The Last Thing I Had Of Them

CHAPTER 3

Avery's POV

I pushed off the edge of the cot, intent on locking the door.

A sharp cramp twisted through my stomach and wrapped around my waist. My knees buckled, and I hit the stone floor, clutching my stomach as cold sweat broke out across my forehead.

No. Please, Goddess, no.

Healer Callum's warning from earlier echoed in my head.

“You're dangerously underweight, Avery,” he'd said, looking at my frail wrists. “many years of Omega labor and skipped meals... your body barely has the nutrients to sustain itself, let alone a growing pup. You need milkroot to settle your womb, but my supply in the infirmary is completely dry.”

I didn't have a single coin to buy it from the pack's herb stalls.

Shepherd's Hill was steep and cold. In my condition, climbing it was foolish.

But as I looked down at my trembling hands resting over my belly, I knew I had no choice. The escape could wait. I needed my strength to save this pup.

After Luna Vivian's threat, asking Callum for help would only put a target on my back. If she realized my body was already struggling, she wouldn't hesitate to lock me in a tower like livestock until the baby could be taken.

I pulled myself up using the edge of the cot, my teeth gritted against another wave of pain.

I didn't move right away.

The hallway outside the maid's wing was always busy at this hour - trays clattering, Omegas whispering. If anyone saw me leave with a cloak, they'd tell her. Or worse, the chief guard.

I pressed my back to the door, holding my breath until the footsteps faded.

When it was quiet, I cracked the door open an inch.

The hall was empty and I slipped out, keeping my head down, my cloak pulled tight over my shoulders. It was too thin. The wind coming off the hills cut right through it, carrying the smell of coming rain.

The sky over Shepherd's Hill was already a bruised grey. If it rained, the path would turn to mud. I would never make it back before dark.

And I had to be back before dark. If the Luna found my cot empty...

I didn't finish the thought.

I tightened the cloak around my belly - around us - and started toward the back gate, where the guards never bothered to check an Omega maid.

The hill was as cold as I remembered. My fingers were numb by the time I found the first patch of milkroot.

I gathered what I could and sank into the grass to rest a bit. The wind blew my hair across my face. Luna Vivian's warning hung in my mind like a stone deep down the lake.

Six years of scrubbing floors for the pack that hated me, and now I was a half starved pregnant woman picking weeds on a hill while the future Luna sat comfortably in my mate’s room drinking tea.

The Goddess really did have a twisted sense of humor.

Behind me, the bushes rustled. Not from the breeze. Something else.

I stared, expecting a rabbit but it didn't come.

Then I saw it.

A pair of wolf eyes, gazing at me.

“Argh!”

I scrambled to my feet, pulse racing wildly. “Okay, get a grip, Avery. This is literally how every bad Omega story starts. The ones where they never find the body.”

I should have run.

I didn't. Because apparently I was an idiot.

Slowly, I moved toward the bush and the figure darted. I caught it - not fur. Hair. Someone's hair.

They didn't move. They just watched.

Oh, hell no. Not today, you creepy forest pervert.

I swallowed hard, shoved the milk root into my cloak, and backed away. I was not becoming a ghost story on Shepherd's Hill. I had a pup to keep alive, and it was already getting dark.

I started down the hill, every step sending a fresh spike of pain through my stomach. I moved like a donkey loaded with goods, being urged forward even though the load was too heavy.

I looked back once, nearly tripping on a stone.

By the time I reached the pack gates, I was shaking and short of breath. I bent over, hands on my knees, rain starting to fall in earnest.

Why was someone following me? Had the Luna sent guards to follow me now?

At least I had the milkroot.

Now I just had to make it back to my room without anyone noticing.

I pushed open the room door only to find Liliana already inside.

She stood by my cot, her back turned to me.

First it was the Luna and now the Gamma's daughter. Could the day get any worse?

I wrapped my cloak around me making sure the root had stayed hidden in my pocket.

“What are you doing in my room?” I asked.

“Your room?” She didn't turn, “this is pack property. You’re just the rat they let sleep in it. Where have you been? Sneaking off again?”

“Get out of my room Liliana.”

She finally turned around with my pendant dangling from her fingers like it was something filthy she had picked up off the floor.

“You still think you can speak to me like that? After what you did to Ethan?” She held the pendant higher. “What is this cheap thing anyway? A keepsake from your traitor father?”

I had hidden it under the pillow when Luna Vivian came in earlier. Now it's in her hands. My hands curled into fists at my sides. “Put it down.”

“Or what?” She tilted her head. “You’ll slap me the way you slapped him? Go on then. Give me a reason.”

I stepped forward before I could stop myself. “I said put it down.”

Liliana’s smile only widened. Without another word, she closed her fist and crushed the pendant.

“Why did you do that?” I rushed to where the shards poured on the floor.

Something inside me snapped.

“You bitch—”

I shoved her hard against the wall.

Liliana stumbled back with a surprised cry just as footsteps stopped outside the door.

“Avery?”

A familiar voice called.

The moment she heard him, Liliana dropped to the floor, clutching her stomach like she was in agony.

The door opened.

Ethan stood there, eyes moving from me to Liliana on the ground. His expression darkened.

“What happened here?” he demanded.

Liliana looked up at him with wet eyes. “I only came to talk to her. She attacked me. She pushed me.” She glanced at the broken pieces scattered on the floor. “She even destroyed her own pendant just to come at me.”

I let out a short, tired breath. Of course she did.

“I didn’t do anything,” I said. My voice sounded strange even to me. “She broke it. She crushed my pendant on purpose.”

Ethan looked at the scattered pieces, then at me. For a second something flickered across his face — recognition, maybe even guilt — before it disappeared.

“It’s just a pendant, Avery,” he said quietly.

“No Ethan. It’s not just any pendant. You know what it meant to me.” A tear slid down my cheek.

“Avery. I’ll get you another one. It’s not worth all this.”

The words landed harder than the shove I had given Liliana.

And now it was just a pendant.

Liliana reached for his arm. “We should go Ethan. This isn’t good for the baby. The stress isn’t good for either of us.”

Ethan hesitated, then nodded. He looked at me one last time.

“Stay here,” he said. “Don’t cause any more trouble tonight.”

I didn’t answer. I turned my back on both of them and lay down on the cot, facing the wall.

The door closed.

The silence that followed was worse than the argument.

I stared at the wall until my vision blurred. Only then did I let the tears come.

My father had pressed that pendant into my hands the night before they took him. He had told me it would keep me company when no one else would. That as long as I had it, I wouldn’t be completely alone.

Now it was in pieces on the floor.

I slid off the cot and crouched down, gathering the shards with shaking fingers. One of them caught the light differently, there was a small carved mark on it, like a seal or a ring imprint, but I was too tired and too angry to look closer.

I tore a strip from the hem of my gown, poured the broken pieces into it, and tied it shut. Then I climbed back onto the cot and clutched the small bundle against my chest.

I had over stayed my welcome. By tomorrow I'd be out of this place for good.