by A L Fogerty
Kayla began to crawl toward him, reaching out. Just as she felt her fingers wrapping around his, the ground fell out from under her, and she was hit by a falling rock in the back of the head. She screamed, blinded by the dust and debris. Unable to call on her wings, she fell faster and faster into the darkness.
Kayla opened her eyes and found herself sitting on a throne in a pack lodge. Smoke Mountain, her father's lodge—the place she was meant to inherit. She looked around, not seeing Daniel or any of her mates. At her side, on the king’s throne, sat her worst nightmare—Colton Irontooth. Shocked, Kayla stood and stumbled away. Where were her mates, her friends, and her daughter?
"What is wrong, my queen?" asked one of her father's guards.
She looked out around her at the lodge filled with villagers whom she recognized. Her aunt Mary was there, but there was no sign of Daniel. Mary looked old, worn, and unhappy.
"What am I doing here?" Kayla asked. "How did I get here?" Her head ached, and her skin crawled at the sight of Colton Irontooth.
"Kayla, darling," Colton said, standing from his throne. He walked toward her and reached out his hand. She shrank away, avoiding his touch.
"Have you taken ill, my sweet?" he said in a mocking tone.
How could this be happening? Where was her family? She couldn't remember where she'd been or how she'd gotten here. All she knew was that it was not right.
"The queen is unwell," Colton said, waving away the attendants. "I'll be taking her back to the alpha's house. We'll resume this meeting tomorrow, when she's feeling better."
Colton took Kayla's arm and guided her out of the lodge, his grip harder than it needed to be. His fingers dug into her skin. She tried to pull away from the pain, but he only held on harder.
"What are you doing?" he asked angrily. "Why are you behaving like this?"
"I shouldn't be here.” Panic gripped her chest. “I shouldn't be here."
"Are you drunk?" he snapped.
"I must be dreaming. That's it. I'm dreaming. I'm back in my bed with Jagger in Mist Valley, having a bad dream. That's all this is."
"Your bed with Jagger? I haven't heard that name since that upstart Blackfang tried to best me in the alpha tournament."
"What are you talking about?" Kayla asked, growing increasingly concerned.
"Jagger Blackfang died in the tournament. There's something going on with you, Kayla. Maybe I shouldn’t have gotten rid of the healer."
"I just need to wake up, that's all. This is a bad dream."
"You haven't been yourself since you lost the baby," he said as if to explain the deep confusion Kayla found herself experiencing.
"What baby?"
"Our baby. You lost it. The idiot healer said I should give you time to recover before we tried again. I’ve let you have your space, even though I don’t agree. It's been six months, and this is getting ridiculous." His hold grew even harder.
"Colton, you're hurting me."
"Really, Kayla, we must provide an heir for the pack. People are growing concerned.”
"I lost a child six months ago?" she asked. Her memory was foggy and incomplete, but she seemed to remember a child. What was the child's name? Where had she gone?
"I lost my child," Kayla said. "I'm looking for her."
"Kayla, you're getting worse every day. Sometimes I think maybe the pack would be better off without you."
"Better off without me?"
"You're not doing your duty. There are plenty of eligible young women in the pack. Now that I'm the alpha and your mate, I could have my pick. If you would just agree, we could find another to carry the heir."
“You want another mate?" she asked.
“It's not uncommon. Though you were the heir to this pack, your illness is making it impossible for you to perform your duty. As the king of the pack, it is my responsibility to take over for you in this situation."
"You want to replace me as the leader of Smoke Mountain?” Kayla said, not surprised.
"You would be happier that way, Kayla. And when you get your strength back, you can also carry my pups."
"I need to rest," she said, pulling her arm away from him.
She walked into her father's house, the familiarity of it itching at the back of her mind. Something was off. Something was terribly wrong. This wasn’t her life. Where had she just been? Kayla couldn't remember anything. It was the most disconcerting experience she'd ever had. She couldn't get a grip on her memory. Colton seemed so sure of everything, but she could not believe him. Jagger, her mate, could not be dead. She grasped at the memories of her old life, feeling them fragment and fall away like sand through her fingers. What had she just been thinking? It was all a haze. There had to be an explanation.
She walked up the stairs and found her father's old room. Her bow sat, dusty, in the corner. Where was Bane? She wanted to ask someone, but she knew that if she left the room, Colton would be right there, and she couldn't talk to him anymore. She sat on the bed, trying to remember where she'd been before she found herself in the pack lodge. She'd been doing something very important. She had a mission. She didn't know how she knew it, but Kayla was certain she had great love in her life, love she never would have experienced with Colton Irontooth, the kind of love that opened a person's heart, mind, and soul—the kind of love that made her a better person. Where had that love gone?
She felt so tired, and her head was pounding. Something was missing. Something was just not right. She had to find out. But first she had to rest. She was so very tired. She lay down on the bed, not even removing her boots, and immediately fell into a deep slumber. In her dreams, fear and darkness surrounded her at every turn.
Kayla woke with a start, sitting up in bed. The dreams had been strange and profound, but she was not surprised when she found herself in her father's old room at Smoke Mountain. She was the alpha of the pack, and Colton was her mate. She'd been alpha since her father's death, which had happened very soon after the alpha tournament several years back. She'd lost a child six months before and was still struggling to recover. Though she hated Colton, she had loved the baby growing in her belly and hoped it would give her some sense of meaning in her dreary life. Her beloved cousin had met with an untimely death soon after her father, and since mating with Colton, she'd found herself increasingly alone until there was no one left but him. The fates had taken her child from her, and now they wanted to take the pack from her as well. Her sweet, loyal familiar, Bane, had been taken in the same accident that killed Daniel, and Kayla had come to know the true meaning of emptiness.
She put on her leather boots and made her way out of her room. She found Colton downstairs in the dining room, drinking tea and eating oatcakes.
"You're up," he said. "I hope you're prepared for the day. We have delegations from packs from all over the region arriving today. With the increased threats from the witches, we must come up with a plan to defend ourselves. We can no longer depend on witch magic to protect our lands. It's time to stand up and fight. As you were the strongest alpha among us, it would be your place to lead. But since you've lost your strength, the responsibility falls on me. But I do expect you to be at the meeting with Windspear later today.”
"Aaron is coming?" she asked, a spark of hope igniting in her belly, though she did not know why.
"Yes. He's taken over Mist Valley lands since the attack on their village.”
"The attack…"
"Snap out of it, Kayla. The people expect you to greet visiting alphas. You seriously need to consider transferring the title of alpha to me in more than just name. As your mate, I can only do so much.”
"I will be prepared to meet Aaron," she said, turning away.
Colton had been pressuring her to transfer the title of pack alpha to him for months, ever since she lost the child. She hadn't recovered from that quickly enough for Colton's approval. Kayla had not wanted to marry him or to be the pack alpha, but she'd felt that she could honor the memory of her mother and her cou
sin by maintaining leadership.
She'd let things go too far already. She should have refused Colton and her father and lived her own life. If she'd been stronger, none of this would have happened. But Kayla had failed herself, her pack, and everyone and everything she loved with her cowardice, and she would have to live with that for the rest of her life.
She headed to the pack lodge without eating, hoping to see Aaron Windspear. She didn't know why, but she felt like he could answer her questions and help her make sense of everything. She had a feeling that none of this was real—that she had another life where she was loved and had a purpose and friends and a family who supported her. It was the strangest sensation, but she couldn't shake it, and the name Aaron Windspear made her think of that feeling. Somehow, he was connected.
Kayla walked into the pack lodge and found all of her attendants waiting. "Has Windspear arrived yet?"
"A rider arrived an hour ago, saying the procession would be here soon," the attendant said. "It is good that you are here and feeling better. I hope that you recovered from yesterday."
"Yes, I've fully recovered," Kayla said, though it wasn't true.
Maybe Colton was right and she was losing her mind. Nevertheless, she wouldn't think of giving leadership of her pack over to that man. She had the sinking sensation that he was responsible for the death of everyone she loved. She might be overreacting, but since the death of her beloved familiar Daisy, she would never trust Colton Irontooth, no matter what he or her father said. The man was evil, and she never should have let herself be forced into marrying him.
Chapter 20
Felix woke with his back aching, lying against the hard planes of the bed. He pulled himself up with a long moan and bashed his head against the wood above him. Grabbing his throbbing forehead, he fell back against the stone slab of a mattress.
He blinked feverishly in the low gray light of the cramped room and tried to make out where he was. His memories were a jumble of thought and form, without logic or linear time. Carefully, he pulled himself out of the bed again, avoiding the plank above him. He realized that he was in a room full of bunk beds. At least a dozen men slept on small beds stacked on top of each other in a ten-by-ten-foot space.
He shook his head, trying to remember where he was, but it was useless. His memories were a blank mass of darkness.
“Time to get up, you lazy louts,” a voice shouted from the hazy light of the doorway. The figure was silhouetted in the rectangle of the doorframe. He didn’t recognize the shape of the man or his voice. He had no idea why he was being called a lazy lout.
“You’re up first for once,” the man said to Felix. “It’s a miracle. Thank the mother and father. Long may they rest in peace.”
“The mother is still with us,” Felix whispered, not sure how he knew that Wolf Mother still walked among her people in this world even if Wolf Father had left them when the rift opened.
He stumbled out into the hallway, his forehead still aching, as the other men groaned and pulled themselves from sleep. He didn’t recognize the man in the door any better after he passed him, nor did Felix have any idea where he was.
“Eat your mash, and be out in the fields in fifteen minutes,” the man said, giving Felix a hard look.
“Where will I find this mash?”
“In the kitchen, you fool.”
Felix didn’t know where the kitchen was but didn’t want to gain any more of the man’s ire. He continued down the hall and luckily found the kitchen around the next corner. The cook stood behind a large pot. When Felix approached, he scooped gruel into a bowl and thrust it into his hands.
Felix took the bowl and sat at a long rough-hewn table on a bench against the wall. The table would seat a dozen men, and another table across the large room would seat a dozen more.
When the men began to enter the kitchen, Felix raised an eyebrow, recognizing every one of them. They were the men of his village, his pack. He thought that at any moment, he would find his brothers. But as the men took their seats around the tables, he didn't see any of them.
“Where are we?” Felix asked Cedric Hollow, a farmer from Mist Valley.
Cedric gave him the side-eye and sighed. “Smoke Mountain.”
“What are we doing here?”
“What do you mean?” Cedric asked in an irritated voice.
“How did we get here?”
“Most of us walked. You been hitting the bottle again, Felix?”
“Bottle?”
Felix had never been a drinker. In fact, he’d only ever tasted alcohol a few times. He did not enjoy the feeling of inebriation and avoided it completely. He didn’t judge those who partook of the stuff, but it was not in his nature to indulge.
“No,” he said flatly. “I don’t remember coming here.”
“We’ve been here since Jagger died in the alpha tournament,” Cedric grumbled, scraping his wooden spoon into the bowl of sludge.
“Jagger… died…”
“You got a fever or something?”
“No. No. I must just still be in mourning. Sometimes my memory gets fuzzy.” Felix made a quick excuse, having learned a few things from his brothers over the years about how to deal with people in difficult situations. “Where are my other brothers?” he asked hopefully.
“The other Blackfangs? That’s quite a story.”
“Please, remind me.”
“After Jagger died, Sid tried to avenge him, but he was killed too. Riddick ran off in wolf form, and Quinn went mad and then died of a fever six months ago.”
“They're all… all gone.”
“Sorry, mate. You’ve been hitting the bottle pretty hard since. They feed us slime in Smoke Mountain, but the moonshine is plentiful.”
“That must be why I can’t remember anything. Where is Kayla?”
“Kayla Redclaw, the alpha? I imagine she’s sleeping comfortably in her bed with her mate, Colton Irontooth.” Cedric’s voice went hard when he said Irontooth’s name.
Felix nearly choked on his gruel. “Kayla mated with Irontooth?”
“Of course she did. Irontooth won the tournament. She mated with the winner. Our village was raided by witches. Those of us who escaped had no alpha to help us rebuild. Smoke Mountain pack took us in. We’re lucky to have a place to live.”
“Only Jenny Blue survived the raid,” Felix said.
“No, there were a few dozen of us who hid in the forest… the women bunk in another room.” The man nodded toward the women as they began to file into the kitchen. Jenny was among them. “We work the fields in return for shelter. It’s a hard life but better than what we would have faced back in Mist Valley.”
Felix was astonished by the information Cedric had shared with him. It didn’t seem possible. It didn’t seem right. Something was completely off, but he didn’t know what.
“Time to get out to the fields, you louts,” the man who’d woken them said from the head of the table.
The men all stood, backs bent, and took their empty bowls to the counter on the way out of the kitchen. They filed down the hall and out into the dingy morning sunlight. They were given shovels and rakes as they walked into the yard. The foreman shouted orders, and the men filed out toward the fields.
The cool morning air chilled Felix's skin as sweat began to break on his brow. He had never been one for manual labor, his mind providing value to the pack beyond the power of his muscles. But in Smoke Mountain, he joined the others digging and tilling the fields.
He pushed his shovel into the ground, cracking the soil and turning it over again and again in a mechanical rhythm that sapped his strength and emptied his mind. The men were silent around him as the sun rose into the sky. When the heat of the day arrived, his mouth became parched, and he asked the man beside him where he could find a drink.
“Can’t take a break till the foreman says.”
“When would that be?”
“Another two hours.”
Felix went back to his labor, not w
anting to draw attention to himself. He missed his brothers. He missed Kayla. How he knew her was a mystery, but he felt as if he had a deep connection to the alpha queen. Quinn, poor Quinn, had always said they would all mate with the last alpha female. Kayla was that woman. But the prophecy had never come to pass. It had been a lie all along.
He sliced the soil with his shovel, repeating the movements, back bent, sweat dripping. The sun beat down on him without mercy. When the foreman told them it was time for a water break, the men hurried to the bucket and stood in line to ladle water between their parched lips.
As soon as Felix had taken a few sips, the foreman shouted for the men to get back to work. Felix joined the others in the field. The sun was hot overhead.
“We deserve better treatment,” Felix said to Cedric. “This is inhumane.”
“Don’t let the foreman hear you say that. Last man to question Alpha Irontooth’s dictates was whipped and then thrown from the village. I heard zombies got him in the end.”
The day wore on. The relentless hacking and digging left Felix sore and too tired to think. The men returned to the bunkhouse at the end of the day and were fed the same gruel they’d had for breakfast but this time with all the moonshine they could drink.
They retired to their rooms, some staying in the cool night air to smoke hand-rolled cigarettes. Felix lay on his bunk, wishing there was something to read and someone to talk to. The news of his brothers cut deep and hard. He couldn’t believe they were dead. He decided he had to be blocking it. In the few psychology books he’d read, he’d learned that the mind had many tricks to protect itself from pain.
When Cedric returned, thick with drink and stumbling into his bunk, Felix rose and greeted him.
“What do you want, Blackfang? You’d think you still ran things with how uppity you are.”
“I was just wondering if there is perhaps a library where I might find something to read?”
Cedric lurched forward, laughing. Shaking his head, he gripped Felix’s shoulder. “You really are delusional. You think Irontooth is going to give us books? Most of these men wouldn’t choose to read even if they could.”