My senses let me know I’m not alone anymore, and I lift my head and see Blackfire and Reed climbing out of the sea.
“Over here!” I yell to them. Their heads shoot up, and they run over in seconds. Of course they don’t check on me. Their eyes fix on Meredith like she is their gravity, and this is further proof that this human has been sent to damn us all. Reed has a fucking stick hanging out of his stomach, and he doesn’t even seem to notice he is bleeding heavily. Blackfire is covered in bruises, and blood from hundreds of cuts is still dripping into the sand at his feet as his wolf heals him. Neither of them notice their own fucked-up conditions—they only look at her.
We have never disagreed or fought over anyone. But her? She is the reason we are currently disagreeing on everything. I’ve known Blackfire and Reed for fifty years of my life, practically half of my life so far, and we have never been like this.
“She’s breathing, and she threw up everything from the sea.” I speak into the silence, knowing they need to calm down their wolves. I can practically see their wolves losing it, just like mine did. What is it about this human that makes our wolves go into a frenzy? “The last chosen is here too. I can hear his heartbeat on the other side of the island.”
I don’t know if they even hear me, because Reed and Blackfire have knelt at her side. Reed is holding her hand. Blackfire is running his eyes over her, checking her, making sure that I’m telling the truth as his hands clench and unclench at his sides. Some argument in his mind seems to short-circuit, and he touches her. My wolf snarls and pushes at me to touch her too, to prove I am better at holding her hand, that I can brush her hairto the side just like Blackfire is doing. I smack my own head and drag my eyes from Meredith.
My wolf growls in my mind.Mine.
I grit my teeth. I need to explain to the fucker—again—that she’s not ours. That we’re not having sex with this human and seducing her. That we don’t fuck humans to begin with and, second of all, we definitely don’t fuck our enemies. She saved my half-sister and stole justice from my pack. She is a lying spy who’s working with the creatures here somehow. I might be conflicted on how she managed to survive and be this beautiful anyway, but it doesn’t mean I am going to give in and become like these two assholes. Who are still too close to her, and I want to rip them away.
Usually, women with a smart mouth turn me on, and she has the smartest mouth I’ve ever heard. She runs it all the time. This must be why I’m feeling like fucking her might solve some of the problems in my life. My constant boner around her being one of those problems.
I climb to my feet just as a letter falls from the sky. I glare up at it, grabbing it out of the air and ripping it open. I hate these letters.
“We need to survive ten nights and ten days on the island to win,” I growl, dropping it next to Meredith.
“I’ll start a fire to keep her warm.” Blackfire stands, looking torn about leaving her side. Such a simp, and he hasn’t even fucked her. How is she doing this?
“No, no fire.” Reed stops him with a snarl. “She has nightmares about fire and burning. I don’t know what happened or why she is scared, but no fire.”
I tense, realizing why she doesn’t like it. I’ve been such a fucking moron. “I have a better idea of how we can keep her warm. But now, I need to work out some frustrations over nearlybeing drowned, and I’m going to kill the final chosen for fun. Want to come?”
I don’t wait, knowing one of them will enjoy some light torture and death to begin our day. Blackfire stands, silently stalking through the forest with me to hunt.
Reed stays behind with our girl. No,what the fuck, not our girl. Not my anything. Fuck’s sake! I shift, hoping that murdering a wolf might finally shake her out of my head.
Chapter Twenty-Six
My mouth is dry when I wake up, and my throat hurts, reminding me that I was screaming in the water. I was drowning.Am I dead?I sniff the air, and I don’t smell cake, so I can’t be dead. I’ve been a good person; I would get cake in heaven with the goddesses. I might throw the cake at them for putting me through this crazy Folkland shit. Hell, who am I kidding? I wouldn’t waste a drop of cake when I’ve been so deprived.
My head is pounding, but I’m warm. Toasty even. I try to sit up, but something’s holding me down, and it’s heavy…and furry. I look down, surprised to see a huge black wolf’s head curled up on my stomach and my shoulder, his body pressed against my legs. He’s so big that I couldn’t move even if I tried.
“Blackfire,” I whisper in realization. He doesn’t wake up, his wolf in a deep sleep, and I relax back. We must be safe ifBlackfire has gone to sleep, and I am too tired to care. Somebody dressed me in a shirt that smells like maple syrup a little too much and covered me in a blanket made of leaves. It’s all surprisingly warm, even out in the open, and I am too comfy to get mad that I’m wearing Orion’s shirt.
I hope the goddesses dressed me and not him…because that would mean he saw the burns. Panic threatens to swallow me whole, but I push it away and tell myself he couldn’t have seen the burns. I’m not that unlucky. Orion would take the piss out of me and call me weak and ugly, like Eli said I would be. I close my eyes and push the thoughts away, focusing on what happened instead. I remember the tidal wave hitting the room and the cabin being smashed to pieces.
A wave of sadness hits me…it had been feeling like home. I don’t remember much else other than drowning. I was right; it’s a terrible way to almost die. I need to make a chart of the worst ways to almost die as I’m experiencing a lot of them in a short amount of time. It could be a cool poster to show the heirs. I wonder if they can add their own experiences to it.
I shuffle my feet and realize there’s another heavy something on them too. I manage to scoot my head high enough to see Orion’s pretty brown wolf is lying on my feet. A sleepy huff makes me look to my left, where Reed’s fluffy white wolf is curled around my other side, his face near the top of my head. The heat of all three of them is keeping me warm, and I’m so glad there’s no fire, even if I don’t understand why they wouldn’t light a fire instead of this. I’m too sleepy to figure it out as I stare at the glittering night sky above, admiring the stars that stretch endlessly. I won’t forget this view, that’s for sure. I’ve watched the night sky in the forest on so many nights, but there are never this many stars, and it is truly beautiful. The stars are all I see as I fall back to sleep.
When I wake up again, I’m alone, but the sun is beaming down, and it’s warm now. I stretch my arms above my head and roll over, the leaf blanket bunching up in my legs with the movement. There’s a gold note next to my head, and I sit up too quickly to get away from it. The floor seems to move like waves, and my sore throat feels like a cat has scratched it raw. I gulp and wince as that hurts too. I pick the gold letter up, seeing it has been ripped open already, and I read the command about ten days and ten nights alone on the island. It can’t be that easy…right? The island seems small from what I can see; a line of palm trees try and fail to block out the warm sun, but they have no leaves or fruit hanging from them.
The sea stretches as far as I can see, and a sandy beach wraps around us. It reminds me of the story told by a man who came into the pub a year or so ago. He claimed he was from the Mother Pack and said he was just passing through with his friends, and they were going back home to the Mother Pack, where the beaches have white sand and the sea is so clear you can see all the fish swimming around your feet. I never imagined a place like that could be real until now. The sea cliffs in the human district are grey and smothered in rocks, and the water is not see-through.
I wonder how long I’ve been asleep. Am I going to be lucky, and it’s already been ten nights? That would be the best wake-up gift, second to cake. I hear a thud, a grunt. I turn my head over to see Arrogant and Blackfire are fighting with long spears they must have made themselves. They’re moving fast, sweat pouring off their thick muscles as they spin around each other, and they’re both very shirtless.
My mouth pops open, and I watch in a trance as their powerful bodies move like lightning across the sky. Heat pools in my stomach, and I swallow, not caring that my throat hurts. They are both so powerful and just big. Muscles flex on their arms, and their abs tense as they fight, and I’m reminded once again how long they must have been friends, because they move like they can read each other’s minds and block them. Blackfire gets the upper hand, but Orion moves to dodge the spear that would have gone through his head.
“Your mouth’s hanging open,” Reed jokes, and I jump. Narrowing my eyes, I turn to face Reed as he walks out of the treeline and towards me.
“Good morning, asshole. You need to tie that bell from the kitchen around your neck,” I grumble. “But also, thank you if you saved me from the sea. I’m not an ungrateful bitch. How long have I been asleep? Also, I was just thinking they must train together as they move like they know the next move.”
He blinks, like he doesn’t know how to process what I’ve said. I might be a little grumpy with him still, but his words are still echoing in my mind.Just some fun. Bored.I have to put a wall up between us at some point, and now seems like as good a time as any other. I can’t let him get close to me when he clearly feels nothing like I do. It hurts, but I have to protect my heart. She doesn’t understand, and I took far too long putting her back together after I trusted Eli.
“Just a day, and yes, they have. We all have sparred and taught each other moves. It makes us stronger to work together towards one goal and have each other’s backs. How are you feeling?”
