LOGINEight of my packmates had died. Four more were found among the carnage still alive, but barely. They were the ones we recovered first, bringing them back to my house where we laid them down to cling to life under the care of ill-equipped pseudo-healers. Awaiting instruction, all I could think to say to them was to clean up the wounded. They were all wolves, so we couldn’t bring them to the hospital. What could we do, bring them to a vet? I didn’t know.I barely existed, all day operating like an automaton, trying to cope with the immense loss my pack had taken without thinking myself into a stupor. If I stopped for even a moment, my sense of failure and incompetence would dominate me, but as much as I wanted to just give up, I couldn’t. My pack depended on me to lead them no matter if our days were prosperous or grave. They turned to me for guidance. Too often I found myself grasping hopelessly at words that felt like they weren’t good enough, and I would just push myself to perform s
Eight of my packmates had died. Four more were found among the carnage still alive, but barely. They were the ones we recovered first, bringing them back to my house where we laid them down to cling to life under the care of ill-equipped pseudo-healers. Awaiting instruction, all I could think to say to them was to clean up the wounded. They were all wolves, so we couldn’t bring them to the hospital. What could we do, bring them to a vet? I didn’t know.I barely existed, all day operating like an automaton, trying to cope with the immense loss my pack had taken without thinking myself into a stupor. If I stopped for even a moment, my sense of failure and incompetence would dominate me, but as much as I wanted to just give up, I couldn’t. My pack depended on me to lead them no matter if our days were prosperous or grave. They turned to me for guidance. Too often I found myself grasping hopelessly at words that felt like they weren’t good enough, and I would just push myself to perform s
I wanted to torment Niko, but the prompt from Muriel convinced me to let him go. I opened my arms and let Niko fall flat on his face, sitting back with a victorious laugh.“How’s it taste, fuckhead?”Niko groaned and sprawled out in the grass.“Where was that the last time we sparred?”“I was just going easy on you.”“Bullshit,” he said, squirming underneath me until he laid on his back and I remained above him. “Get off me.”Mischievous fire lit up in me. I clutched his chin and squeezed his cheeks, then lightly slapped his cheek a couple times.“Good spar.”Niko finally sat up and pushed me off. I rose to my feet and stretched my arms, soothing my coiled and tired muscles.“You wanna go again?”“Yeah, I do. I wanna beat you into the fuckin’ dirt, you little bitch,” he said venomously.“Good luck with that.”We took a five-minute break for both of us to catch our breath and have a drink of water. Then, we continued into another spar. I eagerly delved into the fight with mounting conf
I even chewed on this idea as I drove Muriel over to Niko’s place. She stood behind me as I knocked on the door to Niko’s house, and when he answered, a gout of flame burned my insides, but I tried to remember what Muriel said. Niko stood before me in a buttoned-up flannel and jeans, sneering with amusement while his trucker cap sat high on his brown-haired mullet.“Well, look who it is.”“Afternoon, Silva,” I said immediately. “I’m here to drop off Muriel and since I’ve been healed, I want another spar.”Niko’s eyes flicked past me at Muriel. He gave her a respectful nod, only to continue sneering at me.“Third time’s the charm, hey? Your mommy gave you permission to play?”“Get over yourself.”“As long as you don’t tattle on me for winning fair and square.”“You’re such an ass,” I said, baring my teeth. “That’s what’s gonna make beating you so satisfying.”He laughed down at me and opened the door, welcoming both of us inside. Niko’s arrogance was the flaw that made me dislike him,
Aislin POVSomething was wrong. At first, I couldn’t identify what it was. I woke up late that morning feeling off. Sitting up in my bed, I evaluated my body for the wounds that had become consistent and familiar, only to remember my lungs had been healed yesterday. It wasn’t the slowly closing gash on my heel. The feeling might have been the damage Everett did to my heart, but the depth of sorrow that inexplicably struck me was so much more profound than what I would have expected. It wasn’t like Everett broke my heart. Yet what I felt was… catastrophic. It had to be Everett. His pain wasn’t my fault, was it?It was both a blessing and a curse that I didn’t work today, because without a distraction, I was going to drive myself crazy thinking about him. Tempting as it was to text him, I didn’t. My workout routine kept me occupied for an hour as I visited Grandbay’s only gym and pumped away on an exercise bike, enhancing my biceps and lats on the pull-up bar, charging my core with the
I couldn’t rest until I heard back from Taylor. All night, I migrated around my house looking for something to do. In my office, I processed paperwork that I had set aside in favor of doting on Aislin the day before, and then I listened to the audio recordings from Hexen Manor, but found nothing that would indicate when Dalesbloom intended to attack. There was suddenly radio silence within the parlor where the bug was planted.Immediately disturbed, I made a beeline for the smell, ignoring the dense presence of dragons around us. I would plunge into the pits of Hell to retrieve Taylor if I had to. My feet moved swiftly through the grass, dew clinging to my fur, but I felt nothing except my heart slamming in my ribcage. In the back of my mind, I was grateful Aislin had gotten her lungs healed, because I was already struggling to breathe—and I didn’t know if I could endure this while choking on the sensations of a collapsed lung too.What I saw may as well have collapsed both of my lung







