CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE || REED #2
Claws erupted from his fingertips, long and wickedly sharp, his eyes flashing pure gold. He slashed across the Algea’s face with impossible speed, tearing through its pale flesh and leaving deep gashes in its wake.
The creature screamed and recoiled.
And then I understood.
Harris was a wolf now.
He’d let the pack turn him. He’d died and been reborn, all so he could come here. So he could save me.
He’d given up everything for me.
With his other hand, Harris raised his gun and fired twice more, both bullets finding their mark in the creature’s center mass.
The Algea shrieked and stumbled back, smoking wounds covering its torso.
Then Harris was at my side, dropping to his knees. His hand shifted back to human in the space of a heartbeat—the kind of control that should have been impossible for any wolf, especially a newly turned one—and he pulled the vial of Ethan’s blood from his pocket.
“Come on,” he muttered, uncapping it. “Come on, Reed. Stay with me.”
He tipped the vial into my mouth.
The effect was immediate. The paralysis shattered like broken glass, sensation flooding back into my limbs all at once. I gasped, my lungs expanding fully for the first time in hours.
The wounds on my chest—angry and bleeding—were already starting to close.
I barely had time to process it before the Algea attacked again.
Harris grabbed me and rolled, pulling us both out of the way as the creature’s claws slammed into the ground where we’d been a second before. We crashed into a heap together, but Harris was already moving, dragging me up with him.
We faced the Algea together, circling it.
I shifted my hands into massive, razor-sharp claws, feeling my body respond instantly despite the lingering pain. Being able to move again was such a relief I could have wept.
Instead, what escaped my lips was a dangerous growl.
And then I watched in amazement as Harris did the same. His transformation was fluid, effortless. His eyes blazed gold—alpha gold, exactly like mine—and power radiated off him in waves.
The Algea lunged.
We met it head-on. Together.
Harris moved lightning-quick, his claws tearing through the creature’s semi-corporeal form. I went low, aiming for its legs, and felt my claws connect. The Algea screeched and tried to phase away, but Harris was already there, driving it back toward me.
We moved in sync, as though we’d been fighting together for years instead of moments. When I feinted left, Harris struck right. When the creature tried to slip past me, Harris cut off its escape.
We were stronger together than I’d ever been alone.
I’d been so catastrophically wrong about everything, hadn’t I?
Love hadn’t made Harris weak. It had made him unstoppable. It made both of us unstoppable.
The Algea was bleeding now, oozing black blood. It was slower, but more desperate. It lunged for me, claws extended, but I caught its wrists and held on with everything I had.
The creature thrashed, trying to break free, just as my mate reached for the machete at his side.
The Algea flickered, then slipped out of my grasp.
“Harris!” I shouted.
He flew into motion, following the Algea through the trees, his golden eyes intent and focused as a predator’s.
The monster ran toward the tear in reality it had dragged me through.
I sprinted after them, putting every ounce of speed I had into catching it. We couldn’t allow it to live a moment longer.
We tackled it as it slithered through the portal.
Reality fractured around us.
The world twisted, colors bleeding together, and then we were falling—
We hit the ground hard.
Real ground. Earth and leaves and the familiar scents of the forest. Our forest.
Lacey, Hunter, and Lee were there, their wolf forms frozen in shock as we tumbled out of the Otherworld with the Algea still thrashing between us.
“Stay back!” I commanded, my voice carrying the power of the alpha. “Don’t get in the way!”
The wolves immediately retreated, forming a wide circle around us.
Harris pulled something small and round from his pocket. A gold amulet on a chain that caught the moonlight and seemed to absorb it.
The Algea tried to use its claws on me again, lunging for my throat.
Harris bolted forward. He threw himself between me and the Algea and pressed the amulet directly into the creature’s chest.
The reaction was immediate and violent.
Smoke poured from the point of contact, and the Algea’s shriek was so loud and so full of agony that I staggered back, grimacing. The amulet seared into its flesh, embedding itself deep, and the creature’s form solidified completely.
It thrashed wildly, clawing at its own chest, trying to dig the amulet out. But it was stuck fast, burning into it like a brand.
Then I saw Harris produce the machete.
His eyes were pure gold when they met mine, filled with determined fury.
A wordless understanding passed between us. I knew what he needed me to do.
I lunged forward and grabbed the creature, wrapping my arms around it from behind and holding it as still as I could.
It fought me, bucking and snarling, but I held on. Every ounce of my alpha strength went into keeping it in place.
In that moment, I realized I trusted Harris completely to finish this.
The machete came down in a single, clean arc.
The Algea’s head hit the ground and rolled.
Its body went limp in my arms and I shoved it away from myself with revulsion.
Then I sank to my knees, gasping.
It was over.
Harris dropped the machete and pulled me into his arms. I clung to him, my hands fisting into his torn shirt, and buried my face against his shoulder.
We held each other for a long time.
Everything had changed. Harris was a wolf. He’d given up his humanity for me. And I’d almost lost him because I’d been too afraid to let him in.
But we were together. We were alive. And that was what mattered.
“You came for me,” I whispered, my voice breaking.
Harris’s arms tightened around me. “Always,” he breathed, right into my ear. “I’ll always come for you, Reed. Doesn’t matter if I need to travel a thousand miles or across worlds.”
I pulled back to look at him. His eyes were still gold, still blazing with alpha power. But there was something else there, too. It was warm and fierce and certain.
And I’d almost thrown it all away.
“I’m sorry,” I said, the words spilling out. “I’m so sorry, Harris. I was wrong. About everything. I was afraid and I—”
“I know,” he cut me off gently. “We’ll talk about it. But not here. Not now.”
He was right.
I nodded and let him help me to my feet. My body was valiantly fighting to heal itself, but this wasn’t just scratches in my skin. It would be a while yet before I was fully back to normal.
The Algea’s body lay at our feet, headless and still. The amulet gleamed in its chest.
Around us, Lacey, Hunter, and Lee watched in their wolf forms, their eyes wide.
Harris looked down at the body, then back at me. “We need to burn the body.”
“Yeah,” I agreed. “We do.”
“I had a torch, but I lost it when I came through to the Otherworld. There’s a bonfire at the commune, though,” Harris said. “The pack is there, waiting for us. The witches, too.”
I nodded.
Together, we lifted the corpse of the Algea—Harris taking the shoulders, me taking the legs, the severed head tucked under my free arm—and we started back toward the commune.
Toward home and pack. Toward whatever came next.
Whatever it was, we’d face it together.