EMBER
The nervous energy is an electric pulse tonight. It crackles across the lines of bodies crowding outside the temple doors, brushing against my skin like static before a storm. Blindfolds shift in eager hands. My own feels like lead, heavy with the weight of what’s about to happen.
When the doors groan open, the crowd surges inside. I keep to the back, slipping my blindfold on as the familiar ancient scent of ivy greets me. The power of the moonlight slides over my sensitive skin, begging my wolf to break free.
“Welcome,” the priest calls, his voice dissipating into the open sky above.
“Tonight’s trial is another new trial honoring the one hundredth year.
The priests have decided to call it ‘Trust.’ As trust is an integral part of any union.
A great mate must be loyal, faithful, and true.
The trial is simple. At the stroke of midnight, the Luna Blossoms will open, filling this temple with their spores.
These spores lower ambition, strip deceit, and reveal only truth.
Find your scented mate, take off your blindfold, and get your truths.
Tonight you will find out if these are truths you can live with? ”
His words hang heavy in the moonlight streaming down through open sky, soaking into my skin like sunlight.
“Place your blindfolds on.” Darkness greets me as I slip mine over my eyes. It’s not like I need it. I know who my mate is.
Then it begins. The first curl of scent winds around me, soft and cloying.
At first, it’s delicious, like honey melting on my tongue.
I inhale deeper. Whoops, too deep. The sweetness blooms sharp, sickly sweet, until I can’t tell if I want to laugh or gag.
My head swims. My short hair tickles my shoulders as a tremor runs through me.
I giggle, unable to control my reactions.
A hand clamps onto my wrist. “I found you.”
There’s something different about the voice, and his scent…it’s wrong.
I wrench backward, too hard, stumbling out of his grip and right into a wall of heat and muscle. Arms catch me, strong and sure, a nose dips into my neck. He inhales my scent deeply.
“There you are.”
Relief washes over me in an instant. Pine and winterberry. My body recognizes him before my mind can form the thought. Thorn.
I spin in his arms and rip off the blindfold. Ice-blue eyes stare back at me, equally unmasked, equally wide. For a heartbeat, neither of us speaks. The spores paint everything in faint pink mist, but he is sharp, real, right.
Behind me, a grunt. The other voice, jealous and frustrated, fades into the crowd.
“Come,” Thorn says low, his hand warm at my back, “Let’s have a seat.”
The temple has once again transformed. Pillows in shades of rose and amber scatter the stone floor, silken throws softening the cold edges of marble.
The spores swirl in the air around us, shimmering faintly like powdered starlight.
I sway as I step forward. My knees go weak and Thorn’s hand shoots out, steadying me.
“Careful,” he mutters, a slick smile spreading across his lips.
To my sheer embarrassment, giggles echo out. “Oh my. Your muscles are huge.” My hand betrays me, sliding up the curve of his bicep before my brain catches up. “Oh gods—I didn’t mean—”
His smile is low, devastating. “I would’ve let you touch them all you liked the other night … if you hadn’t been late.”
My breath hitches. Heat flares across my cheeks. A sensual laugh cuts through the haze. Girls glide past and snicker from under their breath. I freeze. Thorn’s growl rumbles deep in his chest, and they scatter.
I withdraw my hand, fidgeting. The spores surrounding us now pressing in on me, tugging at thoughts I’d rather keep hidden. Doubts crawl in. What if they’re right? What if I’m not enough?
The pressure builds until I cough, choke. My chest tightens, vision swimming.
“Ember?” Thorn leans closer, his large frame folding down until his face hovers at my level. “Are you okay?”
“I don’t know.”
“You can’t fight the spores,” he says softly. “They’ll win. Let them. Better than tearing yourself apart.”
“It’s not the spores…” My voice cracks, but I can’t explain the war raging inside me.
He tilts his head, coaxing. “Then ask me something. Anything.”
Those blue eyes pin me, patient and steady, and the words tumble out. “How…how did you get those scars?” I point to his temple.
“I challenged the Alpha.”
“How did you get yours?” He points to my abdomen.
I wrap my arms around them self-consciously. Even though they are visible all the time, remembering they are there is remembering the worst moment of my life. Still, I can’t hold them back as the words come, “It happened during Cullen’s Challenge.”
He nods. “I heard it was brutal.”
I nod, quickly asking another question. “Why did you Challenge the Alpha?”
“He wasn’t a good man.” His tone sharpens.
“Are you… Are you a good man?”
His lips twitch, humorless. “I’d like to think so. But sometimes…” He leans in close, the confession brushing warm across my ear. “…Sometimes I’m afraid I’m not.”
The raw honesty cracks something in me. I press harder. “What else are you afraid of?”
A pause. His jaw tics. “Losing my pack.”
“Are you close to them?”
He shrugs, shifting nearer. “They’re the only family I have left.” His gaze drops, just for a second, shadowed. “But it doesn’t fill the hole. Not really.”
The spores make me reckless. “What hole?”
His eyes flicker, pain hidden deep. He doesn’t answer.
Sweat beads my brow. I found a question he doesn’t want to answer. I look away, desperate for an escape, and land on Olcan. His eyes spear mine across the pink-misted room. Narrow. Hungry. My pulse spikes.
Thorn notices. His hand tilts my chin back toward him. “What’s wrong?”
“I’m scared.” The truth claws out of me, merciless.
“What are you afraid of?”
“I lost everyone. I’m scared of losing what little I have left.”
“How would you?” His voice is steady.
“I built my life from nothing. I’ve been my own everything for so long… I don’t know how to be a mate. I’m afraid…” My throat closes. “I’m afraid I’ll fail.”
The words hang raw, exposed. Thorn opens his mouth to speak when the priest’s voice cuts through. “The trial is ended. The spores may linger — rest, and by morning you will be right as rain.”
The spell breaks. We rise together.
“Ember, I—”
But I don’t want to hear what he has to say.
I’ve already been so raw in front of the first person since Roman.
I don’t want to hear his sympathy or see his pity.
So I step ahead of him, toward the temple doors, relief trembling in my limbs.
But before I can leave, Olcan steps into my path.
His eyes are wild, feral, the spores turning his hunger into obsession.
“Olcan—” Thorn starts, a warning rumble in his chest.
“Do you love Thorn?” Olcan’s voice cuts sharp.
The spores burn through my veins, forcing me open. “I…I don’t know.”
“Olcan,” Thorn snaps, “this is inappropriate. Get your paws off my mate.”
He ignores him, eyes locked on me. “Have you chosen a mate yet?”
I stumble back, trying to skirt around him, but he presses closer, insistent. Thorn shoves him aside, his snarl splitting the air.
“Answer me!” Olcan’s persistence is feral. “Have you chosen?”
The spores seize me one last time, dragging the words out of my mouth against my will. “No.”
That outburst startles me, so I bolt down the stairs. Shoulders brushing the entryway’s doorframe, I push into the night air, cool relief crashing over me. My body shudders, breaking into fur, paws hitting earth before the shame can choke me further.
The moon crowns the valley, and I run toward it, desperate to outrun the truths I never meant to tell anyone.
Especially not someone like Thorn.