“Maribel…there’s something unusual about her.”

My eyes popped open at that, and I sensed Ethan and Austin’s distinct interest. It was always strange to feel their mutual reactions, each processed in a similar yet different way.

Ethan processed things clinically, Austin was more hot-headed, handling emotion first, then fact.

Regardless, they both sat up, and I felt their focus narrow in on Lara.

“What about her is unusual?” I questioned, trying to keep my voice low so that I didn’t scare her.

She bit her lip. “If I see a shadow in Seth, I see a light in her.”

I tensed at that. “In Maribel?”

“Kind of.” A breath escaped her, and it was shaky and a little lost. “This is very stressful,” she whispered. “I’m so used to keeping these things to myself, expecting to be called crazy. I can’t even believe I’m telling you this when it sounds so absurd. Of all the insane things I’ve seen over the years, though, this has to be up there, and that’s why I’m telling you.”

When she gulped, I inserted, “This is a safe space, Lara.”

Her laughter was soft. “No, Eli. Nowhere is safe for someone like Sabina and me.”

My denial was instant, as was Austin and Ethan’s. “Sabina will always be safe from physical harm.”

“Abuse doesn’t have to be physical. To live is to hurt,” she muttered, her words dripping with sorrow. “Look at her now, you can’t protect her from this. You can’t protect her from what life throws at us. We’re magnets, Eli. We attract these things. These situations.

“You can’t protect her from her fate.”

The words resonated with me deeply, and though they speared in on a core of rage that flared to life at her statement, one that was forged in my wolf’s belly, which I longed to release onto her for daring to say that I couldn’t protect my mate, the proof was in my arms.

Sabina’s purpose was not like my own.

Mine was of the earth. Grounded and tethered to this place. To this time.

Sabina wasn’t. It was through her that we’d transported to that other world, that realm where we’d claimed her. She was how we’d learned our strengths and weaknesses, the ways in which we could grow to better defend her and our pack.

I couldn’t say that I understood the ties Sabina had with the Mother, because it wasn’t my place to.

“How do you know this is her fate?” Ethan asked, his seat creaking as he got to his feet and strode over to the foot of the bed.

“Because every gift we’re given is bestowed for a reason, isn’t it? Doesn’t it make sense that we’re not given it to be wasted?”

Her reasoning wasn’t exactly flawed, but it most definitely wasn’t soothing.

Sabina had come to us with the ability to read auras. To sense things about a person from that alone. We’d mated her, claimed her, bound her to us, and with each passing moment, her powers had morphed as only a true omega’s could.

I scrubbed a hand over my face, wondering if all women with such gifts were omegas in the making, if Lara’s destiny was also tied to a pack’s, but before I could utter a word in question, the wolves started howling around the house.

Tension pounded my question into dust as I carefully untangled myself from the hold I had my mate in, and I listened, my head cocked to the side as I registered what the choral song of so many distinct voices meant.

I knew Sabina didn’t understand what each howl signified, but I could. I knew who was singing for me, knew if they were natural or supernatural too.

Then I heard her, and my heart pounded.

Merinda.

Mother.

Berry.

So many names, but…she was still here.

I wasn’t sure if she’d left, if, like Sabina had suggested, that glimpse of her after Lara first arrived was the last I’d ever see of her.

I’d followed her path for years, listened to her advice, forced myself to rule this pack in my father’s image because of her, and I knew I was a prime candidate for a shrink telling me I had mommy issues, but beyond that? I knew if she was howling, then I had to take note.

“What is it? What’s happening?” Lara rasped, her shoulders tense with strain as her gaze flickered around the room.

My nostrils flared as I surged onto my feet and strode toward the wall of windows.

Austin’s voice was surprisingly calm as he told her, “Someone’s here.”

Someone we’d been expecting for a good long while, even if now was the most inconvenient moment for a confrontation.

I heard thudding outside, small feet rapping against the tiled corridor as they made it to our door. And when it flew open and I saw Daniel standing there, panting, I turned away from the window and took in the sight of his terrified eyes, of the skin that was sprouting fur in a way that beckoned a half-shift, as he whimpered, “They’ve come for me.” And he flashed into a wolf, piddled on the floor, before retreating to a half-shift once more.

Nine

Lara

His terror was pure.

His terror was ancient.

It wasn’t the fear of a small child. It wasn’t the worries of a boy who’d barely hit, what, ten?

It was real, so real that I could feel the weight of it in him, in his soul. I sensed his expectation, not that he was looking forward to this moment, but that he’d known it would come.

Worse still, I sensed it in all of Sabina’s men.

The desire to soothe them was a new one, and it didn’t help because I wasn’t the person who could ease them. I could read someone, but I couldn’t act on it. Sabina had always had that gift. It wasn’t a metaphysical trait. Wasn’t something that could be considered a gift. But by nature, she’d been gentle. Always willing to help. Generous with herself.

As for me, I’d only been able to sense something odd, before I’d learned how to lock myself inside the cage I’d spent a lifetime forging.

My gifts made me selfish. Made me run and hide away.

Sabina was different, but then, she’d had a different life to me. A different passage…

My gifts made me think I was going crazy. Hers made her seem like she could read people as if they were an open book.

“What’s going on?” I demanded, staring at the boy as he seemed to transition in a way that belonged in a horror movie.

I’d seen the hyena transform from man to beast, and this was like that but so much slower. It was only now that I recognized how I hadn’t expected this to happen. How I hadn’t expected this to be possible.

Children could shift too.

It was a revelation that made me feel dumb.

I should have figured it out sooner, but it wasn’t as if I’d had a lot of time to come to terms with this hybrid of man and beast. I’d barely stopped being attacked by one kind before I’d been brought here, into the home of a different type of… what were they? Different species?

Different races within their kind?

Gnawing on the inside of my cheek to withhold the scream that throbbed in my throat, I stared a little blindly at the child.

Hair popped out of tiny pores, his eyes were flashing bright green before returning to the more regular hue of human proportions. Nails morphed into claws with the speed of drawers opening and closing, going from soft, flat edges to sharp points that could hurt.