From the moment of my birth, I was a member of the Aibek Pack. Masters of the Moon. First I was an epsilon, then a delta and eventually a gamma. I had no problem being a gamma, being the middle of the pack. My father had been a sub-alpha and my mother a beta; both of them fighters, both of them lost in the Aibek-Lunaire Pack War when I had been in middle school. I had been cared for after that by the pack mothers -- those older females who had already raised their young and had taken on the task of raising the many orphans left from that war.
Night had been just twenty-one then, had just received his mate brand and had assumed his role as Alpha after his father had been brutally tortured and killed, separated from his Howl, who had also been killed, so they could not form their Bonded wolf.
Something had snapped in Night and his brother, Néron, after their parents were killed. The Slaine brothers had been an unstoppable force, rallying the Aibek wolves to press forward, not stopping until a bloody, ugly victory had been won with many carcasses from both sides left in the wake of their unrelenting quest for blood. Night and the Alpha of the Lunaire pack had hashed out a truce, and the shaky agreement had held in the eight years since. No one trusted it would last, and many were amazed it had lasted for so long. Much of that was due to Night's reputation as a fighter, a brutal warrior who never would back down until he had a pile of throats at his feet.
Today I had discovered that brutality extended to other areas of his life as he had shown all of us. My hands shook as I threw my clothes and toiletries into two duffel bags. Looking around my tiny apartment, I thanked the Great Wolves that Night had not issued an Alpha Decree keeping me on pack lands. I'm sure it never occurred to him that I'd leave. I was -- had been -- a gamma. We were rule followers, helpers, contributors; we loved our pack and our positions in it. Night wouldn't think I'd be bold enough to leave.
And that was why I needed to leave, fast, before he thought to issue a decree forcing me to stay. I might be broken, I might be in excruciating pain, but I refused to die. I'd text my friends once I left, hoping they weren't already headed over to my place to bring much-needed comfort. They'd try to talk me out of leaving, but there was no way I could remain. Staying here would lead to my death.
On my way out, I grabbed the soft, cashmere afghan my mother had made -- the only real keepsake I had of her besides a few pictures I managed to save of her and my dad.
When I got to my car, I stopped cold. My friends Owena and Echo stood by my old, but reliable, Monte Carlo, duffel bags in hand.
"We figured you'd be taking off," Echo said, pushing her sunglasses up on her head.
Owena nodded. "I'd be running from the law after that clusterfuck we all just witnessed because I would have killed both of those assholes." My friend since elementary school, Owena sometimes lacked a filter.
"Yeah, well, you couldn't have because Alpha Decree," I reminded her.
"So, where are we going?" Echo asked.
"We're not going anywhere," I told them. "I'm going to hunt for the Raevyn, see if she can help me, and you two are staying here."
"Nope," Echo contradicted me. "We're going with you. What kind of best friends would we be if we let you take off alone, no pack to comfort you, have your back? You don't even know what's going to happen to you since he...after the Alpha...now that he's..."
"Rejected me," I finished her sentence firmly. "I can't pretty it up, Echo. My Destined One rejected me and as much as it hurts, I have to face it."
"Well, we'll be facing it with you, then," Owena said. "Now, let me drive us out of here, past the guards. They've seen me driving your car all the time, so they won't ask any questions."
Echo and I hid down in the back, hoping the guards would attribute our scents in the vehicle to the fact that we all drove around in my car all the time. Maybe they hadn't heard about my humiliation in the Den yet and wouldn't be on the lookout for one broken and battered wolf leaving pack lands.
In the end, getting off pack lands was anti-climactic. The guards saw Owena driving my car and waved her on through the gates.
No questions.
No comments.
And then we were free. As soon as were twenty miles beyond pack lands, Echo and I popped up in the back seat, figuring the odds of the three of us being spotted by anyone in the pack on a Saturday this far from pack lands was minimal. Although we may have to go to the city or nearby towns to work during the week, on weekends, we wolves stayed near our pack, close to home.
"So, this is really happening," Echo said, more to herself than to either of us. "Road trip!"
I could barely smile, still reeling from the reality of what Night had done to me.
Echo reached into her duffel bag and pulled out her computer. "Listen, we have no clue what's going to happen to you, to your wolf, as a result of this...this...this..."
"Rejection!" I snapped at her. "If I can say it, you can. I don't want either of you walking on eggshells around me. We all lost our parents in the war, so this can't be any worse."
That was a huge lie. Losing your Destined One could destroy a wolf in days, the will to live just gone. My wolf hadn't made a peep since that fun scene this morning. She was deep in me, not even licking her wounds yet because she couldn't summon the energy. She'd always admired the Alpha -- as a female, it was inevitable -- he was a big, big wolf, his solid black fur thick and soft, his golden eyes watchful of his pack members. Up until today, Night had been a caring Alpha, always concerned with his pack's well-being. Today was the first day he'd ever shown deliberate cruelty to any of us. Lucky me!
Echo researched possible symptoms I could experience from being rejected, but refused to tell me any of them.
"No. It's like when you hear about lice and your head starts itching," she said when I demanded she tell me. "I could tell you that your canines growing longer was a symptom and you'd start feeling them with your tongue."
Which was exactly what I was doing at that very moment. Just in case.
"So, I'll tell Owena and she and I'll watch you closely for any of these symptoms. And if we see you exhibiting a symptom, then, and only then, will we tell you the symptom. But right now, we're going to hope for the best and maybe we'll find the Raevyn before you have any symptoms."
I thunked my head against the back of the seat and groaned. "How are we going to find her? Finding her is going to be like finding a needle in a haystack. Impossible."
"No!" Owena smacked her palm against the steering wheel. "We are not going to fail in our mission. We are Aibek pack and we are fighters. No mission is beyond us. We're going to find her and we're going to get you help and it's all going to be good. It's all going to be good."
Buoyed by Owena's optimism, we all settled into our seats for the drive to wherever we were led. Echo researched all the Raevyn legends and stories, reading them out loud to us to see if any of us could pick up a clue. We couldn't, no matter how hard we tried. Raevyn was a mystery and it looked as if she would remain one.
We drove all day and well into the night, stopping for gas and food twice, before we finally pulled into a hotel for some much-needed sleep. Stumbling into our hotel room, we had just enough energy to kick off our shoes before we fell onto the king-sized bed, passing out immediately.
Emotional pain will do that to you.
It will also wake you up screaming from a nightmare.
Echo and Owena immediately shot up in bed next to me, Owena demanding to know what was wrong, Echo rubbing my back and assuring me in soft, sweet tones that I was OK.
"He was...he was..." I tried to catch my breath and willed my pounding heart to resume a normal beat. "He was cutting off my mate brand. From my face. He was trying to cut my mate brand off my face with a knife."
We all absorbed that horror for a moment, and shivered as one at the mere thought.
Owena and Echo exchanged a glance.
"That's a symptom, isn't it?" I demanded. "Bad dreams."
Echo nodded, but never paused in rubbing my back. "It's one of the earliest ones, so that's good. It means it's just starting. We have time."
"And when does the pain start? Like the real pain, not just the I'm-shattered-because-of-what-you-made-me-witness-and-what-you-said pain."
"No," Owena said firmly. "One hour at a time. No worrying about when some old stories said it may or may not happen. You just had a bad dream. That's it. Now, we're going to go back to sleep, get a few more hours of rest, and then wake up ready to drive on tomorrow, wherever we're led."
"South," I said suddenly. "We've been traveling west, but tomorrow we need to go south."
Why I said that, I'll never know.
But we headed south the next day, stopping whenever we needed gas or food. I didn't tell them that the pain had started, a crushing pain that made it hurt to breathe. It wasn't constant, but it came in waves and it was all I could do to hide my body's reaction to the agony.
When we stopped for the night at another hotel, I looked forward to sleeping and maybe escaping the pain.
But once again, after about three hours of a restless sleep, I woke up screaming. Same dream, except this time Night was trying to use a hatchet to remove my mate brand.
Sweaty and shaking, I realized this dream had been worse, more vivid, more intense, and my hand flew to my mark to make sure it was still there. The dream had felt very real.
"You're OK," Echo assured me as she rubbed my back. "You're OK, Neera. It was just a bad dream."
Owena clapped her hands together. "We need to run," she said. "This hotel backs up to a huge wooded area and just beyond it is a river. Let's let the fur girls out and have some fun. They've been cooped up for almost three days, and they need to stretch their legs. Come on. We have a couple of hours before sunrise, so let's do it."
"Sounds good to me," I murmured. Anything sounded better than going back to sleep, maybe seeing Night coming at me with another hatchet or something even worse this time.
We walked out of the hotel and into the woods a little ways before we shedded our clothes and tucked them safely into the low vee of an oak tree.
Then we shifted and my fur girl, a smallish black-furred wolf with green eyes, sprinted through the woods, Owena's and Echo's fur girls following.
We ran and ran, playfully nipping at one another as we splashed in the river and chased rabbits -- but not in a serious way -- until we eventually turned back as the sun began peeping over the horizon, orange and pink and breathtaking.
As we came around the bend in the river, a woman sat on the biggest, flattest rock in the outcropping, watching us. She seemed young, her skin beautiful and unlined. What you couldn't help but notice was her lack of hair and the tattoos that covered her head in a spiral pattern.
And then, because she'd surprised us and we'd been focused on her, we noticed the ravens surrounded her, sitting beside her on the rock, one perched on her shoulder, several circling above her in the air.
She looked steadily at my wolf and smiled. "So, Neera, I understand you've been looking for me and have need of my services."
Holy shit. It looked like the Raevyn had found us.