by TJ Klune
“I don’t know.” He looked down at our hands. “Maybe.”
“He won’t hurt you. Neither will Joe. They want you here almost as much as I do.”
He looked at me. Kelly had given him a piece of leather cut from his pack. Gavin had used it to pull his hair back off his face, tying it off. It looked good on him, even if his brow was furrowed. “You’re different.”
“How?”
He shook his head. “Just… more. Different. Stronger? I think. Not like you were before.” He flashed his violet eyes at me. “You were like me. Animal. Wolf. And in the cabin, the same.”
It hit me then. “You didn’t know me as a Beta. I was always an Omega, ever since you came to Green Creek.”
He looked away. “Not like me. Not anymore.”
I squeezed his hand. “Is that bad?”
“I don’t know. Just here. By myself.”
“You’re not,” Kelly said, and Gavin jerked his head up. Kelly glanced at him before looking out at the road before us. “It doesn’t matter if you’re an Omega or a Beta. You don’t have to do this alone, Gavin. You saw what happened when you left. Carter found you. Remember that, okay? And this isn’t just about Carter. We were all looking for you.”
“Looking for my father,” Gavin bit out.
“That too,” Kelly allowed. “But if we could find him, we could find you. And not just because of what you are to my brother.”
“What am I?” he asked, and it was a challenge.
“Yeah,” Kelly said dryly. “I’m not even going to touch that. You two can figure that out on your own. I think.”
I opened my mouth to snap at him, but the words died on the tip of my tongue.
I barely noticed the blue house passing us by on the left.
Because there, standing on the porch at the house at the end of the lane, was the rest of my pack.
Robbie was bouncing on his feet, his glasses crooked on his face.
My uncle Mark was smiling a secret smile, the raven on his neck looking as if its wings were fluttering. Gordo had told me they’d thought about trying to remove Mark’s raven like they’d done to his own, but Aileen and Patrice hadn’t thought it necessary.
Bambi stood near the door, a bundle in her arms. I watched as she leaned down and pressed a kiss to a small sliver of skin.
Jessie had her arm wrapped around the waist of Dominique, her head lying on her shoulder.
And there, walking slowly down the steps, a shawl wrapped around her shoulders, was a queen.
My mother.
Elizabeth Bennett.
Her hair sat in a loose ponytail over one shoulder. Her hand was already at her mouth, and even from this distance, I could see the sheen in her eyes.
“Mom?” I whispered.
She tilted her head back toward the sky, tears falling freely. She was beautiful, this woman, this wonderful woman who had given so much. A sharp lance of guilt pierced my heart because I knew that I’d only added to it. I needed her forgiveness. I needed her to see me. I needed her to tell me I would always be her son, even in the face of what I’d done.
She was all I could see.
Kelly climbed out of the truck.
I pulled my hand away from Gavin.
I stepped out into our territory. It washed over me, and I wanted to howl because this was where I belonged, this was where I was supposed to be.
This was my home. This place. These people.
My mother took a step toward me.
She said, “Carter.”
She said, “Hello.”
She said, “You’re here.”
She said, “I knew you’d come home.”
She said, “I always knew.”
And then she was running.
I caught her as she leapt at me. I stumbled back but somehow managed to stay upright. Her hands were in my hair, and she was sobbing against my chest, and I’d forgotten how much bigger than her I was, the top of her head barely at my chin, and I was struck by the dissonance in her, how fragile she seemed. How breakable, but it was all a lie. She was strong, stronger than anyone else I knew. I didn’t know how she’d done it. How she’d survived after all she’d lost. And I, blinded to anything else but Gavin, Gavin, Gavin, had only added to it. These happy tears were for me, but I didn’t know if I deserved them.
I said, “I found him. Mom, I found him, and I know I should have listened, I know I should have trusted you more, but I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t think. I was lost in my own head, and I thought I was doing the right thing. I thought I could keep it away from you. Keep all the death and blood and fire. That if I could do this on my own, you wouldn’t feel like you were being torn apart.”
And she said, “It doesn’t matter, it doesn’t matter. Not anymore. You’re home. You’re home, and all the rest will come later.” She pulled back, taking my face in her hands. Her smile was watery, her cheeks flushed. Her blue eyes were so much like my own, and I wished I could be as brave as she was. As forgiving. And, as she was a mother, she said, “You’re too skinny. Why are you so skinny? Didn’t you eat? I’ll feed you. I’ll feed you until you’re sick of food, and then I’ll make you eat more.”
I laughed then, at the ridiculousness of it all. And if it came out cracked and soft, then it was just for us.
She kept ahold of me as the others came, never letting me get too far away from her.
Mark was first. My father’s brother. He looked different, though it wasn’t entirely physical. He was a Beta again. He seemed calmer, more at ease. He pressed his cheek against mine, rubbing his scent into me. I sucked in a breath, and I remembered being a kid, maybe five or six, and my uncle putting me up on his shoulders, my legs draped over his chest. “You ready to fly?” he’d said, and I crowed with my arms over my head. He’d run then, run through the forest, faster than any human, the wind whipping through my hair. He’d been laughing, and when we’d come back, my father had smiled at us, arms over his chest.
Mark said, “I’m so happy you’re home. After all this time. Here you are.”
“Here I am,” I whispered, and then he was with Gordo, kissing him soundly, lips smacking. Gordo grumbled at him, but he didn’t mean it. He was smiling, the lines around his eyes and mouth deep and kind.
Jessie came next, standing in front of me, looking me up and down critically. “Bennett.”
“Alexander.”
“You’re up to your neck in shit.”
“I figured as much.”
And then she jumped on me, wrapping her legs around my hips, her chin hooked over my shoulder. “Dumbass,” she muttered against my skin. I spun her around, her hair smelling like lilacs.
Dominique was there, eyes alight. They were orange, and it was a piece of a puzzle I never knew we were missing. She was packpackpack, and I wondered what she sounded like when she sang to the moon now that she had found healing. She spoke in her whiskey-smooth voice, her lips quirking. “I’m not going to jump on you.”
I set her girlfriend down. “You sure about that?”
“Pretty sure, white boy. You’re as thin as a whisper. I don’t think you can handle me.”
I grinned at her. “We could always find out.” I held out my arms.
“Another time.” She leaned in and kissed me on the corner of my mouth. “Welcome back, Carter.” She stepped back, Jessie taking her by the hand as she wiped her eyes.
Robbie nearly tripped down the steps. The haunted look that had been a permanent fixture since he’d returned to Green Creek was gone. The recovery of his memories had taken a toll on him, but he’d had the pack to hold him up as he found his place again. He was shaking his head, and before he came to me, he touched Kelly’s face, fingers trailing along his jaw. “You did it,” he said quietly.
Kelly nodded. “Told you I would.”
Robbie turned to me. He puffed out his chest, hands on his hips. “I’m going to kick your ass.”
I blinked. “Uh. Okay? Well. You can try, but unless you learne
d some new shit while I was gone, you’re going down, Fontaine.”
And then he was in my arms. “You don’t know what it was like,” he whispered. “You can’t do that again. Not to Kelly. Not to Joe. They need you, Carter. And we do too, almost as much as they do. Promise me. We can’t go through this again.”
And even though I couldn’t make such a promise, I did anyway.
Bambi was last. She moved slowly down the steps with her precious cargo. Rico was at her side, and it was as if he was glowing from the inside. He was strutting, continually glancing between Bambi and the baby in her arms.
They stopped before me.
Bambi said, “Would you like to meet your nephew?”
“But we’re not—”
“Carter.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
And then I had an armful of blanket and child, Rico telling me I needed to prop up his head, adjusting my elbow until I had it right. “I read a lot of books,” Rico told me. “I take this shit very seriously.”
I looked down.
Joshua Thomas Espinoza stared up at me, blinking slowly. His eyes were dark, like his father’s. Rico pulled the blanket back slightly, and a little hand reached up to touch my nose and chin. I pressed my lips against his forehead, breathing him in. “Hello,” I whispered to him. “It’s so nice to meet you. I’m Carter. Apparently I’m your uncle, even though that’s not quite how genetics—”
“Carter.”
I shook my head. “Yeah, yeah.” I looked up at Bambi and Rico. “You did good.”
“Right?” Rico said. “He’s pretty much the most beautiful baby ever born. And I can say that with absolute certainty. I’ve seen baby pictures for most of the people here. You were all ugly compared to him. Especially Tanner.”
“Hey!” Tanner glared at him. “You know I was dropped a few times. It’s not my fault I had a weird-shaped head. Not cool, man.”
And then my mother said, “Who do we have here?”
I turned to look at who she was talking to, Bambi taking Joshua back.
I had a moment of panic, fierce and terrible, when I saw the truck was empty, the passenger door hanging open. He was gone, he was gone, he was—
“Hello,” my mother said.
A timber wolf stood at the back of the truck, peering around the side. He saw us looking at him and ducked back like he was trying to hide, but he was too big. I could see the tops of his ears over the truck, the curve of his back. He leaned his head forward again just barely, nose and whiskers twitching. He whined quietly and pulled his head back again.
I started to step forward, but Ox grabbed me by the arm, shaking his head. Just wait, he mouthed.
I did.
Mom approached the timber wolf slowly, her shawl fluttering behind her. She only had eyes for him, and he watched her warily, ducking his head back behind the truck again as if she wouldn’t be able to see him.
She stopped near the back wheel well and took the shawl from her shoulders, settling it on the ground in the thin crust of snow. She sat down upon it, hands on her knees. It was cold, and I could see the gooseflesh along her arms, but she stayed still.
She said, “Gavin.”
He made a noise that I’d never heard a wolf make before, almost like the hoot of an owl. It was as if he were acknowledging her. He knew what she was.
She said, “You were with us for a long time. And I knew you as much as a mother knows her children, though you were always as you are now. I would like to see your face, if you’d show it to me.”
He pawed at the ground.
She nodded as if she understood. “You saved us. You saved Carter. When all seemed lost, when my son’s fate lay in the hands of a monster, you found it in yourself to let go of the wolf and return to your true self. I never got a chance to thank you for that. I’d like to now.”
He leaned around the truck again, this time his whole head. His eyes were violet.
“You had a place here,” she said. “With us. Even when you were lost to your wolf, you recognized us for what we were. What Gordo was. What Carter was. Isn’t that right?”
He huffed out a breath in response.
“But regardless of family or fate, you would still have belonged to us just as much as we belonged to you.”
He stepped out from behind the truck.
“Jesus,” Rico whispered behind me. “I’d forgotten how big he was.”
Gavin glanced at me over my mother’s shoulder. I nodded at him, and he turned his gaze back to her, though he kept his distance.
“I know you’re scared,” she said. “And you’re unsure. It’s blue. But I see the green in you. You know us. You know this place, don’t you.” It wasn’t a question.
He took a step toward her.
She said, “Can I tell you a secret?”
He cocked his head.
She said, “I knew your mother, brief though the moment was. I have this… gift. Ever since I could remember. It doesn’t always work, but when it does, I know what I’m witnessing. Certain people shine. Brightly, as if their innate goodness was a palpable thing. Her name was Wendy. Wendy Walsh. And she shone. It was happenstance, this meeting, the passing of ships in the night. She didn’t know who I was, but I knew her. She was lovely. An innocent in all of this. She didn’t know what we did. She didn’t know what your father truly was. She only saw what he allowed her to see, as was his way.”
Gavin growled.
Mom nodded. “She was his tether. Was it fair of him to put that burden upon her? It would be hypocritical of me to say one way or another.”
Joe leaned his head against Ox’s shoulder.
“But I know this,” Mom continued. “She shone brightly. And I wondered then, as I do now, what things would have been like if only we’d done right by her. If Abel Bennett had brought her into the fold instead of sending her away. We are wolves, yes. We can do many things that others cannot. But we can still make mistakes. Awful, terrible mistakes. We should have seen what was coming. We should have known how deep the darkness ran within our own pack. We didn’t, and she suffered because of it. Her hand was forced in a way it never should have been. And you… you were never given a chance to know you had a family. A brother.”
Gordo looked away, Mark whispering in his ear.
“I’ll ask for your forgiveness,” my mother said. “But I won’t demand it. It’s not conditional of you being here. You’ll always have a choice of whom to trust. But if you allow it, I would like to earn it. I know it’ll take time, and time may be something we don’t have. But you are not a thing to be discarded. You are flesh and blood. You are important. And not just because of my son or my witch. You are important to me, to this pack, because you have proven yourself beyond measure. We have lost much. We have suffered.” Her voice cracked, but she pushed on. “But we stand tall, because we are the Bennett pack.”
Gavin bowed his head.
She reached out slowly. He didn’t pull away as she pressed her hand on the underside of his jaw, lifting his head. She looked so small compared to him, but she was unafraid. “Regardless of what relationships you forge with the pack, what decisions you make about the future you see for yourself, you will always have a place here. I have missed you. I know the wolf before me, and if you’ll let me, I’d like to know the man.”
He stepped away from her. He looked above her at the rest of us. No one spoke.
He looked to me.
I nodded.
He walked back behind the truck. The hair along his back began to recede as muscle and bone shifted. He gasped quietly. Gordo stepped forward. He went around to the passenger side of the truck and gathered up the clothes Gavin had discarded. He walked to the back, muttering to his brother that it was too cold to be naked. Gavin grunted, and Gordo sighed.
When Gavin reappeared, he was wearing jeans and a coat, though he’d forgone the shirt and shoes. He looked skittish as he stepped out from behind the truck, hands clenched in fists at his sides.
&nbs
p; “He’s like a hotter version of Gordo,” Bambi muttered.
Jessie snorted into her hand as Rico glared at the both of them.
But Gavin only had eyes for my mother.
She stood slowly. “Gavin,” she said.
He nodded, head jerking up and down, eyes darting side to side. I wanted to go to him, to tell him it would be all right, but I was rooted in place.
“I like your face,” Mom told him. “It’s a good face.”
He grimaced, hair hanging down. He reached up and brushed it back. And then he said, “Music.”
“Music?”
He nodded again. “You. In the kitchen. Or… painting. You play music. You sing.”
“I do,” she said.
“I… like. The music. I like it. When you sing. I remember.”
I could hear her smiling. “I thought as much. You should know that no one else watches me paint. I won’t allow it. It’s private. Personal. I need focus. Not even Thomas was allowed in my studio. He never knew how to stay quiet. His sons get that from him.”
“Always talking,” Gavin muttered.
“Yes. They tend to do that. There was only one other person who ever watched me paint, and though our time together was brief, I will treasure it always.”
“Who?” Gavin asked.
“Her name was Maggie. She was Ox’s mother. And like your mother, she shone brightly. I loved her more than I can put into words.”
“She’s gone,” Gavin said.
“Yes,” Mom said quietly. “Gone with the moon. Like so many others.”
He gnawed on his bottom lip. “Not good. At this. Being human.”
“You seem like you’re very good at it to me, but I understand how it’s easier to stay as a wolf. Before you came, and after Thomas and Maggie were taken from us, I only knew grief. I was a wolf for many months. It hurt too much otherwise. But pain is life. It reminds us of what we have. It’s a lesson I wish none of us had to learn, but sometimes we don’t have a choice. And yet here we are, as we are now. Together again. I know it’s not what we planned, but I like to think everything happens for a reason.”
“My father.” His mouth twisted down.
“Yes.”
“Bad wolf.”
“Is he?”