by G. Bailey
“I can’t—”
“You will,” Chastity firmly states, pushing it into my arms. “I imagine losing your memories is a far worse injury than any I could imagine.”
My eyes betray me by looking at the space where her arm should be, and of course, Chastity follows my gaze. “Torn off by an angel in the fight, and I was left for dead.”
“I pulled her out of the pack lands,” Reine fills in.
“And saved me,” Chastity adds. “I was very lucky.”
“I will treasure this,” I tell her.
She smiles and places her hand on my back and leads me to the table. I sit down and enjoy some of the pastries, mini cupcakes and devils chocolate cake slices that Chastity made on her own, apparently using a recipe book from the humans. It’s all delicious, and I find myself eating seconds as Reine and Chastity talk, more like gossip, about the high ladies of the Fall Mountain Pack.
“I wouldn’t have guessed they were sleeping together,” Chastity states. “Not with her proposed mating to Beta Lewis.”
“I saw it myself,” Reine adds in. “Well, scented from the other room. The pair of them are going to start a fight my mate will have to end.”
“Maybe they are true mates,” I suggest.
They both look at me, a little pity flashing in Reine’s eyes. “Their scents would mix into one after the first time they had intercourse.”
“Oh...” I say, my cheeks burning red.
Chastity giggles. “She likely knows this already, the way your sons have been reported to be in love with her.”
“I don’t,” I quickly add, feeling the need to clarify. Alpha Reine looks surprised, and she doesn’t try to hide it.
“They could be your true mates, then. It’s more than common for shifters to share male mates, more so with the female birth rate declining,” Chastity says, breathing out the words in equal shock.
“I have no idea,” I admit. “But I’m drawn to them constantly, and it’s deeper than just sex.”
Alpha Reine and Chastity look at each other before both turning to me. Chastity reaches over and squeezes my hand on the table. “Mate bonds are rare and pure, the last true magic left from the gods before they left the mortal world. Well, at least, until you seven were born. I hope you are right.”
“As do I,” Alpha Reine agrees, her eyes on me a touch longer before she changes the subject to one of another scandal in the pack. I look at the photo on the table and smile at my beautiful mother.
“Thank you, Dot,” I say as a book slams onto the table in front of me out of thin air. Breelyn frowns, looking around us as I open the book on legendary weaponry and find the page I want on the seven weapons made in the river of souls. Breelyn looks with me as I find a page dedicated to Morganis, the dagger clipped into a holder on my upper thigh. I turn the pages, finding several have been ripped out and there is only half a page left, showing the top of a blue axe. All the writing about the weapons was ripped out.
“Well, if this is the best the library has, we aren’t finding much more out about the weapons,” Breelyn says with a sigh. “This is why I don’t like—”
Another book slams on the table, but it’s in front of Breelyn instead, and it looks like a children’s book, bound in black leather with red textured font. I lean over and read the title out loud, “How to Be Kind.”
Breelyn growls, the growl echoing around in the air, and a slight giggle echoes back.
“I hate this place,” Breelyn states as I try to stop laughing. “Can we leave?”
I shake my head and look up at the shelves of books. “Do you have anything on the myth of The Wolven Crown?”
The alphas’ warning about The Wolven Crown comes back to me, a crown made from god blood. A crown of immense power.
I only get a giggle in response.
I sigh, knowing it wouldn’t have been that easy. As the weeks, almost a month, have passed since I came into this city, I feel the clock ticking down on the promise I made to Persephone. I climb out of my seat and leave the library, Breelyn walking by my side. I walk to the balcony and overlook the waterfall, noticing the dead leaves falling in the water, the chill in the air marking the change in season.
“It’s getting cold,” Breelyn voices what I was thinking as my bare arms are littered with goose bumps. “What happens if you don’t find this Wolven Crown?”
Something dark settles into my gut. “Then I will make a goddess of death extremely angry. We are soul-linked; there is a chance she could kill me. Or worse.”
“Then we will find it,” Breelyn announces, placing her hand on my arm.
I cover her hand and smile back. “We will, friend.”
“Omega soon.” She winks, and I chuckle, agreeing. I turn as I hear two pairs of footsteps coming towards us. Erin and Phim walk to us, Erin bowing her head.
“You don’t have to bow,” I tell her. “We are friends.”
Erin searches my eyes and then blinks. “Everyone bows for the alpha female, even the alphas.”
“We are leaving for The Wolves of Mnemosyne,” Phim cuts in, and now I realise why she has twice the amount of weapons on her than usual. “I have paid the guards to leave you alone and poisoned the others. They won’t be getting off the toilet anytime soon, but they will live.”
“There is a carriage in the courtyard. It will take you to the edge of the city where a male will be waiting. He will guide you outside the border of the pack,” Erin whispers, even when the roar of the waterfall would mask her voice for anyone nearby. “This castle is big enough that if anyone asks where you three are, I can cover for you.”
“Thank you,” I tell her and turn to my friend and my sister. Truthfully, they are both sisters to me, one in blood and one in loyalty. They would follow me anywhere, protect me at any cost, and I know I would do the same for them.
“We are ready,” Phim tells me before I can ask. Breelyn nods as Phim hands her two daggers and a bow with arrows. My own daggers are all I need with my magic to be backed up if I need it. Phim turns to Erin. “You did good.”
She blushes with a big smile. “I happily serve this castle and our pack.”
Phim nods at her before we walk off down the corridors to the courtyard. The sun is setting over the crater, casting a mixture of pink, orange and yellow light dancing around us like embers of a fire as we climb into the plain black carriage. I don’t know why we are travelling at night, when the danger of the Levi is higher, but I’m not judging quite yet. My heart feels stuck in my chest as I watch the courtyard and the castle below disappear in the distance. My alphas are going to be livid with me, but this is my choice, something I have chosen to do for myself. They wouldn’t, couldn’t, let me do this, but if I’m to become their mate, bound to them forever, I want to know who I was. It won’t change who I am now. It might change nothing, but this is the only chance I’m going to get.
“If they ask for something that is too much,” Breelyn starts, and I turn to her, the carriage bouncing across the road under us, “leave the past. Leave the memories if they risk your future or present.”
I breathe out. “There are answers in the past, answers I need, Breelyn. I want...I need to hear my mother’s voice. I need to know who saved me and left me in the Ravensword Pack. I need...”
“The past,” Phim says, pity in her eyes. “I would like to know who took you to the Ravensword Pack too.”
“It was an angel with black hair,” I say, remembering the flash of memory I was shown in the Fenrir Court. “And I felt safe. Like I knew the angel...which makes no sense. I need more.”
“Then we will get more,” she replies. Simple, to the point. Everything about my sister is. We travel in silence, all of us tense about leaving the pack lands and the risk of the Levi being close, never mind the wolves we are going to see. They aren’t our pack, and they are not like us. From what I’ve heard, they give only to take much more than they should. I need to be careful not to get tricked by these wolves. When the carriage stops
, it’s dark out, the street lit up behind us, and a male holding a large torch waits for us by the hill that leads to the top field where the train is. Walking with Breelyn and Phim, I get to the male, who bows his head, something I will never get used to. He has salt-and-pepper hair, brown eyes and wears a simple tunic with a gold embossment of the upside-mountain mark of the Fall Mountain Pack.
“Call me Cean,” the male introduces himself, his eyes watching me more than Breelyn and Phim. “Are you certain this is what you wish to do?”
“Yes,” I answer for us all. Cean nods with a tut before turning and walking up the hill. His torch lights the way for him, but I have to use my wolf’s senses to see any rocks or lumps on the hill to avoid tripping as we climb. Cean walks right through the barrier, and part of me wants to pause and not do it, but I walk through the portal, and it wraps around me like a comforting hug before disappearing. I damn hope my alphas can’t sense I’ve left the barrier, or I’m so screwed. Breelyn shivers as she steps out, and Phim barely blinks. Outside the barrier are four brown horses tied to a post.
“Come, the Levi hunt at night, but never close to the city. I’d still not risk staying here much longer,” Cean explains.
I nod and go to the horse, climbing up as Breelyn and Phim climb on theirs. Cean unties our horses, handing us the reins before mounting his horse. “Why don’t the Levi come near the city?”
“Something in the air... They don’t like it,” he explains before clicking his tongue and guiding his horse. The ride is short, across a grass field and over a small hill. The entire time, my heart races as I take in every tree swaying in the breeze and the little noises of a rabbit running in the bushes to hide. I know everyone is doing the same as me, listening for the sound of the Levi, of an attack we would struggle to win alone like this.
After about ten minutes, we come to a massive, cracked gap in the middle of two large hills, like a god ripped the hill apart with their bare hands. There is nothing but darkness within it, but as I stare, I almost see a flash of gold. Cean looks back at me and nods before guiding his horse through the gap, so tight his feet scrape on the rock and his horse resists. Breelyn goes next, and I follow her, Phim behind me. As the darkness encloses around us, I look up at the stars peeking out, the silver light from the moon shining high above us in a place it cannot reach.
I immediately scent two things the further we go, one unknown to me, and one familiar. Human. The other scent reminds me of the thick scent of flowers and the musky scent of a forest, but there is something sweet about the scent. Sickly sweet. In the darkness ahead, I see a ball of light, and as we get closer, I see it’s a metal fire pit shaped into a sphere, floating off the ground and full of fire that burns on its own.
Cean climbs off his horse in front of the sphere, and I climb off mine, patting her side. Breelyn and Phim stay close to me as we walk to the sphere, the strange scent stronger by the second. Cean nods to me, opening his mouth to speak, when he freezes. Boom. A flash of gold light blasts out of nowhere, and when I open my eyes, I’m in a different room, in front of a different flaming sphere.
Breelyn, Phim and Cean are gone, replaced with gold wolves that make a circle around the cavern clearing. The rocks are black, littered with gold dots that make it look like stars. The wolves are different and strange, bigger than most wolves I’ve seen, except for my alphas. They don’t move, their gold glowing eyes watching me like prey. The heat of the fire burns my cheeks as I straighten up.
“Nice trick,” I start. “Now you have me here. Who is your alpha?”
“That would be I.”
I turn around to find a male standing behind me, head to toe in a black suit that’s filled out by his thick shoulders and broad chest, his voice warm and deep. The male has short blond hair that looks like the ends are on fire with gold light. His skin is golden, warm and tanned, and his eyes...they make me pause as he towers over me, his hands resting behind his back. Gold. They are shining gold, mesmerising to look at, like the sun itself is in his eyes. His presence is overwhelming as we stare at each other, and I can’t read anything about him until he smirks. He tilts his head to the side. His scent, a mixture of sunshine, dark forests and burning flames, surrounds me until I can’t scent anything else.
“Who are you?” I ask him.
He straightens. “You wish for a deal, Mairin Elysia Astra Fall, chosen of the moon goddess, soul of Persephone, the goddess of spring and death, and soon to be alpha female of the Fall Mountain Pack. What other titles will fall on you before this world is saved?”
He talks in riddles, but every word is true, and I feel like his eyes are looking right into my soul. I can’t see into his. “Have you heard it’s rude to not introduce yourself, alpha?”
“Yes,” he answers bluntly, and when he smiles, I see a flash of long, sharp teeth. He circles me, moving so close to the fire that he should be burnt, but it doesn’t harm him. “You are a daughter of the earth, and I am a son of fire. Your alphas are sons of the darkness. Perhaps names are nothing in comparison to our birthrights.”
“Birthrights mean nothing unless they use them for good.”
He laughs at me. It’s deep and makes me shiver despite how patronizing he is being. “I’m sure the millions of humans enslaved by the king of the angels would say his power is not nothing.”
He moves closer. “If you listen, you can hear their cries for help, or death or anyone. They pray to the gods, and they never answer. You’re a goddess, can’t you help?”
The silent room starts to echo with cries and pleas. I cover my ears as they get louder and louder, each one so desperate.
“Stop it,” I growl, and the sounds disappear, leaving a hidden mark on my soul.
“Why should I help you, goddess?”
I lower my hands, his question one I’ve thought about more than once.
He steps back in front of me, close once more, and I tilt my head to look at him. “Why, when your future is so bleak, would I help you?”
“Because I wouldn’t be here if you didn’t already plan to help me, trickster,” I reply simply. “You already know what I want, don’t you?”
He smiles.
“I can’t remember anything before I was twelve, including how I ended up in the arms of an angel, carried to a dangerous pack and abandoned,” I say, watching him. “I want your power to remember my past.”
“For a price,” the trickster replies, like the snake he is. “Hmmm.”
He moves away from me and leans against the fire pit, flames brushing his clothes and never taking alight. “What you ask for, and will ask for in the future, comes at a deeper cost than you will ever want to pay. I will take two female wolves from your pack. One now and one in the future.”
My heart all but stops. Wolves? I can’t trade others’ lives. “There are two times your memories have been wiped clean. Did you know that?”
“Twice?”
He smiles like a snake wrapped around a rat. “You begged for your memories to be taken by the angel. Both times.”
The earth shifts underneath me, and my vision swarms as a million questions fill my mind. I asked for my memory to be taken? Twice?
Why would I do that?
“How old was I when the second memories were taken?”
He turns his head to the side. “My truths are not free, young goddess. Have we a deal?”
“Who do you want?” I ask.
“The white wolf for your memories. For the second time you will come for my help, I wish for the female child who wears a crown. Your heir in return for what you will seek.”
For a second, I have no idea who he is speaking about other than Breelyn. “Your blood in her veins. She will live with me until a mate has been found. They both will share this fate.”
“You want Breelyn and my firstborn child? What if I never have a child?” I ask, shaking my head.
He doesn’t answer for a moment. “I’ve seen all, I see all, and I am all. I do not bet on the unknown.”<
br />
The power in his statement I can feel down to my bones.
I’ve never thought of having a child before, but I’m certain it isn’t worth any price to give a child up. I would never give a child up, and I can’t see why I would come to these tricksters a second time. I won’t. “I won’t come back.”
He only smiles, like he knew I’d say that.
“And Breelyn Ravensword is not mine to trade,” I carry on. “Name another price.”
He lifts off the fire pit and clicks his fingers. There is a flash of gold light, and I turn to see Breelyn on her knees behind me. She looks up through a curtain of soft hair.
“It is her choice,” the trickster whispers to me. I can feel the overwhelming heat of his body pressed against my back until he walks around me. Breelyn climbs to her feet by the time he gets to her, and she looks to me before back to him.
“Breelyn Ravensword, intended omega, white wolf and true beauty,” he starts. Breelyn rolls her eyes and walks away from him to my side.
“We are leaving,” I tell her firmly, grabbing her hand.
The trickster laughs as he turns on his heel. “For your alpha female’s memories and my future promised help with another deal she will desperately need, I want you to join my pack. One year and then you may leave. One year.”
“I said no,” I snap with a growl. I reach for my power, surprised to feel it doesn’t work here. The dark pit in my soul, where the magic usually is, is empty.
He smirks. Breelyn is silent, watching the trickster. “If you wish to leave, it is your choice.”
“Will you harm me?” Breelyn asks.
“No—” I start.
“Females are never harmed in our pack. If a male dares lay an unwanted finger on a female”—he pauses—“my skills as a torturer come in very handy.”
Torturer. Trickster. Alpha.
What else is this male?
Breelyn looks at me, and I can see the decision she has made already. “No. I forbid it, Bree. You can’t, we know nothing about this pack and—”