“You’ll see soon enough. It is your fate. But let me make this very clear—your destiny does not lie within the three packs and its heirs.” He reaches up, touching a strand of my gold hair as my heart races. Before I can move, before I can think what he says, his hand slides to the back of my head, and he yanks me forward,pushing my forehead against his, both of us so close that our breath mixes and my nails dig into his stomach on instinct. “Your future’s in oblivion, and only I can be your anchor and your light. Just say you’re mine and our bond will be set forever.”
“I don’t know who you are,” I whisper.
“The first trial—the Crone goddess’s one—has begun when you wake. You must survive it and show the goddesses they were right to choose you for this.” He breathes against my lips. “I suspect they don’t know who you are, but that’s good. They wouldn’t give the power to an oblivion-touched.”
“You still aren’t going to tell me your name, my monster?” I mutter. I’m just confused. “Even when you’re close enough to kiss me again.”
“One taste was like the gods’ nectar, and if I take more, I will never stop until I’ve tasted all of you.” My cheeks burn at the suggestion. “Survive for me, my love.” Suddenly I’m falling through the clouds, screaming, swirling in the fog around me. All I can hear is the same word repeating over and over.Oblivion. Oblivion. Oblivion.
I wake up with a gasp, sweat sticking to my body. I lick my dry lips and frown as I look around. Heavy fog smothers everything in all directions, and it’s snowing. I suck in a freezing cold breath and look down at Elizabeth, sleeping next to where I was lying.
“Elizabeth.” I shake her arm to wake her, and she hits my arm away, moving to lie back down. I get it; napping is important, but I think we might be in trouble. Her long brown hair smothers her face, and the vine tattoos on her arms seem to glow green as she shoos me away.
I shake her shoulder again, and she actually wakes up this time, shooting up to sit, and she blinks once, rubs her eyes, and then looks at me with her bright green eyes, the tint of darknessin them swirling a vortex of worry. “What happened? Are you okay?”
Should I say no? I’m not okay, mostly because I haven’t eaten cake in days and I’m competing in the Folkland—when I’m painfully human. I’m also dreaming about a handsome monster who likes me. Maybe Tannith is right and I need a love life so I don’t imagine one for myself and question my own kinks.
“I don’t think we’re in the forest anymore.” I shrug my shoulder, avoiding her question. Mostly for her sake. “I don’t know where we are, though. I think this is the Crone goddess’s trial, and I’m praying it doesn’t involve fire.” I shiver at the smell of smoke in the air. I really don’t want Elizabeth to see me freak out.
Elizabeth rises to her feet, offering me a hand. “I’m your guardian, so you’re going to be okay.” She grabs my hand when I don’t take it from her, and she squeezes, looking into my eyes. “I was never forced to swear allegiance to the Mother Pack because royals do not need to, and I never found anyone in my life that I thought was worth fighting for. Everyone has given up on me or done worse things, but you? You are human, and you fucking jumped into certain death in that river to try to save me. You fought for me, and I am swearing here and now, the mark of the guardian between us is something I will follow until my last breath. I am your guardian, Meredith Crone, and your friend too. I want someone to remember me as more than the murderer of the alpha. More than a bloodkin. I’m not just that.”
I never thought she was. I nod once in agreement, seeing how serious she is. Her wolf flashes in her green eyes, and I swear I feel my blood vibrate with the promise. I can’t promise her anything, not when there is every chance I’m going to die and zero chance I can protect her back.
“Now we have sorted that out,” she says, nodding, “I agree, this must be the trial. Perhaps they took us when we were sleeping.”
“Maybe,” I whisper, not liking this. I can smell smoke in the air, even though it’s so cold, and the air is hard to breathe in. Every inhale hurts my chest, and I wince at the feeling. I think we are high up in the air, as I remember a history book on hiking that I was made to research. I failed the test on it, so that’s not a good start.
I walk to the edge of the stone platform we are on and look down. Would jumping be better? I’m not sure.
Elizabeth yanks me away from the edge, moving us both to the centre. How did she know I wanted to jump? I should have offered to let her join me. It could be like one of those trust falls they teach in therapy, but we’d both die.
“You could slip, so don’t go near the edge.” She has a point. The ground is covered in ice, and the snow is building up, sticking to my clothes too. A sound like swarming bees buzzes in my ears, and the fog starts to shift, moving on a phantom breeze, revealing Orion on a cliff ledge near us. He is too far away for him to jump over and try to kill Elizabeth, which, by looking at his hostile smirk, I bet he is thinking about it. I stick my tongue out at him, and he growls before turning away from me.
“Reed! Blackfire!” he roars, but no one answers him, and I begin to worry. Reed will be okay; he has his selected, but Blackfire doesn’t. What happens to Tannith if Blackfire dies in this? I suspect the alpha will kill Tannith and punish me endlessly. Blackfire can’t die, even if the asshole deserves to.
The fog keeps clearing, revealing more of the chosen and some of their selected. A good portion of them are on their own, like Orion, but others have their selected with them. I try to count and find there are nine chosen left, including us. I find the female that I locked eyes with before we touched the bloodstone.She’s with her selected, another female that is similar in looks to her. She nods once to me, and I nod back. Some kind of weird womankind alliance passes between us, I guess. Maybe when I run with Elizabeth, we’ll be safe with her. Girls can stick together.
I reach for my bag to check on Tannith, but I find it is gone. I search the ground and finally look up at Elizabeth, who is tying her hair back. “Tannith isn’t here.”
“Maybe they don’t want you having help here,” she offers, and I know she is trying to make sure I don’t panic. “Here.” She offers me a hairband, and I smile gratefully before tying my messy locks at the back of my neck.
“But what if she’s alone out in that forest?” I mutter. “I’m only doing this to keep her alive, and I can’t keep her safe if she isn’t with me.”
Elizabeth pauses, searching my face. “Can’t you be doing all this soyousurvive and have a life after? Fighting for yourself is important too.”
She doesn’t know that I’m not worth it. She can’t; she doesn’t really know me. Sometimes I think my soul died when I was eighteen, when I was burnt, when I was told I wasn’t worth it. After that, I knew I had to fight for someone else because no one was going to fix me. I can’t be fixed. Every part of my life since then has been about keeping Tannith alive and happy, keeping the orphanage running and safe. I never planned a life for myself that didn’t include helping them in the best way I could, and I’ve never once thought I deserved to want a future for myself. People like me aren’t worth it. I can hear his screams in my ear, telling me I will die and no one will care. That’s the truth, and I can never escape it. “I need to get back to Tannith.”
Elizabeth frowns, opening her mouth to continue her speech on self-worth, and I turn away from her, watching as the fog drifts like a wave across the sea. The fog keeps clearing andeventually revealing what’s right in the centre: a colossal statue. The statue of the Crone goddess, if I’m not mistaken, and it’s hard to be mistaken about her. Even in stone, she’s stunning in a way only a goddess could be. Long, tight curls of hair falling all over her shoulders, straight down to her feet, winding with the beautiful dress wrapped around her.
The Crone goddess’s hands are held together, holding a beating heart. Even in stone, the heart is red, and it is thumping like a drum. From the heart spreads red veins that look almost like tree roots, thick and heavy, and they crawl all over her arms, her hands, through her hair, and down her dress to the stone ground. Several of them are locked around her eyes and in her hair, almost creating a crown. The veins are moving and crawling across the stone, and I watch as they slowly, magically slither through the air between us and pool into a circle at the edge of our platform. I glance to my left, seeing Orion has the same, and as I look around, every platform I can see has one too.
Please don’t say we have to climb. I’d rather die than go hiking. My body is not built for endurance or strength; it is built for cake. Cake is my safe space.
Orion is on the far side of his platform, shouting. I follow his gaze, looking to see Reed and Ayan next to him, both of them waving their hands around as they talk. Blackfire isn’t hard to find. He is on the platform next to theirs, crouching and looking around. His eyes lock with mine, and I swear I see something like relief in the red pits of madness. Maybe he is relieved I’m alive because he still needs me to be bait. That must be the reason, because he clearly hates me.
Elizabeth is pacing up and down as we wait. All of them begin to get restless, but I sit down on the edge and whistle to myself, enjoying the snow. Winter is always my favourite time of year. The snow makes the streets of the human district almost look clean and new, washing away the grime and dirt. Tannith hasalways preferred summer, mostly because we need less gold to work the heating, but for me, the heat only makes the streets stink, all the smells much worse than usual.
After a while, my nails are beginning to turn blue, and I can’t stop shivering. Elizabeth sighs, coming over and covering my hands with hers, sitting right next to me. Her hands are warmer than mine, even in the cold. “You need gloves.”
