“Stop it, Mathe,” Ramsay said. “You’re gettin’ yourself all worked up over nothing. Look, Gabrielle’s a drama queen, we all know that. No offense, Colton.”
“No, she is,” Colton agreed.
“Right. So don’t take what she says personally, okay?”
I frowned, still feeling bad. “How can I not take it personally? She thinks I’m a disappointment. Hell, probably everyone here does! And they’re right!”
“Enough,” Eric growled. “I’m not going to listen to you talk about yourself like this.”
Before I could protest, Eric grabbed my wrist and dragged me towards Noro, who blinked his yellow eyes.
“Noro,” Eric said. “Can you teach Matheson?”
“Teach him?” Noro echoed. “Ah. You mean in regards to magic, yes?”
“Yes. He obviously needs a teacher.”
Eric’s words stung, but they were true. I didn’t know what I was doing. But I should’ve been thanking him. In my state of mind, I was too meek and depressed to ask for help on my own.
Maybe I’d been a little arrogant thinking I could figure everything out by myself. Ever since I became pregnant and realized my magic had awakened, I’d felt stagnant. I needed this.
“I’m not a powerful mage by any means, but I’ll try to help,” Noro said.
Eric nodded. “Good.”
The remaining pack leaders approached Noro warily. I could tell they still didn’t fully trust him, but at least they were respectful of him.
“So what does this mean for the rest of us, Matheson?” Mom asked. Her authoritative voice made it clear that, despite wanting to support her son, she was also thinking about the good of East Pack.
“I don’t know,” I said honestly.
“Well, if Matheson’s secret is safe, then we shouldn’t be in any trouble,” Dad pointed out. “Right?”
“The pride would have no reason to come here otherwise,” Noro agreed. “But sitting around and hoping for the best rarely works out.”
“That sounds kind of like a threat,” Dan muttered.
“It’s not a threat,” Noro said gently. “I’m only being realistic. As I’ve told you before, I have nothing to gain by harming Matheson. My only wish as a magic Keeper is to see him succeed.”
“Succeed in what exactly?”
Noro glanced my way, his eyes drifting to my belly then back up to my face. “Succeed in setting the shifters free, like it says in the verse. I’m assuming this means that Matheson will no longer be the only omega. The balance of alphas, betas and omegas in the area should return to normal.”
Dan uncrossed his arms in shock. “What? Really?”
“Is that true?” I asked, my eyes wide.
“I can’t imagine it means anything else,” Noro said.
“It makes sense to me,” Eric murmured. “What I don’t understand is, why hasn’t it happened already? If we fulfilled the verse and Matheson is pregnant, shouldn’t there already be others having an omega awakening?”
“I don’t know,” Noro admitted. “Prophecies work in mysterious ways, as I’m sure you’ve noticed.”
Colton sighed, sounding downtrodden. “And here I thought we got it all...”
“All right, all right, no moping around,” Ramsay growled. “We figured it out before and we’ll figure it out again. Nothing’s gonna get accomplished if we sit here sucking our thumbs about it.”
I knew Ramsay was right, but it didn’t stop me from feeling like the weight of the world was crushing my shoulders. I couldn’t stop thinking about Eric’s point. Whyhadn’tother omegas popped up already? Did we do something wrong? If so, what did we miss?
