She Wakes

Mate.

The word rang through my skull like a struck bell.

I gripped the arms of the chair so hard the wood creaked. My heart was pounding. Heat poured through my veins, and every inch of my skin seemed to stretch toward the man in the doorway.

Mate. Mate. MATE.

Stop it, I thought frantically. Stop. Who are you?

The voice paused. Then it came again, rich and low and deeply offended.

Who am I? Who am I? Something prowled through the back of my mind, restless and huge. Twenty years. Twenty years I’ve been locked in the dark, scratching at the walls, and that’s what you have to say to me?

My breath hitched.

No.

It couldn’t be.

I’m your wolf, you ridiculous girl, the voice said. My name is Freya. And you’re welcome.

My wolf.

The Moon Goddess had never sent her. Everyone said so. The healers, the elders, the whole Dark Moon Pack. Wolfless Kira. Useless Kira.

But she was here. I could feel her, warm and fierce and alive, curled around my heart like she’d always belonged there.

Tears stung my eyes.

“Kira.”

Zion’s voice cut through the haze. He’d crossed the room without my noticing, and now he stood beside my chair, close enough that his scent wrapped around me, cedar and cold rain, so strong it made my head swim.

Freya practically purred. Oh, look at him. Look at those shoulders.

Be quiet.

Make me.

“The healers said you were running a fever,” Zion said. He was frowning down at me, his gray eyes narrowed. “You’re flushed. And you’re shaking.”

“I’m fine.”

“You’re not fine.” He reached for my forehead.

I jerked back so fast the chair scraped the floor.

He froze, his hand still raised. Something flickered across his face, too quick to read.

What are you doing? Freya snarled. He wants to touch us. Let him touch us!

He might have killed us.

The words fell between us like a stone.

Freya went silent.

In my last life, I told her, my thoughts tight and trembling, someone dragged me into the woods and left me to die. Me and Mom both. It was either him or Dakota. I don’t know which. So no, he doesn’t get to touch us. Not until I know.

For a long moment, she said nothing. I felt her turning that over, quiet and wary.

I don’t remember any of that, she said finally. I was asleep. All I know is what I feel. A pause. And I feel that he’s ours.

Then you can feel it quietly. He can’t know.

He’ll find out eventually.

How?

When we shift for the first time. She said it like it was obvious. Until then, the bond is still forming. He’ll feel something, but he won’t know what it means. Once we shift, though? His wolf will know us the second he sees us.

I swallowed. Then we don’t shift anywhere near him.

Freya huffed, but she didn’t argue.

Zion was still watching me. He lowered his hand slowly, his jaw tight.

Then he leaned in, just slightly, and breathed in.

My whole body went rigid.

His nostrils flared. His brows drew together. For one heartbeat, something gold flickered in the depths of his gray eyes, there and gone so fast I almost thought I’d imagined it.

“You smell different,” he said quietly.

My heart stopped.

He noticed us, Freya said smugly. His wolf noticed us.

Not helping.

“It’s the clinic,” I said, keeping my voice flat. “Antiseptic. Wolfsbane. It’s all over Dark Moon’s infirmary, and I was there for an hour.”

He didn’t answer. He just kept looking at me, his head tilted, the way a predator watches something it doesn’t understand yet.

“Who are you?” he said at last.

“Your wife.” I met his eyes. “For one year. Per the contract.”

A muscle ticked in his jaw. “That’s not what I meant.”

“I know.”

The silence stretched. Mom’s monitor beeped softly. Outside the window, the first gray light of dawn was creeping across the lake.

Then the door opened, and the older healer stepped in, holding a tablet. The kindness in her face was gone. In its place was something grim.

“Alpha. Luna.” She looked between us, then at my mother. “I ran the bloodwork myself. I wanted to be certain before I said anything.”

My stomach dropped. “What is it?”

“There’s silver in her blood.” The healer’s mouth thinned. “Not old silver from months ago. It would have burned out of her system by now.”

She turned the tablet toward us. I didn’t understand the numbers on the screen, but I understood the look on her face.

“This is fresh,” she said. “Someone has been giving it to her. Small doses, over and over. For months.”

The room went very cold.

Freya’s growl rumbled low through my mind, furious and protective.

Someone has been killing her slowly. On purpose.

And they’d been doing it right under everyone’s noses at Dark Moon.