Chapter 12 - Raegan
The captured Thornridge scout is lying about his name, and I can feel the deception crawling under my skin like insects.
“Chip Long,” he says again when Oren asks for the third time.
The man sits zip-tied to a chair in the pack hall’s interrogation room with blood crusted under his nose from when Jay tackled him during yesterday’s border patrol. His real name displays in my mind like a neon sign, though I have no idea how I know that.
“He’s lying,” I tell my brother without taking my eyes off the prisoner. “His name is David Crane.”
The scout’s pupils dilate with shock before he can control his reaction. Oren glances between us, then back at the man whose cover story just crumbled.
“Interesting,” Oren muses. “Care to explain how my sister knows your real name when we haven’t even run your prints yet?”
David—I refuse to think of him as Chip anymore—recovers quickly. His training shows in the way he straightens his shoulders and meets Oren’s stare. “I don’t know what game you’re playing, but—”
“Oh, shut the hell up. We already know you’re full of shit,” I interrupt.
“You’ve been living in the Henderson cabin for six weeks.
You told the neighbors you’re writing a book about desert wildlife, but you’ve never even gone on a hike.
Your mail is being forwarded to a PO Box in town that’s registered under an entirely different name. ”
None of this information came from intelligence reports. It flows out of me like water from a broken dam, and each detail is accompanied by the absolute certainty that comes with supernatural knowledge. The prisoner’s face goes white.
“How?” he breathes.
“Enhanced interrogation,” Veva says from her spot near the door. “Though not the kind you’re thinking of.”
I turn to look at her for the first time since she arrived an hour ago.
Veva Marone still carries herself like someone ready for a fight—shoulders back, chin up, dark hair pulled into a practical ponytail that keeps it out of her way.
Her clairsentient abilities made her invaluable during the rebuilding years after Oren became alpha, and now she’s here to help me understand what’s happening inside my head.
“The marriage bond unlocked psychic abilities that were already present in her bloodline,” she explains to David, though her words are meant for me. “Raegan can sense deception, read emotional states, and sometimes access information that shouldn’t be available through normal means.”
“That’s impossible,” David insists.
“So is infiltrating our territory with military-grade equipment and thinking we wouldn’t notice,” Oren replies. “Yet here we are.”
I close my eyes and reach toward the scout with senses I’m still learning to control. His emotional signature blazes in my mind—fear mixed with pride, anger at being captured, and underneath it all, and genuine terror about something his handlers will do if he talks.
“He’s more afraid of them than he is of us,” I tell Oren. “Whatever they threatened him with, it’s worse than anything we could do.”
“We’ll see about that.”
“No.” I stand up and move closer to David’s chair. “Violence won’t work. He’s been conditioned to resist torture. But fear…fear of the people who sent him here, that’s different.”
David’s breathing becomes shallow as I lean down to meet his eyes. This close, I can smell his sweat and see the way his hands shake despite the tough-guy act.
“They told you this would be simple,” I continue, reading the emotions that flow from him like heat off pavement. “Get in, gather intelligence, and get out. Nobody mentioned that some of us have abilities your training didn’t account for.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
The lie makes my skull throb. “Stop. Please. Every time you lie, it feels like someone’s driving nails into my brain.”
Veva steps closer and rests her hand on my shoulder to pull me away from him. “Raegan, you need to pull back. Sustained contact with hostile emotional states can cause feedback loops.”
But I can’t move away. Information keeps flowing from David’s mind into mine, and I finally understand how we caught him in the first place.
“You were supposed to be extracted yesterday,” I realize aloud. “Your handler was going to pick you up at the old mining road, but something went wrong. They left you behind.”
David’s face crumples. “The timeline moved up. Orders came through to abandon all non-essential personnel and focus resources on the primary objective.”
“Which is?”
“I can’t—they’ll kill my family. My real family. They have my daughter.”
The anguish that pours from him makes me stagger backward. Losing a child, the helplessness of knowing someone you love is in danger and you can’t protect them—those emotions cut through my psychic defenses like they’re made of paper.
“Raegan!” Veva catches my arm as I nearly fall. “That’s enough. You’re taking on his emotional state.”
She’s right. David’s terror for his daughter bleeds into my own psyche until I can barely tell the difference between his feelings and mine. The room spins around me.
“Get her out of here,” Oren orders. “She’s done enough for now.”
“No.” I straighten despite the nausea rolling through my stomach. “He’s going to help us because he understands that his daughter has a better chance of survival if Thornridge doesn’t succeed in their plans.”
David looks at me with something approaching hope. “You’ll help her?”
“I’ll try. But I need information first.”
The negotiation takes another hour. David provides details about communication schedules, supply routes, and the approximate size of the force that’s been assembled. In exchange, Oren promises to put resources toward locating and protecting David’s daughter once this immediate threat is resolved.
By the time we finish, my head feels like someone’s been using it for target practice. Veva helps me walk to the break room while Oren continues questioning our cooperative prisoner.
“That was reckless,” she tells me as she hands me a bottle of water. “Using untrained psychic abilities on hostile subjects can cause permanent damage.”
“I didn’t have a choice. He wasn’t going to talk otherwise.”
“There’s always a choice.” Veva sits across from me at the small table. “But I understand why you made the one you did. The question is whether you’re going to learn to control these abilities or let them control you.”
I drink half the water bottle before responding. “How do I control something I don’t understand?”
“The same way I learned to control my magic. Practice, patience, and accepting that some things can’t be forced.”
“Ash says the abilities will get stronger if Wyn and I…” I stop before finishing the sentence. Talking about consummating my forced marriage feels wrong on so many levels.
“Complete the bond,” Veva finishes. “She’s probably right. Bloodline magic tied to mate bonds usually requires full supernatural connection to reach maximum potential.”
“That’s not happening.”
“Your choice. But you should understand what you’re limiting by making it.”
Before I can respond, Reeyan appears in the doorway with an armload of books that look like they predate electricity. The pack historian nods to Veva, then settles into a chair.
“Ladies,” he greets us. “I have some rather disturbing historical parallels to share.”
Reeyan opens the largest tome and turns it toward us. Hand-drawn maps show territories throughout the western regions, with dates and annotations marking various conflicts over the past two centuries.
“The Thornridge tactics match patterns of territorial conquest going back to the 1800s,” he explains.
“Infiltration, intelligence gathering, economic disruption, then overwhelming force applied at carefully chosen moments. I’ve explained this to Oren, but I feel you should know, considering how involved you are. ”
He flashes me a sympathetic smile before he points to different sections of the maps.
“Here, here, and here. Three different packs that followed identical strategies to claim territories much larger than their original holdings. They would spend months or even years positioning operatives, gathering information about local defenses and resources, then strike when their targets were most vulnerable.”
“What happened to the original inhabitants?” I ask, though I suspect I already know.
“Scattered, absorbed, or killed. Thornridge doesn’t seem interested in coexistence.
There’s more,” Reeyan continues, turning pages to reveal detailed tactical analyses.
“The infiltration always follows the same pattern. First, they identify high-value targets—usually unmated omegas from prominent families. Then they place an operative in a position to form a romantic attachment.”
“Like Bastian did with me.”
“Exactly. The emotional manipulation serves multiple purposes—intelligence gathering, access to secure locations, and eventually, legal claim to family resources through marriage.”
“But that didn’t work this time.”
“Which is why they’ll move to the secondary strategy. Direct action.” Reeyan closes the book with a sound like thunder. “Based on historical patterns, I estimate we have less than two weeks before they begin their primary assault.”
The room falls silent. We have two weeks to prepare for a war we’re not equipped to fight against enemies who’ve been planning this for months.
“We need more intelligence,” I blurt out. “David gave us some information, but not enough to plan effective countermeasures.”
“You’re not interrogating more prisoners,” Veva declares. “Not until we figure out how to protect you from psychic feedback.”
“Then we find another way.”
The door opens and Wyn walks in, still wearing tactical gear from his latest reconnaissance mission. He looks exhausted but alert, like someone running on adrenaline and Amanzite alone.
“How did it go?” he asks.