All Chapters of Rise of the Phoenix Wolf: Chapter 101 - Chapter 104

OCTAVIA. Khufu was the first to voice the question they had both been sitting on.“Why us?” he asked, tilting his head. His usual sharp smile faded into something serious. “Out of everyone down here, why choose us?”There was more beneath the question than simple curiosity. His voice carried a slight roughness, and beside him, Breandán went completely still.Osric didn’t hesitate. He told them exactly what he had told the rest of us back in Roman’s office. He believed in second chances—not the kind handed out blindly, but the kind that gave someone the opportunity to become more than the worst thing they had ever done. Mistakes still carried consequences, and harm still demanded restitution. But punishment without purpose only created more pain, more anger, and more monsters.If someone was willing to own what they had done, make amends, and choose differently when given the opportunity, then they deserved the chance to prove they could be better. Restitution mattered more than retrib

OCTAVIA. (3 Years Later)Three years. I still couldn't get my head around it sometimes, not the number itself, but all that the number had somehow contained."Mama, look! Look, look, look!"August dashed across the yard as fast as he could, black hair flying into his eyes, his arms swinging like the finish line of some race he could see. He skidded to a halt in front of me, nearly falling on his own feet, and raised in triumph a beetle as large as my thumb."He's so big," he announced with a flourish. "I keep him? Can I name him?" He didn't wait for an answer before deciding to name him Gary."Gary's a great name," I said enthusiastically.I leaned forward to admire his find properly, because in our house, a two-and-a-half-year-old's beetle discovery received the same level of seriousness as anything else."Does Gary have a home to go back to, though?"August stared at the beetle for a long moment, his face scrunching up as he considered this."Gary go home?" he asked, not entirely ce