"A poisoner." I sighed down into my lap and reached inside my pocket for the little jar of poison that was so much stronger than Baba’s. Shay’s creation, only because I begged her to help.
"Faust would've gotten it somewhere else if not from your dad. Something even more powerful, and there'd be even fewer of my pack left.” He went quiet for a long moment, the food in his hand forgotten. “Maybe all of us would be dead."
"You blamed me, though, when we were in Margin."
"I didn't know you. I didn't know how deep into this war you were willing to go."
As deep as the war went. Deeper if it meant getting Archer, Grady, and Ronin back.
I took a bite of the sharp, tangy pickle as I mulled over my next thought. "When you were what?" At his silence, I clarified, "You were talking about my baba when he was masking your scent when you were what?"
A beat of hesitation. "Nearby in the Crimson Forest."
"Doing what?"
Moments passed, churning over each other like the steady grind of Thomas's teeth even though he’d long since swallowed. Somehow, I’d struck a nerve.
"Hunting," he finally said, and his lethal tone chased a shiver down my back.
"So you were there that day Baba was shot, nearby. Did you see Lager, the bald man? Or me ride away on my horse?"
"No. I heard the shots and smelled the blood."
"You didn't hear anything else?” My voice pitched higher. “No shouts from my neighbors' house?"
"Nothing."
Jade would've been screaming her head off though. Unless for some reason, she couldn't.
Unless she'd been knocked out. Lee, too, possibly.
My stomach plunged the food sideways, and I gripped the table tightly until I was sure I wouldn't be sick.
"I swore to Shay I wouldn't hurt Lager myself, and I won't, despite all he's done.” I exhaled slowly. “But Faust… I want to see him pay."
"You will," Thomas growled. "I'll take great pleasure in ending him."
"How? Where?" And why hadn’t he killed him before now? Unless the chance had never presented itself in almost two years’ time?
"Soon. Even with the help of the Slipjoint wolf pack—”
“The ones at the church in Margin?”
His eyes narrowed, and I had a feeling he wasn’t used to being interrupted. “Yes. Even with them, Faust and his pack still outnumber us. We need to surprise them like you did in Old Man's Den. And wouldn't it be something else if he died right at the opening of a ruby cave, the thing he’s so desperate to find."
My eyes widened. "You know where they are?"
"No."
"But you’re the alpha," I reminded him.
He turned the jar as if looking for a specific pickle. "You know that the ruby caves are only seen by female wolf shifters who are ready to breed with her harem. The females dream of the ruby caves, which is how they usually find them, but there have been cases when males and females stumbled upon one by accident. Unless invited in by a female, even the alpha can’t go inside or find them on his own because the caves move."
The caves moved? "But…you’re the alpha.”
He cut me a hard look. "So you’ve reminded me, but I’m not a female. Females have the real power in the Crimson Forest pack. They mate. They create life. That’s why they have the harems to protect them and the pups."
"But you weren’t in a harem by default?"
"Not by default, no. Not at all. I was invited many, many times to join a harem and breed in the ruby caves." He gazed at me, eyebrows lifted. “Harems are forever, though. And there were plenty of females only interested in the act of breeding, not in breeding itself.”
“Oh.” I nodded down at the table while my face burned all the way to the tips of my ears with my next thought. I shouldn't want to know this, but I asked it anyway. "Did Archer and Grady go to the ruby caves? Or stay outside…for the reasons you said?"
"A day never went by that Archer wasn't asked to the caves."
Of course he was. Falling in love with him had been effortless with his easy laugh and gorgeous…everything. I wasn't surprised.
"He never went," Thomas said carefully, and I could feel the harshness in his gaze soften some. "Sure, he messed around a lot outside the caves, but accepting an invite into the ruby caves is serious. Joining a harem is serious. Not to be done on a whim."
"And Grady?" I croaked.
"Grady is Grady. A lot of females liked him from a distance, but then they tried to talk to him.”
"I see your point."
“He wasn’t as bad then, but he wasn’t Archer either.”
It’s what I do to take the edge off of my nerves, Grady had once told me, right before sinking one hand down the front of my pants. To himself, he’d meant. He touched himself because he was too brash for the other female wolves? And yet he seemed so…experienced.
“There was one female he did like, though, a little thing,” Thomas said.
My blood squirmed at that, though I really ought to feel relief for him that he’d had someone.
“They made eyes at each other and then a whole lot more, but not in the caves.” Thomas stood abruptly, rocking the chair back and forth on its legs. “She was the first to die from poison.”
I gasped and covered my mouth, my pulse frozen. My chest ached fiercely for him. How terrible. I could only imagine how crushed he’d been afterward, how that might’ve helped cement the grouchy man he was. Now more than ever, I wanted to hold him. Both of them. Promise them everything would be all right.
"After the female and her harem leave the caves," Thomas said, his back to the fire, “they vanish and reappear somewhere else in the Crimson Forest. Some say the light of the rubies fades while inside, then dies, then births again somewhere else.”
Sasha plopped down on the table and laid her head on my hand.
“The cycle of life,” I said absently.
"Exactly.” He turned slowly toward the fire, all but blocking it with his size. “Fucking and leading my pack were what I was good at. Until they started dying."
Sasha sighed, such a sad sound, and her sweet breath rolled over my knuckles.
I reached out and stroked her. “Will Faust ever find the ruby caves?”
"He can’t,” Thomas said over his shoulder. “He rejected the Crimson Forest pack and started his own. We're tied to the Crimson Forest and the ruby caves though. Always have been since the pack has been around. When he walked away, the Crimson Forest and everything in it left him too."
"So he decided to try to take it back by force,” I said, nodding. “Why did he leave in the first place?"
He took a huge draw from the bottle and set it down hard. "Didn't like the new alpha. Plenty didn’t. Didn’t like that females could have multiple mates but not males."
I released a long, shuddery breath as I processed that. There was such bad blood between the brothers, and I had a feeling the rift was a tenuous, complicated thing similar to my relationship with Jade, only much, much rockier. I loved Jade more than I hated her, though, and it sounded like, at least deep down, Faust loved Thomas, too, if he couldn't find it in his small, cruel heart to kill his brother. Maybe I had it all wrong though.
"What about other wolves like the Slipjoint Forest pack?” I asked. “Do they have their own version of the ruby caves?"
"Every pack is different, but wolf mating is supposed to be sacred, secret, and even though they’ve helped me, I’m still an outsider to them. Faust could go join them if he really wanted, but he isn't a follower."
"He takes,” I spat. “Like Lager."
"I'll handle my brother when the time comes,” he said fiercely.
One thing was for sure—I believed him. And somehow or another, I’d handle Lager too.
Silence thickened the air inside the tiny cabin while Thomas stared, unmoving, into the flames. I’d learned so much, but there was still a lot I didn’t understand, especially the one thing I’d wondered since meeting Thomas. Fina
lly, I couldn’t take it anymore.
“But if babies are so important to your pack,” I blurted, “why won’t you even look at Sasha?”
He didn’t answer for the longest time, though I knew he’d heard me. Finally, he said in a low voice, "She was my sister's."
"She's still your sister's, and you're her family. You all are. That hasn't changed, and it never will. She doesn't blame you for what happened."
The muscles across his shoulders tightened. "You can't know that."
“I do. Just look at her. Hold her. You'll see for your—"
He breezed toward the door without a sound, and without his coat. “I’ve got first watch.”
Chapter Three
Winter made sure we didn't leave the next day. Or the next. And the next. Snow and wind bludgeoned the sides of the tiny cabin, and I thought for sure several times that it would crumble down on top of us.
And Thomas would never admit this, but the trek here likely did his wounds much more harm. He needed to rest.
With nothing left to do, I whittled more arrows by the fire while I studied Thomas's quiet movements, listened to the sound of his breaths, tried to figure out what made him tick. I could tell he was doing the same to me. It seemed like we were circling each other, caught in an eternal spin that never brought us closer but didn't force us apart either.
Sasha had curled up in a corner with a stick she'd rescued from the log pile by the fireplace, providing my eyes for me since she never stopped gazing at him with her head tilted. He sat in a hard-backed chair by the dancing flames with his legs spread while whittling too. His scarred face was so unique, beautifully handsome, but also free from emotions. He didn't wear a smile or frown like Archer or Grady; his normal expression was emptiness. But then he'd glance over at me, and his face would change slightly. A spark of curiosity. A hint of a question, but he never asked one. He only made observations.
There’s one more pickle left if you want it.
Archer did well on your arrows. Mine aren’t half as good.
Potato and bean stew sounds great. Again.
Our silences were far longer than our conversations, but at no point was I uncomfortable. We simply existed, together.
"I have to pee," I announced and stood from the chair opposite his.
Sighing, he stood, too, and reached for his coat slung over his chair. "Do all humans have tiny bladders?"
"I wouldn't know since I only have mine," I said absently as I hurried into my coat. After I buttoned it, I bent to pick up Sasha. "Come on, sweet girl. Time for another trip to the outhouse. This place isn't like our old cabin or Margin’s inn with a fancy indoor toilet."
She whimpered when I took the stick from her and set it down.
"It'll be here when we get back." I kissed her between the ears, and she melted in my arms like she always did. "Think your uncle will hold you while I do my business?"
Thomas threw open the door, a clear signal for me to shut up and hurry. Snow pelted inside. The wind howled and whipped down the fire. I darted us toward the door so it wouldn't go out altogether. The rope that led from the cabin to the outhouse had blown away two days ago, and without it guiding me, I didn't stand a chance of finding the outhouse or my way back even with Sasha's eyesight. There was nothing to see but blinding white and nothing to shout that winter didn’t scatter into the trees.
After latching the cabin door behind us, Thomas opened his large coat and wrapped us up tight in it. His warmth blocked the frigid cold, and the hard expanse of his body blocked the wind. Now came the strange part that made me smile into his chest. Circling one arm around his waist, I stepped up onto his boots and inhaled his natural scent—fresh snow. He started toward the outhouse with the two of us bundled against him. The first time I'd done it by accident, ducking into him as a shield and tripping over his feet in the process. Now it was just what we did when I had to pee, and it kept Sasha and me warm.
Despite how sweet it was, he never held Sasha for me while I went into the outhouse. I was beginning to think he couldn’t for some odd reason.
I'd just finished my business when Sasha, who'd been sniffing under the large crack in the door, growled. A real one this time, nothing cute about it as the sound spiked the hairs at the nape of my neck. I froze, only halfway through straightening my clothes.
Then, chaos.
The walls of the outhouse lifted skyward. Just…gone. I threw myself at Sasha and scooted her underneath me in a protective cocoon. All around us, the forest groaned and sounded like the trees were crashing together at top volume.
Terror sliced my heart and choked up my throat. What was happening? I didn't dare look, just kept my hands over my head, kept my body shielding Sasha.
"Thomas!" I tried to shout.
He'd been right outside the outhouse.
Something hailed down on my back with enough force to strike all the air from my lungs. More things crashed down around us. Was that what was left of the outhouse? Finally, the crashing stopped, leaving nothing but eerie howls. The wind, I hoped. Not wolves stealing off with Thomas.
One more something smashed down inches from my head and sprayed a veil of snow up over my hands and head. Something big. Oh god, what was it?
It took several attempts to drag in more breaths, then, "Thomas!"
"Aika!" A shout from a thousand miles away.
I lifted my head for a look, but Sasha was pressed up close to my leg and facing the other direction, shivering.
"It's okay," I told her, but I didn’t believe myself. My back ached where I'd been hit, and the snow seeped into my knees and pierced cold up through my hands. When I tried to circle her around so I could see, she shied away from my reaching hand. I couldn't blame her. I was terrified, too, and until I knew more, she was safest right where she was. Me too. Thomas would find me; my red coat was good for a lot more than warmth.
"Thomas!" I shouted again.
Nothing.
Shit. I tried again for Sasha so I could borrow her eyes, but she chomped down on my fingers. I yanked my hand away, tears filling my eyes. Guess I deserved that, but we couldn't stay outside forever like this.
I started to shove to my feet when large, warm hands gripped my arms and stopped me.
"Don't!" Thomas shouted.
“Why not?” I yelled. “What happened?"
"Grab the pup and she'll show you. We have to go now."
I was so tired of hearing that. It always meant something terrible had happened, was still happening.
It must've been the sound of Thomas's voice that either soothed Sasha or made her obey, because she let me pick her up and stuff her down the front of my coat. Then, I saw.
The outhouse, the cabin, the fire in the fireplace, my bow, every one of the arrows I'd whittled for the past three days—gone. Only a pile of splinters remained, each one gouging into my heart.
"A snow tornado," Thomas said. "Got the sleigh too."
Also known as a snow devil. Rare, but Jade had read about them to me.
I hissed a hot breath between my clenched teeth, feeling it billow up into my face and suffocate me. "One step forward, five steps back. We… We have nothing. Once again, we have nothing."
"No." He squeezed my arms and shook me hard so my building tears ran free. "You feel that. That rage. You hang on to that even if you think it's the only thing you have left. Don't ever let it go until this is done. Do you hear me? Don't—"
The wind howled louder, its eerie notes biting into my skin harder than the pelting snow.
"Don't what?" I shouted.
"Don't feel nothing," he yelled, most of his face covered by his tossed hair. “Don’t be like me.”
His words knocked me back a few steps. “What?”
"There's nothing in here.” He slammed his hand over his chest. “It's dead and empty. I’m dead and empty. I died the day my pack began to die. Faust did kill me."
Dead. Empty. He was wrong. Dead, empty people didn't wake shouting like he had every
night in the cabin. They didn't strike fear with just the tone of their voice. Telling him this wouldn't change his mind; he'd meet my protests with silence, so I did the only thing I could think of.
I stepped forward and wrapped my arm around him, the other around Sasha.
"I'm sorry," I said into his chest, and though I doubted he heard me, the wind carried the sentiment and cloaked us in this moment. A moment of understanding, the promise of peace kindling beneath my rage. Only a moment, but that was enough.
Slowly, almost hesitantly, he wrapped his coat around my back to block the wind. I stepped up onto his boots automatically, and a small smile cracked my frozen face. It was like we'd been preparing to travel far distances this way for the past three days in our practice treks to the outhouse.
We started away from what was left of the cabin with nothing but the coats on our backs, each other, and ourselves. Maybe that would be enough. No, it would be, because I still had the little jar of four-step poison in my pocket.
The cold lashed around us as Thomas gripped me tighter to take higher steps through the snow drifts. Keeping my legs loose when all they wanted to do was lock up from cold proved near impossible, but I tried. I shivered deeper into Thomas’s chest and began counting, the only thing that would take my mind off our lack of food or shelter or weapons. We could go back to the cave, but then what? We had no food. Maybe we’d find a wild, but even Thomas with his hunter instincts hadn’t been able to find anything.
I must've drifted off because when I snapped alert, I realized we'd stopped.
Thomas slid me off his boots onto the snow-packed ground and took my hand, his muscles tensed. I turned, and with only Sasha's ears and eyes peeking from inside my coat, I saw why.
Wolves surrounded us. Some were so white, they blended with the snow. Others were of varied colors that stood stark against the whiteout. I jerked my arm over my shoulder and grasped at nothing. No bow. No quiver.
Unease dashed up my spine, and I held to Thomas's hand tighter. "Who are they?"
"The Slipjoint Forest pack."
The red wolf that stood only a few feet in front of us bared its teeth and released a warning growl.
Winter's Rage (The Crimson Winter Reverse Harem Series Book 3) Page 2