His hand scrubbed over the curve of my head, and when he scratched my ear, I grunted with delight. I wasn’t sure if he’d distracted me on purpose, if he could feel this overwhelming sensation too, or if he just wanted to touch me—to touch me as much as I wanted to touch him.

But when he scratched me, distracted me, I forgot about the other people, about their grief. It whispered out of my mind as though the wind caught it.

“You’re different,” he said softly, and the words, though whispered close to my ear, seemed to shiver along the wind too. “I don’t know your name, but I will the second you shift back. So, for the moment, I’m going to call you Silver.

“You don’t know this, but silver and gold wolves are very rare. Werewolves, shifters, have been around for thousands of years, as long as humans, and we’ve shared terrain with you. Some humans know of us, some don’t. But the ones who do, have kept our secrets safe, just as we protect them and our territory.

“It’s to my dying shame that this happened to you last night. I will find out who’s responsible for turning you against your will even if…”

As he released a sigh, I tensed, wanting to know ‘even if’ what?

He scratched my ear again, distracting both of us until he built up the courage to mutter, “Even if it was Mother-blessed.”

Mother-blessed? What the hell did that mean?

His mother? Whose mother?

The no pain thing was beyond epic, but not being able to talk sucked. Fuck.

I pulled back, looking him square in the eye. Or at least, trying to. I had to tilt my head this way and that to get a good picture of him because in this form, my vision was odd. I saw different stuff, the colors weren’t the same too which…

Crap!

If the colors were different, then how could I read his aura?

Blue might have been murderous, and green might have been passion for all I could discern in this skin!

He surged to his feet, even as he kept his hand on my head. The connection felt good, and I peered up at him when as he stated, “You need to learn to walk.”

My tongue lolled out at that.

Walking couldn’t be too hard, could it?

“The first instinct, when you shift that initial time, is to go and eat. But once you awaken from the stupor, it’s like being a pup. So I’m going to assume that your stasis has been on fast forward for a little while. Let’s get you started so we can go home.”

Home?

I hadn’t had a home for a long time, and the way he said it, it wasn’t like he was saying it was his home solely. Like it was my place too.

The yearning inside me made me release a keening sound that drew his attention. He tilted his head to the side and studied me, but I didn’t think there was much he could read in that form. Somehow, I was able to communicate the things I’d kept buried away inside me for over a decade in this shape, but he couldn’t translate them.

Wasn’t that bittersweet?

He released a breath, closed his eyes, and within seconds, he was like me again. Walking on four legs rather than two.

When his nose ran down my back, along my side, scenting me, I didn’t stop him. It felt good. And since he was a wolf, it didn’t feel weird, because I knew this was how creatures like this interacted. His nose ran over my hindlegs, and when he sniffed up my tail, only then did I yip at him to back off.

As he returned to face me, his tongue dangling, I’d swear that I saw amusement in his eyes. It was like he’d known I’d yell at him for that. Shakily, on legs that felt as fragile as saplings, I attempted to take a step forward.

My body heaved with the effort of staying upright, of not falling over, and when the male wolf nudged me, eagerly helping me along, a warmth blossomed inside me.

I wasn’t alone.

Even the grief that had weltered deep in my being from out of nowhere, while a negative emotion, was further proof that somehow, I’d been merged into a collective.

I wasn’t an individual anymore.

Maybe another person wouldn’t have been happy about that. Maybe they’d mourn the loss of their independence, but they weren’t me.

With my background.

With my history.

Each paw connected with the soft ground, and I felt the earth in a way I wouldn’t have ordinarily. I liked walking barefoot. In truth, it was my favorite way to move around. But standing here, now, feeling the loam squish between the pads of my paws, smelling the scents blossoming from the pressure of my weight atop the soil burst into being…it was magnificent.

Just walking was an experience.

Before I knew it, I’d made it from one end of the clearing to the other, and all along, the male was at my side.

Sure, my chest was heaving like I’d walked a thousand miles, but I’d fucking done it.

I’d walked!

Yeah, it didn’t escape me that I’d managed to achieve what a toddler could do, but still, I felt triumphant.

Mostly, I felt free from pain, and it was enough to make me feel delirious.

I wanted to thank Kali Sara from the bottoms of my paws to the tips of the ears that now sat on the top of my head rather than at the side of it.

The relief and joy I felt at being free from the ever-present discomfort my condition had granted me was like a bright light being shone through the darkest of tunnels.

On some days, yesterday included, the pain was so strong that I could feel the echoes of it down my nerve endings. The shadow wasn’t excruciating, more of a memory. One that made me realize that, for certain, I should be angry about being forced into this transformation, and yes, there was someone out there who’d meant me harm—which was nothing new, not with my having been on the run for twelve years—but for this freedom?

I’d take it.

Gladly.

And for the smile in that man’s eyes?

Well, that was too difficult a question to answer. I just knew that not even Kian had made me feel this way, and while that was a betrayal in and of itself, he was gone now, dead, and I was alive and barely living.

If this man, this stranger, could make me feel something other than misery? Well, I wasn’t about to turn my back on it or him, or this strange new world I found myself in.

Ethan

I’d been on edge all night. Uncomfortable ever since I’d crossed the threshold into my home and had stayed up watching the council.

They’d long since left, and the roosters on the surrounding farms and ranches had long since cried their joy at another day dawning, but I hadn’t bothered to leave the cabin, nor had I bothered making my brother take over my post.

The urge to sleep wasn’t a strong one, and my ears told me he was still awake too. Which meant we were both feeling the same way—unnerved.

Altogether, that shouldn’t have surprised me. We were similar in that, even though, in many ways, we were completely different entities. That usually surprised people. Especially our people. It was like, because we had the indecency to share a womb, we were clones. Carbon copies of one another. But we weren’t.

I loved reading and learning, and Austin wasn’t happy if he couldn’t get his ass in front of the TV to watch some stupid game at least once per day.

He never read, and I never watched TV.

Of course, that wasn’t the only marker as to our differences, but one way in which we were similar—our wolves. The power we had. The ability to discern nuances about a situation that kept us out of the crapper.