Chapter 5 - Caitlynn
The second trial came two days later. And where she stood at the starting line, Caitlynn was certain that this would be her last. It was a decision she’d made when she found herself unable to sleep the previous night.
She’d survived the mountain. Proved she wasn’t weak. That should be enough. After all, she’d already shown them that she was more than capable, even though she was human. There was no point really trying anymore, and besides… she was exhausted.
“Today’s trial is a maze,” Olivia announced before explaining that the maze stretched beneath the mansion—a network of stone passages lit by torches that cast dancing shadows on the walls. Ancient. The kind of ancient that made the air taste like dust and secrets.
“The maze responds to intent,” Olivia explained to the assembled candidates. “It will try to confuse you. Misdirect you. The first one to reach the center wins. The last three to emerge are eliminated.”
Caitlynn stood at the back of the group and tried to look less interested than she felt. This was perfect. Get lost in a magical maze, wander around for hours, emerge last. Eliminated. Done.
Sloane stood near the front, studying the entrance with calculating eyes. She’d been shooting Caitlynn looks since the mountain trial—cold, assessing looks that made Caitlynn’s skin crawl.
The starting horn sounded.
The candidates poured into the maze like water down a drain. Caitlynn waited until most of them had disappeared, then followed at a leisurely pace.
The passages were narrow and cold. She could hear the others—footsteps echoing, voices calling out, the sound of people who thought they knew where they were going.
She didn’t try to think her way through like the others—trying to solve the maze like it was a puzzle with logic and patterns.
Instead, she walked around calmly as though she was merely passing through, with no mention of a challenge.
Then she froze. And heard it.
It sounded like a whisper, though she could not make out any meaning at all. She lifted her hand, pressed it against the wall of a maze.
Left. For some reason, she knew… she had to go left. There was no explaining it. It was just… a feeling. She walked until the whisper touched her skin again. Right. Straight through a passage, then left again…
With each turn, the certainty that had been building in her grew stronger. She’d forgotten all about her determination to not finish this trial and go home. She was powerless against this whisper that softly led her to go on, follow it.
She was no longer thinking, she just moved—her feet instinctively understanding where she needed to be.
She burst out into sunlight so suddenly that it blinded her.
The center of the maze, she realized as her eyes got used to the light. It was a circular courtyard with a fountain in the middle, water dancing in the afternoon light.
No one else was there. The thought coursed through her, and she pressed a hand to her chest.
She’d beaten everyone.
She’d won. She wasn’t supposed to win. She was supposed to fail, get eliminated, go home.
Instead, she’d navigated an impossible maze faster than she-wolves who’d been training for this their entire lives.
“How?”
The word came out loud in the silence. Her voice echoed off the stones. A sea of faces stared back at her—each one as shocked as the next. Then her eyes found his. He was staring at her with an expression that looked almost proud. He smiled. A small, almost imperceptible smile.
She turned quickly at the sound of footsteps to her left. It was Sloane who emerged, looking rather more worn-out than Caitlynn had seen her since beginning this ordeal.
Still, she smiled proudly as she broke through the trees, lifting her arms in victory. She froze when she saw Caitlynn, and her hands fell limply to her sides.
“You.” It was a flat, dangerous growl.
Despite her heart racing wildly in her chest, Caitlynn faced her head-on. “Me.”
“How?” Sloane stalked towards her predatorily, like her wolf was too close to the surface. “How did you get here first?”
“I just followed my gut, I guess. My instincts.”
“Don’t.” Sloane’s voice dropped lower. Sharper.
“Don’t lie to me. You’re human. Humans don’t navigate ancestral mazes; they don’t have instincts.
They get lost and wander until someone finds them.
” She stopped three feet away, close enough that Caitlynn could see the fury burning behind her eyes.
“So I’ll ask again. How. Did. You. Cheat? ”
“I didn’t cheat.”
“Liar.”
The word hung between them like a thrown blade.
More footsteps. Another candidate emerged—a redhead whose name Caitlynn didn’t know. She took one look at Sloane’s face, at Caitlynn standing victorious by the fountain, and her expression shuttered.
“Interesting,” she murmured, and moved to stand beside Sloane.
They came one after another. Two candidates. Five. Ten. Emerging from different passages, seeing Caitlynn first, drawing conclusions before anyone spoke. The courtyard filled with she-wolves who’d been raised for this, trained for this, who should have won this.
And a human had beaten them all.
Whispers started like fire catching dry grass. Soft at first. Then spreading.
“—fifteen minutes, how is that—”
“—must have used magic—”
“—cheated, obviously, there’s no other—”
Sloane stood silent in the center of it all. Watching. Waiting. Building her case with every shocked face, every suspicious glance.
Caitlynn wanted to defend herself. Wanted to explain that she hadn’t cheated, hadn’t done anything except follow an instinct she didn’t understand. But the words stuck in her throat because what would she say? Something pulled me, and I followed it, and I don’t know what it was, but it felt right.
They’d laugh. Or worse.
Olivia made her way through the crowds. The rest of the pack allowed her to pass, though their eyes clung to Caitlynn as though they shared Sloane’s sentiment. Olivia moved until she stood next to Caitlynn.
“Results for the second trial.”
The courtyard fell silent.
“First place—” Olivia’s eyes met Caitlynn’s for half a second. “Caitlynn Williams. Fifteen minutes, thirty-two seconds.”
Nobody moved. Nobody breathed.
Rather than the applause that had followed the announcement of the winner the first time, the entire pack just stared. Caitlynn looked up and again met his eyes.
Kahn.
It seemed as though the moment between them stretched for eternity.
Then Gideon’s voice shattered it.
“This is absurd.”
The Pack Elder cut through the crowd like a blade through flesh. People stepped aside without hesitating, creating a path for him. His grey hair was pulled back tight enough to make his face look carved from stone.
“A human doesn’t navigate the ancestral maze in fifteen minutes.” He stopped in front of her, close enough that she had to tilt her head back to meet his eyes. “It’s impossible.”
“The timer doesn’t lie,” Olivia said simply.
“Then she cheated.” Gideon’s attention didn’t leave Caitlynn’s face. “How?”
Olivia frowned. “Uncle Gideon!” Her voice was reproachful. “You know as well as I do that it is not possible to cheat the maze.”
Caitlynn looked from one to the other. Gideon still did not seem entirely convinced.
“I… didn’t cheat,” Caitlynn said at last. “I just walked.”
“Walked.” Sloane laughed angrily. She moved to stand beside Gideon, and the two of them glared down at Caitlynn angrily.
Sloane laughed coldly before continuing her rant.
“You expect us to believe you just walked through a maze designed to confuse shifters with centuries of magical heritage? You’re human.
You shouldn’t even be able to sense the passages, let alone navigate them. ”
“But I did.”
“Impossible.”
The word echoed. Someone in the crowd muttered in agreement.
“Is it?” Caitlynn heard her voice rise, but couldn’t stop it. Not that she wanted to. “Because I’m standing here. First. And you’re standing there. Not first.”
Gasps rippled through the assembled pack. Sloane’s face flushed red, then white. Her hands clenched into fists at her sides.
“She needs to be eliminated.” Gideon sounded certain. People straightened when he spoke. “Removed from the competition immediately. No human could do what she did without cheating. We can’t trust her. We cannot have a Luna who cheated in a task. She’s a threat.”
Despite herself, Caitlynn let out an almost bark-like laugh. “A threat? To what? Your perfect she-wolves? Or just to your assumptions about what humans can and can’t do?”
“Watch your tone—”
“No.” She could feel her entire body heat up with the same pressure she’d felt in the bakery when the rude customer pushed her too far.
Her hands started tingling. “You watch yours. I didn’t ask to be here.
I didn’t ask to be chosen. But I was. And I finished your trial.
On my own. Without cheating. So if you want to eliminate me, you’re going to have to find a better reason than ‘it’s impossible. ’”
The courtyard went dead silent.
Gideon growled and stepped forward. “Listen, girl…”
“Stop.”
Though the voice was soft, everyone listened at once. Then they turned. Kahn moved slowly down the steps, his eyes fixed on Caitlynn.
“She stays,” he said simply. “And that is final.”
He said nothing more before turning and walking away.