by Eden Beck
There’s only so much of that a girl can take before she has no choice but to act.
It’s the first time I’ve been here alone since the day I nearly drowned in this same river. This time, I make sure to use the bridge.
I don’t really know where I’m going, only that Remus and his pack will be out here somewhere. They won’t be going to the alliance meeting, not since according to Romulus, Remus has rebuked the alliance entirely.
I’m hoping that if I just walk far enough into this open territory, that I’ll find them, or that they will find me.
The latter is more likely true.
And this is where the ‘foolhardy’ part of my plan comes into play, because I’m also hoping they don’t try to kill me before I get a chance to plead my case.
I should be more scared than I am. But I just feel … excited. My fingers turn the jade totem over in my pocket, a little token of luck. I’m going to need it.
This is the first bit of hope I’ve felt in as long as I can remember. If there’s even the smallest chance that doing this can allow me to be a part of the boys, then I have to do it.
Then it isn’t really even an option.
As cold as it is outside, my nerves are keeping me warm enough to break a sweat as I cross to the other side of the river. An immediate feeling of being watched falls over me as soon as my boots set foot on the opposite side.
This is it. Free territory.
“Hello?” I say into the darkness. “I’m a friend of Romulus. I just came to talk to his brother Remus.”
Immediately, I hear a low growl that makes the skin on the back of my neck prickle.
This may have been a really, REALLY stupid idea. I thought I might find them here, but honestly, I didn’t expect to find them so soon.
If it is them. If it’s even Remus’ pack.
Who knows how many shifters are in the woods these days. Who knows how many packs—alliance or not—are hidden between these trees.
“Hello?” I say again. It’s too late to turn back now, and even if it wasn’t, it’s too important for me to give up.
There’s a movement in the woods and I prepare to see a wolf come lunging out at me from between the trees. Instead of a wolf, it’s a man.
And I already know who he is.
I’m immediately taken aback. There’s only one way he’d find me this quickly … and that’s if he was seeking me out as well. The thought should scare me further, make me quake in my boots … but instead, it emboldens me.
“Remus?” I ask as he walks toward me. He’s tall and broad-shouldered, resembling his brother.
“Did Romulus send you?” he asks. He doesn’t sound friendly.
“No,” I say. “I came on my own to talk to you.”
“That doesn’t seem like a smart idea,” he says with a deep sounding laugh. Despite the warning in his voice, he invites me to sit with him.
“You’re brave for a human,” he says as I sit on the side of the large fallen tree that sits up against the riverbank. “I’ve been watching you for some time now.”
That prickle alights on the back of my neck again, but he doesn’t give me the chance to respond.
“What is it you came to talk to me about?” His face looks menacing in the moonlight and there’s a slight indication in his eyes that my visit here without Romulus’ permission gives him devious delight.
I’d planned exactly what to say in this moment, but he’s caught me off guard. All my careful preparations, my planned speeches, my logic … it all disintegrates as I blurt out the first thing that comes to mind.
“Romulus told me about Sienna.”
And it’s the wrong thing to say.
His expression darkens and I immediately regret mentioning her name as fear starts to gnaw at my stomach.
“I came to see if you could help me.”
“Help you with what?” his tone has changed to a more suspicious and unforgiving one.
“I’m in much the same situation that Sienna was.” I’m really taking my chances mentioning her again, I can feel it. “I want more than anything to be with his boys. Marlowe, Kaleb, and Rory.” I’m hoping that the mention of his blood nephew will help support my case. “And they want to be with me too, which is why I’m begging that you help me try to convince Romulus to allow me to go through with the transformation and become a part of their pack.”
I can’t read his expression well enough to know whether he is angry or empathetic to my plea.
“You have feelings for my brother’s sons?” he asks.
“Yes.”
“And they feel the same toward you? All three of them?”
“Yes, I think so.”
“How interesting.” He sits back and eyes me for a moment. “History has a funny way of repeating itself.”
I straighten my posture. “It’s not the same,” I say. “Because we’re bonded.”
The phrase causes a light to appear behind his eyes, but he only cocks his head and looks at me more closely. The silence around us, the stillness of the forest … it’s unnerving to say the least.
“Will you help me?” I blurt out again, hopeful that the fact he didn’t immediately say no means that there’s a chance he’ll help.
“No.”
And there it is.
The word rolls all too quickly off his tongue.
At least this time, he doesn’t let me sit in shifting silence.
“What you’re asking is impossible. It’s against all of the agreements of Romulus’ precious alliance to turn any new humans. And even if it wasn’t, I still wouldn’t help you.”
He eyes me again, that menacing smile pulling at the corner of his lips again. This time, the menace is directed at me.
“You say Romulus told you what happened between us … but surely, that isn’t all he told you about me?”
“I just thought—”
“So, he has,” he snaps, cutting me off. “And yet you still came? How curious.”
That smile turns utterly wicked.
“You’re a fool, Sabrina. None of those boys want you as anything more than a novel plaything. You’ve definitely come to ask the wrong person if you thought that I would be any help to you. My mangy brother has a soft heart for the half-breeds, but I, however, do not.”
He stands up, his already tall stature looming over me like a giant in the darkness. He could kill me here, now, and he’d barely have to lift a finger to do it.
“Out of what little respect I still have for Romulus, I will ensure that none of my pack harms you tonight. But, as soon as you leave here, and if you dare to come back; I can’t promise that I can control them. You were foolish to come here. Not even just for the fact of risking your life with my pack, but there are other packs on the move right now too. Didn’t you already have enough of a scare with Rory’s own girl?”
“What?” What did he mean by Rory’s own girl?
Remus lets out a laugh that fills the woods with an echo of howls back to him.
“I guess my nephew left that part out in the details, did he? The girl that attacked you before was meant for Rory. She was supposed to be his mate. But instead, he took a fancy to you.”
I gape up at him. In my mind, that grin widens until it takes up the entire forest. It’s all I can see.
“I can imagine you understand why she would dislike you so much now. A woman scorned, and all that … or didn’t Romulus mention she was a part of my pack? That she was the olive branch I offered … and Rory was supposed to be the one to mend us, but instead …”
He eyes me pitifully. “Instead, you came along.”
Rory had already been promised to someone else? How the hell does that work? And if there was some sort of prearranged mating of shifters, then what consequence did he incur by denying her in order to be with me?
This was all going way worse than I had hoped. Worse than I imagined.
Remus’s look of pity turns to disgust.
“Go now,” he say
s as he stands up to leave. “I think we’re done here.”
I start to open my mouth to say something to ask him to wait, to explain something more, but as soon as he stands, I see a wall of glowing yellow eyes emerge from the trees. There are dozens of wolves who start slowly creeping out of the woods on silent paws. I suddenly feel like the sacrificial rabbit in a hunt, keenly aware of how little stands between me and certain death yet again.
“Hurry up now, Sabrina … before I change my mind.” He starts melting into the trees alongside the multitude of eyes. “Run along before the wolves are biting at your heels.”
I don’t linger.
I turn to run back to the other side of the river as fast as I can.
As fast as my stupid human legs will carry me.
15
Sabrina
What an utter disaster.
I stumble over my racing feet in embarrassment over how foolish I was and how ridiculous Remus made me feel.
Not just him, though. I was ridiculous.
I still am, because I’m still in the forest … surrounded by the sound of running wolves.
This was a horrible mistake that I’m ashamed to have even considered, let alone acted upon. I’ve broken Rory’s trust for nothing. I let the fear of being ripped to shreds push my legs steadily forward. All of this was for nothing.
I start to panic as I run through the woods and find myself no closer to home than when I started. Try as I might, I can’t think straight enough to figure out where I’m going. All the trees start to blur together until I have to try to calm my breathing in order to get my bearings.
Everywhere I turn, I see flashes of fur. I hear the panting of breaths, the snap of padded feet breaking branches on the forest floor. They’re all around me until … suddenly … they’re not.
The Gray mansion looms overhead.
As soon as I see the dark shadow it casts upon the hill, I let out a gasp of relief.
I know Rory told me to stay away from the house, but everything looks still and silent, and I am sure that the alliance is gone by now. Even if it’s not, nothing I can do now is worse than what I’ve already done. Nothing is worse than the risk I’ve already taken.
And there, at least, I won’t be killed by the members of Remus’ pack surely still lingering in the woods behind me.
I rush up to the door and pound my fist hysterically against the wood. Instead of being relieved when Rory opens the door, I have to pause.
Something is wrong.
“Sabrina …”
The way he says my name makes my stomach sink.
He won’t meet my eyes.
The entire family is standing in the hallway. They look unnerved and on edge.
“Come in, and shut the door,” Lydia says, stopping herself after one half step towards me. Her hand lingers in the air for a second, before she thinks better of reaching for me and just lets her hand drop back to her side.
Her voice doesn’t sound like its usual warmhearted self.
And like Rory, she won’t look me in the eye.
A lump rises in the back of my throat as I look between them, standing here. Then I look behind them—at the hastily packed bags piled on the floor at their feet, and I feel a wave of dizziness hit me.
“What were you thinking?”
It’s Kaleb. He steps forward, only for one arm to shoot out from Romulus’ side to restrain him.
Kaleb is the only one looking at me now. His eyes bore into mine, pleading with me.
I see the unspoken there, and I know suddenly what’s happened.
They know.
“Tell me it isn’t true,” Kaleb whispers, before being pushed back into line beside his brothers.
“I … I had to …”
Romulus steps forward to interrupt me, but even he doesn’t get the chance to speak. It’s Remus who steps in front of everyone to interrupt.
He stands in front of me, looking at me with such disgust that I feel like a piece of rotten and decaying flesh.
He’s smaller here, inside, than he was in the darkness.
But he’s no less menacing.
As shocked as I am to see him here, I guess I should have known that he would come here to tell Romulus of my unsanctioned visit; and of course he would be faster than me at getting to the mansion. Even if I hadn’t gotten lost, he still would have beat me.
I don’t know how I thought I could keep my little visit a secret, even for a second.
I should have known it would have ended here, eventually.
“You’re all mongrels,” he growls as he looks at everyone around me, including his brother. “And you, Romulus, are a traitor. Protecting these humans and half-breeds as if they were your own. You should be disgusted with what you have become. Consider this my one and only warning to all of you; if this girl, or any of your pack, steps a single foot or paw inside my territory again—I won’t be held responsible for the bloodlust of my pack.”
His territory?
That was Free Territory.
Unless …
Marlowe speaks, his voice calm and quiet. “Remus’ pack claimed that side of the river, Sabrina. It’s an old wolves’ code.”
“But how was I supposed to know that?” I say, before I think better of it.
“That’s the point,” Remus snaps. “You couldn’t. You aren’t one of us. You never will be.”
Romulus draws himself up as if he’s about to confront his brother, but Lydia puts a hand on his shoulder to stop him for exacerbating the growing conflict.
Remus notices her movement, and the effect that it has on Romulus and sneers.
“You and your ridiculous alliance,” he says to his brother. “I don’t give a shit about the alliance, and if it were up to me I would do away with it entirely, along with all the non-pure-blooded wolves.”
“As for you,” Remus says to me, walking closer in front of the open doorway. “Your visit to me tonight proved exactly why you, and every other human, should never be turned. You’re an impulsive, ignorant, and frail species who have no place breeding with our blood.”
He casts one look over his shoulder at the man he once called his own blood. The man who still is, though neither of them seem eager to admit it.
“Bonded to you?” he spits, his words as toxic as venom as he glances around at his nephews. “What a terrible mistake.”
Remus knocks his broad shoulder into me to push me out of the doorway as he leaves. All the boys immediately bristle, but they do nothing to stop him.
Nothing at all.
All eyes are on me.
Suddenly I feel an alarming sense of ruination. My stomach twists inside of itself as I start to feel my world begin to spin. Something REALLY bad is coming, and there’s no way for me to stop it.
The inevitable has arrived.
Romulus steps forward to finally look me in the eyes. I wish he looked angrier at me, even that would have been better than the way he’s looking at me right now. Instead of anger, he looks vacant; as if he is looking at nothing more than empty space in front of him.
“Because of what you just did,” he says with treacherously prolonged words, “embarrassing our entire pack, humiliating me in front of my brother and all who are allegiant to him, and endangering both yourself and others … we have no choice.”
My breath comes out so quiet, it sounds like it’s barely a whisper. “No choice but to …”
“To leave.”
Behind him, Rory, Marlowe, and Kaleb stand still as statues.
“Leaving? For how long? Where are you going?” I can feel the hysteria burning the inside of my throat as each new question bubbles out of me.
“For good,” he says as he turns around. “And you have no need to know where we’re going, because you aren’t coming with us.”
It all happens so quickly, for a moment, I think it’s another one of my nightmares.
My head swims. My heart races. Vomit and bile rise in the back of my throat.
> It’s as if I stand frozen in slow motion as all the world turns normally around me.
I panic and try to pull the boys aside to talk to them, but they’re already grabbing their things to leave. Lydia looks over her shoulder at me as she picks up her bag and shoots me a look of sheer pity, but even she doesn’t stop to talk to me.
“Kaleb, please!” I say as I pull on his arm enough to get him to finally stop and look at me.
“Remember what you said to me inside the tree, Sabrina? About feeling left behind?” he says.
I brace for what he is about to say, but even I couldn’t have predicted how deep his words would cut me.
“Well, now it’s more than just a feeling. Now it’s actually the case.”
“No, no, please!” I cry as I try to block them from leaving the house. “Please just wait for a minute and let me talk to you about it. Please!”
I’m used to Rory’s temper. Even Marlowe’s semi-detachment. But Kaleb …
Kaleb …
I’ve never seen him so angry.
He doesn’t touch me, but it feels like his next words sucker punch me in the gut.
“This is your fault, Sabrina,” he hisses. “Because of you, we’ve just lost everything.”
He grabs his bag and slings it over one shoulder. Even though it looks light, the way he’s carrying it makes it look as if it contains the weight of the entire world.
“Kaleb …” I try again, but I don’t know what to say. What can I say?
What can I do to make them stay?
Romulus blocks me from trying to hold on to the boys as they leave, and Lydia follows close behind them. Then he turns to look at me one last time. This time there is also anger in his eyes. As soon as they are outside the door, I run after them.
But they’re already gone.
They’ve disappeared like shadows into the night.
16
Sabrina
Gone like shadows.
Gone like the ghosts I used to worry might haunt these woods.
This can’t be happening, I say over and over again in my head as I stumble back down to the cabin. I couldn’t stay one second alone in that house, not without them there. Not after what they said.