I cast them all a look, absorbed their uneasiness with the fact that one of the twins, one of the cursed sons of the pack, was now in a leadership role, and where before, I’d caused them fear, I worked hard to use that same heretofore unknown link that connected me to them, and filled them with ease.

With hope.

Because that was what a united leadership would bring.

Tied to me?

We’d be bringing only the best to the pack, uniting them in love rather than tearing them apart with power struggles.

When they relaxed some, when even Brandon stopped his ferocious panting, I figured it worked.

Eli shot me a look, and he practically vibrated with pride.

In me.

He was proud of me!

The thought shouldn’t have delighted me, but it did. It made me incredibly happy in fact. Almost pathetically so.

But then, when he reached up, when he touched me, his thumb sliding along my chin, he murmured, “You could never be pathetic. Nothing about what we have together could ever be that way. Do you understand?”

I gulped, touched beyond words that he could sense my unease with my joy at his pride in me.

“I understand,” I rasped, sensing he wanted a verbal response.

I licked my lips, then asked, “What now?”

“Now, Ethan is accepted into the rank of beta of the pack.”

My eyes widened at that, at the sudden formality, because Eli hauled me into his side and moved me so I was nearer to the totem.

When Ethan stepped out of the challenge circle, my heart stopped pounding so hard, and I recognized it was only racing because the competitors’ hearts were racing too.

The circle was a…what? Conduit?

Even as my brow furrowed, Ethan wandered over to us. I thought he might do something swoon worthy, like grab me in his arms and take me in a kiss that was reminiscent of a romance movie, but he didn’t.

More’s the luck.

If anything, he didn’t even cast a look at me, didn’t connect his gaze with Eli’s. He just took the six steps that would take him to the totem.

I followed his trajectory, and only because of that did I see the little wind that came and brushed along the path he took.

My eyes widened in surprise, but the wind revealed a small wooden step that had been worn smooth over the passage of time. It was dark, rich with a color that the rest of the totem didn’t share, and when Ethan’s feet collided with it, this time, instead of racing, my heart slowed down to a pace that made me feel like I was holding my breath underwater.

The sensation was strange. Like I was drowning and had reached that point where panic wasn’t necessary—yes, I’d experienced that one horrendous time in my life because that was my awful brother’s idea of playtime—and I grabbed Eli’s hand blindly, clinging to his fingers, tightening mine around them as I tried to deal with whatever it was that was happening to me.

I felt him tense behind me, sensed Austin’s concern, but Ethan?

Kali Sara, I knew why I felt like this!

He wasn’t there.

He was absent.

And I’d never even realized how present he was inside me. Two weeks ago, when I closed my eyes, I saw nothing other than darkness. Maybe it was tinted orange but that was it. Nothing more, nothing less.

But now?

It was like I’d stared up at the sun, closed my eyes, and the ball of light was hovering around, just waiting to fade out of my retina’s memory.

What I could see when I closed my eyes now?

Two blazing balls of light. Bigger than the sun, hotter than it too. Dazzling colors that soothed and warmed at the same time, but there was a third one missing.

I knew which was which too.

The oddly maroon ball was rich with brown and red—a man of passion and a man connected to the earth. Eli.

The other? A bright orange, bouncy with vitality, joyous and cheerful. Austin.

Where was Ethan?

He wasn’t there.

He was…?

Gone.

The mournful thought came from the she-wolf, but before I could panic, before I had too much time to worry, I sensed him.

Green.

Like grass, rich and verdant with a few shades of emerald thrown in there. A man who was calm, a man who was grounded. Connected with the Earth itself in a way that Eli, who was ruled by passions that were deeply buried, wasn’t.

When he was back, even though I knew he hadn’t actually gone anywhere, I opened my eyes and stared at him.

“You see them?”

The voice came from nowhere, but from everywhere too.

I peered around, staring at the world about me, but as I did, I noticed that nothing was the same.

No one was moving.

Not even my mates.

It was like time had been sped up or slowed down, I wasn’t sure which.

It wasn’t frozen, because I could see Austin’s eyelashes gently quivering like they were in the process of moving.

“Does it make sense for me to speed up time?”

My throat was more choked now than it was before. “Who are you?”

“I am the spirit of the Mother.”

My brow puckered. “The spirit?”

“I am the totem. My name is Lidai.”

I froze.

A stick of wood was talking to me.

I reached up and rubbed my temple, pretty sure I was either having delusions or, I don’t know, I needed to go to the hospital or something.

A wind whispered out of nowhere, brushing over me, cosseting me in its warmth.

Like a hug.

From a gust of wind.

Kali Sara, what was happening to me?

“This is normal,” the totem murmured. “I speak only to my children twice in their lives, and you are hearing my voice at a moment that is slightly earlier than should be, but your power was a little—” The wind danced around me again. “You needed help seeking control before you had all my children collapsing with distress.”

My eyes widened. “I meant them no harm.”

“You didn’t mean to do anything, I know this, but it wouldn’t have stopped you from doing it. You are ignorant of your strength, but I am not. You are needed in this pack. My child, Eli, has done his best to carry on in his father’s image, but Paul wasn’t the alpha Eli is.

“I see all, I take note of all, and neither the previous omega nor alpha did right by their people. You will help Eli to right those wrongs.”

My throat tightened. “Why?”

“Because of the children you will carry.”

“I’m important because of my womb?”

Well, if that wasn’t disappointing to hear!

The wind danced around me again, and I sensed that was the ‘spirit of the Mother’s’ way of showing me she was amused because the temperature was perfect.

Neither too cold, nor too hot like those winds that could whip off the desert, making you feel even sweatier than you felt before the gust hit you in the face.

“You are more important than your womb, but you bring change. Quite naturally. Each person to roam the Earth does this, and each human who is tied to this life has more power than usual.”

Warily, I questioned, “What power?”

“The men who are your mates. All brothers. Do you know how rare that is?”

“I know it’s strange to be in a relationship with three—”

“No, not with a female of your power. I speak of their kinship. One child per mated pair. This was so for a reason. The Mother, for I am only her voice, not her mind or will, decided that we were too strong to populate the Earth as the humans do.