place to make sure our secret doesn’t get out.”
“Who enforces these rules? Is there a shifter president or something?”
“Not exactly, but there is a hierarchy of power,” he responded with a smile, “Every couple yea
rs all of the Alphas meet up and convene to discuss the problems and pressing matters regarding our kind. In the interim, if there’s an emergency they’re called to band together and deal with it.”
“Interesting,” I commented.
“Opposite of interesting,” Benji scoffed, “Why aren’t you asking any fun questions yet?”
“Like what?” I asked with a laugh.
“Like aren’t you wondering about how we handle coming out of wolf form naked?” He waggled his eyebrows and Milo punched him in the gut again.
“Okay, you’re right,” I conceded, “I am a little curious about that. How do you ‘handle’ that?”
“It’s a three step process,” he said, clasping his hands together and raising his index fingers to his lips. Everyone groaned at his dramatics. “Step One: Loose t-shirts and tear-away pants at all times until you can properly control your shift. Step Two: We have hiding spots all over the woods for lockboxes that contain clothes in emergency situations. And finally, and this is the best part-” he warned as he reached into his pocket and pulled out a tiny black roll of fabric. He unraveled it to reveal what looked like a drawstring polyester shopping bag with a super long vinyl cord handle, “When we plan to shift, we place our clothes in these bags and place the handle over our head and around our neck. That way, wherever we go in wolf form, our clothes come with us.”
“That’s pretty crafty,” I admitted. It was a solution I would not have thought up myself. Noah laughed and rolled his eyes.
“Every pack approaches the clothing issue differently,” he said with a shake of his head, “I’ve known plenty of packs to be naturists and not bother to worry about it.”
“My family in Mexico wears loin cloths with expandable waists so they’re never caught with their pants down,” Milo contributed.
“Exactly,” Noah agreed, “The roll up bags are just something my dad and Uncle Peyton invented when the ranch re-opened and streaking was a major concern.”
I laughed and was about to move on to the next question, but was cut off by the sight of Adeline standing in the doorway. By her side were two people I had never seen before. One of them was a tall, beautiful black woman wearing a long maroon dress and lot of jewelry. The other person was shorter, with cropped dark hair and thick eyebrows.
“Chloe?” Noah asked, “What are you doing here?”
“Noah,” the tall girl responded, “We need to talk.” I was immediately struck by the way she said his name: it was too familiar, and I didn’t like it. Immediately, Noah got up and followed them out of the room, not saying another word to any of us. The rest of the group on the couch slowly turned back around and looked at me guiltily.
“Here’s another question,” I said, trying to keep my voice light, “Who the heck was that?”
➹➹➹
Noah
“I got your text,” Chloe explained as we made our way into Adeline’s office, “And I did some research. This is Phoenix by the way, they’re a member of my coven.”
“It’s nice to meet you,” I nodded to Phoenix, eager to move on to the point of their visit. They responded with a quick nod.
“Tell him what you told me,” Adeline encouraged. Chloe took a deep breath and looked at me forebodingly.
“Not only is an anti-Arrow spell of that caliber possible, but I think that’s exactly what’s happened to your pack.” It was just as I expected.
“You’re sure of this?” I insisted, “The last time we spoke about it you made it seem like it was a spell that only worked on one person.” She looked away guiltily, before reaching into her bag and pulling out what looked to be a very large and old book.
“I only knew about the spell back then from stealing it out of my mother’s grimoire,” she explained, “I didn’t think it was anything out of the ordinary until I had Phoenix look into it. The more we researched the more we discovered that this is a magic that had never been done by witches before.”
“What does that mean?” I asked.
“It means this is an original spell,” Phoenix replied, gesturing their hand to the book. Chloe placed it on my mother’s desk and opened it to a certain page. I raked my eyes from top to bottom, not understanding most of the symbols and having difficulty reading the scrawled handwriting.
“I don’t understand,” I said, looking up. Chloe smiled sadly.
“Noah, my mother developed this spell for Beau. My family is the reason your pack has been weakened for so many years.”
I looked at Ma and she looked down at the floor with a sorrowful expression. For so many years Eden had been a close friend of Ma’s, and now we discovered she was the reason behind our clan’s plague.
“Why would she do that?” I demanded. Chloe’s eyes brimmed with tears.
“I don’t know.”
“Ask her!” I yelled. Chloe flinched and Phoenix stepped in my face, a raised hand with spread fingers threatening me.
“Phoenix, it’s okay,” Chloe put a hand on their shoulder and coaxed them aside. She looked at me sadly, “Noah, I can’t ask her because she’s missing.”
“What?”
“That’s the reason why I stepped up as High Priestess. She was supposed to visit my Aunt for a weekend but she never returned. We didn’t want to raise alarm, or appear weak, so we just lied to everyone and simply said she was unavailable.”
“Your Aunt in Canada,” I clarified, “You know what this means, don’t you?”
“Yes, Noah,” Adeline interjected, “Eden is responsible for the Rippings too.”
I ran a hand through my hair as I paced the room. Was she the one who poisoned my mother as well? How could she betray us like this?
“I’m so sorry, Noah,” Chloe cried, the tears streaming down her face, “I had no idea. I’ll do everything I can to fix this. You can trust me.”
“How?” I snarled, “How can I trust that you won’t just turn around and try to kill us like your mother?”
“There must be a reason why she’s doing this! Eden loved Adeline, she always said so! Maybe she’s being blackmailed-“ she wiped the tears from her face- “Either way, I’m going to make sure she doesn’t do any more harm.”
“I think you should go,” I said, moving towards the door.
“Wait!” she said, stopping me before I could leave, “There’s something else you need to know.”
“What?” I asked, guardedly.
“My aunt wouldn’t answer my calls so I had the coven summon her. She looked so scared, Noah, but she kept denying everything. All she gave us was a warning before closing the channel off from us completely.”
“What was the warning?”
“Thanks to the help of my mother, he has gotten control over the Ripped wolves. They’re listening to him and they’re almost ready to attack. Noah,” she whispered, “they’re coming for all of you.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
Sophia
They all dodged my question with coughs and averted eyes, so I resolved my curiosity with the plan to force it out of Noah later. To ease the tension, I asked everyone their story about the first time they shifted.
“Benji’s was hands-down the best,” Milo declared, once his testimonial was finished. Everyone laughed and nodded in agreement.
“I got shampoo in my eye and I was so mad about it I shifted right there in the shower,” Benji said with a shrug.
“Shattered the shower door in the transformation,” Frankie added, “and if that wasn’t enough the big goon then proceeded to flail about the tiny bathroom, breaking just about everything else in there too.”
“Bathrooms are slippery!” Benji raised his hands in defense. “I can barely stay balanced in them on two feet, let alone four.”
We all laughed until Noah burst into the room again. I was thinking I hadn’t seen him that angry since I almost died falling out of my window when suddenly I was being yanked to my feet and pulled from the room.
“Sophie’s leaving,” he said through his teeth. I
was?
“Uh, bye then?” Milo asked, watching me be forced from the room. I allowed Noah to pull me all the way out the front door as I racked my brain for the exact moment I did something wrong. I came up with nothing.
“Why am I leaving?” I asked, as he began the walk to my car. He didn’t answer, continuing to walk ahead with hurried steps. “Noah, please,” I pleaded as I pulled back on my arm a little, my eyes beginning to well with worried tears, “What did I do?” He continued to ignore me, and suddenly I was filled with rage. I yanked my arm back forcefully, pulling him to look me in the eye. “Talk to me!” I yelled.
His eyes finally connected with mine, and they looked unhinged. I grasped either side of his face as I searched my favorite green irises for answers. “What’s going on?” I whispered, overcome with fear. He placed his hands over mine and shook his head with closed eyes.
“It’s not safe,” he said, his voice hoarse, “It isn’t safe.”
“What’s not safe?”
“Me. Us. You.”
“Noah, you’re not making any sense. Just tell me what happened! Who was that girl? What did she say to you?”
“What don’t you get?” he yelled, “IT’S NOT SAFE. You asked me if being with me was dangerous, and I lied.”
“W-what?” I stuttered. Where was this coming from?
“I was so afraid to lose you, I guess I let myself believe that there could be no risk involved in loving you. But Beau’s coming for us, Sophie, and he wants the entire pack dead.”
“No,” I blurted.
“He’s headed here with a pack of Ripped wolves dead-set on destroying us.”
“But I thought you said that Ripped wolves were rabid and uncontrollable! How is he commanding an army like that?”
“He has a powerful witch on his side,” he said bitterly, “There’s no end to what he can do.”
“What are you going to do?” I asked desperately. There had to be something that could stop this!
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