I got it.

I did.

And whatever the Mother’s game was, I was pissed.

And I had no compunction in telling Her that. Even if She wouldn’t answer. Even if She was only going to ignore me, I had to figure out what the hell was going on, and only the Mother had the answers I needed.

Six

Austin

When Sabina stormed off, heading into the forest, the four of us hovered in shock, letting her go. I knew I, for one, was at a loss, and it figured that even my know-it-all brother was too, because he was just as still, just as stoic as he processed what we’d learned, thanks to our sister-in-law’s uncanny ability to see us for what we were.

I wasn’t sure why that was something anyone would be gifted by a deity, but who the hell was I to question why?

Was I even grateful that she’d somehow identified Merinda in a wolf’s body? A supernatural she-wolf at that?

For some reason, the thought put me on edge, and I swallowed before rasping, “Lara, if you’ll excuse us, we need to go and check on our mate.”

She hummed, but as I made to move past her, she grabbed my hand and forced me to look at her. “What is it? Where’s she going?”

“There’s a place in the woods that is special to us. We go there to commune.”

She showed no signs of disdain at what, to a human, might sound like a weirdass bullshit excuse, merely nodded her understanding—even though she couldn’t possibly understand the importance of the totem—and told me, “I didn’t mean to upset you.”

“I know you didn’t,” I told her, and Ethan repeated that sentiment too.

“It just came as a shock is all,” Eli countered before he started after Sabina, who was across the way by now, heading toward the forest line.

As he moved, Ethan took after him, and the urge to join them had me dithering as I wondered if I should look after her or go after my mate, who had two of my brothers to ease her stress.

Only, Lara reached up and stunned me by cupping my cheek. The move was more than just fraternal, even though there was nothing sexual about it. It felt more like it was her way of scanning me, which didn’t exactly put me at ease. Not when I knew she had mad skills that our mate hadn’t bothered to explain to us…

“It’s okay. Be with her. She needs you.”

I gulped because I could feel Sabina, could sense that she did need me. More than anything, she needed me to get her out of trouble because one didn’t just go into the totem and shout at the Mother and expect Her to talk back to you.

Until death, we weren’t supposed to be able to commune with Her again. Now we were mated and the claim had settled, but I would bet a hundred thousand dollars that wasn’t the case here. I just knew that in this, too, Sabina would be an overachiever.

Neither could I just leave Lara out on the drive, so I leaped up the few stairs to the veranda then hollered inside. “Elsa! I need you to come and show Lara to her room.”

I twisted around, saw Lara was there, hovering a few steps behind me, and I murmured, “Elsa will be along shortly. I’m sorry about this.”

She waved a hand. “It’s quite nice for my gifts to be accepted as helpful and not lunacy,” she told me sagely. “So please, go and deal with the repercussions of that. I just need a bath and bed.”

“You can have both. Your suite is one of the largest we have, or alternatively, you can stay on the property line in a cabin there.”

To be honest, I hadn’t asked Sabina where we were putting her sister up, so I had no idea, and my priorities were elsewhere. I gave her a tight smile, then I left her in the foyer without a backward glance as I shifted.

I knew my brothers had transformed too, even if Sabina hadn’t, and I raced toward them, shoving myself harder and faster so that I could catch up and beat them. When I did, when Eli took off after me as he ate the dust I left behind in my wake, we almost tumbled into her, which had her growling, “Back off. The Mother and I need to have a talk!”

“A talk about what?” Ethan asked, his voice relatively sensible now. Which was definitely an oxymoron—see, I knew big words too—because Ethan was always sensible, and only where our mate was concerned would he ever be anything other than reasonable.

“A talk about how She can’t mess with your lives like this!”

“She didn’t mess with our lives, Sabina. Mom found a rite, remember? She was the one who started this whole thing. She gave her life so that I could find you. She just never said what would happen in the aftermath.”

Sabina ground her teeth, but she came to a halt at Eli’s comment. “How upset are you?” she rasped, staring at us for a few seconds each before passing onto the next one. “I mean, she’s lived with us all this time. Why hasn’t she shifted back? Why hasn’t she—”

“Maybe she can’t,” Ethan qualified.

Because I’d seen how protective Berry was of Sabina, I had to agree. “I think she would if she could.” Berry took her position as Sabina’s guard seriously, which was a great relief to us because we always knew she was safe.

There was, I knew, more than one way to swing a cat.

“Well, how can Lara see her, then? If she can see our wolves, and she could see Merinda in Berry, then—”

“Nothing about this has to make sense, sweetheart,” Eli rasped, but his tone was more soothing than I’d expected. I knew he was as disturbed by this as I was, as Ethan was, but somehow, he wasn’t projecting it.

And when alphas were pissed, they projected. Loud and clear. Only the trouble was, in this instance, if he projected, it would further piss Sabina off, which was nobody’s intent here.

When Eli shifted, standing naked before her, I knew that was a testament to his agitation.

None of us, it seemed, were glad to have Merinda back with us, even if it was in a half-life or shell or whatever was currently going on with her.

When a shifter transformed while fully dressed, clothes could be unharmed, maimed during the process, or completely disappear depending on how powerful the shifter was as well as their state of mind.

Eli’s anger was clear to behold in that, even if he wasn’t showing Sabina his irritation.

Though I knew she was aware of that rule, it wasn’t as natural to her as it was to us. Ethan and I shared a wary look, fully apprised of the state of Eli’s temper, before we both shifted too.

Surprise, surprise, we were naked as well.

Fuck’s sake.

I heaved a sigh, because I’d liked those boots, then muttered, “Love, our world is made up of dudes who shift with clothes on and return to their skin naked because they’re pissed off. What about that makes sense?”

She scowled at me, but I noticed her checking me out as she gave me the side eye. I arched a brow at her when she finally met my gaze, and I bit back a laugh when she gave me a heated look, but one that told me if I approached her with anything other than caution, she’d bite me.

And on the soft and dangly parts.

Mother, I loved a bitch with a temper.

Trying hard not to drool, and well aware she knew I was close to said drooling, I watched her as she stiffened her shoulders and ground out, “The Mother can’t keep doing this. Just throwing this shit at us, expecting it to stick, and then for us to have to clean it up somehow.”