29. Willow
TWENTY-NINE
Willow
In the quiet aftermath, the air felt sharper, fresher—like the storm had finally passed. I looked over at Caleb, standing there beside me, tired but unbowed, his strength radiating in the stillness of the forest around us. We’d spent almost two weeks emptying the cabins, laughing at the stories he and Eamon had of the ones who had lived here, and feeling the weight of their passing.
The final confrontation was behind us, yet the path forward was somehow clearer than it had ever been.
I caught him watching me, and he gave me a small smile. It was that same smile that had always stirred something in me, had always pulled me in, even when I’d tried to keep my distance.
“I guess that’s the last of them,” he said, his voice both relieved and steady, and it anchored me in a way I hadn’t realized I’d needed.
I took a breath, stepping closer, the weight of all that we’d been through settling in a way that felt whole, complete. “It is,” I replied softly.
Caleb looked at the last cabin as it burned, tugging me into his arms. We’d cleared out some cabins, others we’d burned. “It’s because of you, both of you; I couldn’t have done this alone.”
Slipping my hand into his, I squeezed his fingers. “You don’t have to be alone anymore, Caleb. You have us…” I looked around for Eamon, but he had wandered off a few minutes ago. “Does it feel good to have this done?”
Caleb nodded, his eyes bright with emotion. He looked around, taking in the changes. When we first started, I hadn’t been privy to the reason certain ones were saved, but as the day went on, I learned that when there were too many memories associated with the former occupants, the cabin was burned.
The cabins were replaceable, the owners were not.
“I could sleep for a week,” I told him, relishing the warmth of his arms around me.
“Your ME has been very well-behaved,” Caleb noted, pulling away and looking down at me. “You sure you’re okay?”
“Yeah, I feel good.” I beamed up at him. “I can show you if you like?”
His eyes gleamed with wicked intent, but Eamon’s very loud, deliberate approach had me hiding my smile as Caleb glared towards his friend.
“You can bang each other all night long as soon as my cabin’s built,” Eamon growled, walking past with charred wood. “Until then, Alpha , why don’t you do something useful, like help clear the dead wood?”
“He never used to be so…bossy,” Caleb grumbled, kissing my lips and hurrying after Eamon.
We’d done so much work that I wondered why I wasn’t lying passed out in the snow. But apart from a few days where I’d been sluggish and needed to rest, I was fine. I might actually be able to say I’d been healthy…well, maybe that was a push, but I’d definitely been able to do more than I thought possible. But I’d also had time to consider what would happen when I wasn’t able to do anything. Shifters didn’t get sick; what would happen if I needed a doctor? Would Doc be on call? He was hours away. It was a thought I hadn’t been able to push to the side.
The morning sun slipped through the gaps in the trees, casting a gentle warmth over the cabins that still stood. It had been days of hard work, and while Caleb, Eamon, and I had fallen into a routine of clearing the cabins, each day was a mix of clearing and quiet conversation, finding our way back to the peace we were all so clearly craving.
I was also craving some fresh food.
One of us needed to leave Shadowridge Peak and get us something other than rabbit. And I knew I needed to go home and see my friends and decide what to do next. Caleb and I had been so honest with each other since he opened up to me, it felt wrong to keep these thoughts to myself.
Caleb was chopping wood when I found him, his steady movements a comforting sight. I looked around for Eamon, but he was out of my line of sight. I took a breath and called to Caleb, watching as he paused, turning to look at me with a raised eyebrow.
“Hey,” I started, a little uncertain but determined. “I wanted to talk to you about something.”
He set the axe down, giving me his full attention. “What’s on your mind?”
I took a breath, choosing my words carefully. “I was thinking about going back home for a little while. Just to check in, see Lily and the others, and…clear my head.”
His jaw tightened slightly, his gaze unreadable. But after a second, he nodded. “Makes sense. I know it’s been a lot, all of this. You don’t have to explain.”
“No, I want to explain,” I said, my voice quiet but firm as I stepped closer. “This isn’t me running away. I just need some time to…figure out how everything fits together. There’s a lot to work through, and it’s not about needing space from you or this place—it’s about needing clarity.”
He looked down, exhaling slowly as his hand gripped the handle of the axe. “You’re wondering if this life fits, aren’t you?” he asked, the words careful, almost resigned. “If you and I even belong together in this world I’ve dragged you into.”
I closed the distance between us, my hand resting on his arm. “That’s just it,” I said, gently squeezing his arm. “You didn’t drag me into anything, Caleb. I chose to be here. But…there’s a lot about myself I still need to figure out. I need to know for sure that this is what I want, not just because of everything we’ve been through, but because I’m certain it’s right.”
“I need to tell you something.”
Warily, I stepped back. I recognized that look in his eyes too well. “What have you done?” I asked in trepidation.
“Take a walk with me?”
“Or you can tell me what you did?” I suggested.
“Let’s walk. I have something to show you.” He started to move away. Looking back over his shoulder, he gestured for me to follow. “Come on, it isn’t far.”
We walked in silence, questions burning on my tongue and as quickly dying out when I opened my mouth to ask them. Was I scared of what he was going to say?
The trees grew thicker, denser, and more than once, Caleb had to lift me over a fallen log, and if I hadn’t known better, I would have been sure this was the place where my body would be buried.
All sinister thoughts were swept aside when we broke through the trees and the most beautiful waterfall tumbled into a small pond. The sound had been in my ears for a while, but I hadn’t put it together.
“Oh my God, it’s real,” I whispered as I looked around the scene I had painted a long time ago. It looked different in the snow, but it was still breathtaking. I saw the two flat rocks that I had painted but left the wolf out of the scene. “It’s beautiful.”
Turning, I looked up at Caleb and saw he was watching me closely. “This was my mother’s favorite place,” he told me simply. His gaze swept the scenery once, a glimmer of pain in his eyes as he stepped back in his memories. “She would like that you are here.”
“It’s gorgeous. Thank you for showing me.”
Caleb nodded once, his gaze averted, and then he turned his head to look at me. “The night you almost died”—he cleared his throat—“I gave you my blood.”
“I know.” I stepped closer. “You saved me.” I reached for him, but he stepped back.
“My grandmother was an old one,” he told me gruffly. “Not a shaman, though Luna may have welcomed her, my grandmother was…” He struggled for the words. “Eccentric?” he offered. “Some may say odd, some may say delusional.”
“She sounds interesting.”
“She was.” He nodded and it seemed to help him come to terms with what he had to say.
“She used to tell me high tales of nonsense when I was young. Father would scold her for filling my head with gibberish. Mother would scold her for scaring me.”
The thought of Caleb scared of fairy tales made me smile.
“She would tell me stories of times before, when we were more animal than shifter. There was a time when we preferred to stay in wolf form. Rogues that we worry about today, the worries they had about me…” He hesitated. “They are founded on our knowledge. Our history.”
“I don’t understand.”
Caleb didn’t meet my eyes. “In times before, we weren’t pack. It was more one wolf for themselves, rather than one wolf looking after a pack. Luna allowed us to run free and wild. Wildness causes its own problems.” His gaze shifted to my belly where my scars were hidden. “You’ve seen what wildness can do.”
“But you’re not wild,” I reminded him gently.
“No,” he agreed. “But I could be. I have been.” Caleb licked his lips. “I accept now that the darkness of the beast will always be within me and, that to move on, to live , I need to accept that.”
“That’s good…” Anxiety was dancing all over my body, and I felt nauseous as I waited nervously for the bomb to drop. I knew one was coming, I just didn’t know why.
“You’ve saved me, Willow.” His lips curled into a soft smile. “I owe you my life.”
Shaking my head in denial, I moved closer to him. “No, you saved me, remember?”
“My grandmother told me tales of shifters who lusted after human women, who wanted to keep them with them. Shifters live longer, did you know that?”
Did I? “Um…I know you don’t age the same as I do.” My thoughts were racing. “And the shaman is really old, so when I think about it, then yes, I guess I did.”
Caleb nodded. “The shifters of old wanted to keep their human women with them for as long as possible. Not always for a good reason and not always successful.” His frown deepened and his voice grew harder. “Dangerous to do so. Exposure of our kind is the most guarded secret. But men aren’t always wise.” Caleb’s hard gaze kept mine transfixed. “Blood magic is a dangerous thing. An unholy thing.”
“Blood magic?”
“Tying a life to yours by blood is not the Will of the Goddess.” He swallowed. “It’s unpredictable. A life for a life, a life bound to a life…it’s not the Will of Luna.”
I was confused, my head was spinning with this weird conversation. “Okay?”
Caleb saw I was struggling. “You were dying.” The sound of the words was like a hammer in the silence. “I killed you, Willow. You would have died.” He swallowed hard. “I did the only thing I knew to save you.”
“I know, you gave me your blood.”
“I gave you more than blood,” he murmured. “Ask me now and I wouldn’t remember the spell…”
Spell?
“Ask me now, and I wouldn’t be able to perform the rite.”
“What rite?”
“But with you in my arms, dying, bleeding all over me… Losing you? I couldn’t do it. I wouldn’t do it.”
Apprehension made me step back. “Caleb? What did you do?”
He looked at me, really looked at me, I felt him in my soul. I felt the bond strumming between us. Tying us together. Binding us.
“My life for yours, Willow. My blood for your blood.”
“What?” It was no more than a whisper. It sounded as loud as a scream.
“I bound you to me through blood magic. My blood healed you. Strengthened you.”
“Your life for mine?” I mumbled. “But you’re not dead. I don’t understand.”
“No. I could’ve been,” he admitted. Caleb’s eyes shifted up to the sky. “She is not finished with me yet,” he murmured. Looking back at me, he shook his head. “The way you think you feel about me…it could be because of the blood magic.”
“No.” The answer was so sudden, so clear, he looked as surprised as I did. “The way I feel about you is the way I feel about you. Nothing else.”
“You should take the time when you are away to think about it.”
That was it? It was that simple?
“That’s it? You tell me you performed some creepy blood spell on me, that your ancestors used to bind women to them, and then tell me to think about it?”
Caleb let out a breath. “I don’t know what else to tell you,” he said honestly. “I did what I did to keep you alive. I will always keep you alive.”
“You made a choice for me.” I sounded as bitter as I felt. “You had no right.”
“I know.” He bowed his head. “It won’t help me any by admitting this, but I’d do it again.”
I knew I was gaping at him. “You know it’s wrong?”
“I will always choose you, Willow.”
“And if I don’t choose you?” My voice sounded harsh, the thumping of my heart against my ribcage sounding loud.
“Then it’s your choice.”
Moving away from him, I turned my back as I struggled to think about what he had told me. “Why has it taken you so long to tell me?” I looked back at him. “The others know?”
“They do.” He stood still against the backdrop of white. “I waited to tell you…” He sighed heavily. “Because I knew I could lose you when you knew what I had done.”
“Nothing I feel is real?”
He looked pained at the question. “I can’t answer that,” he spoke slowly. “I know for me, it’s all real, but…you have to decide.”
He moved closer, until he was in front of me, and his hand came to rest over mine, his fingers warm and steady. “I think you’re right. You need to go, figure it out, away from me, and see how you feel now you know it all, Willow,” he said, his tone softer now. “I won’t stand in your way. I only want you here if you want to be here.”
“You’re impossible, this…this isn’t normal.” Looking up at him, I felt like crying. “That you kept this from me… You should have told me sooner.”
“I don’t want to lose you.”
I felt the first tear slip over. “What if you already have?”
“Is that how you feel?”
“I don’t know , Caleb!” I shouted in the quiet of my surroundings. “You just blindsided me, and I don’t know how I feel about anything !”
“Then take as long as you need.”
“And if I go and decide I don’t want to be with you?”
He looked at me, sadness in his eyes. “Then it’s your choice. I will understand.”
The confusion I felt ebbed even as relief settled in. “I hope so.” I hesitated, adding, “I don’t think I am handling this well,” I confessed. “I was so sure of us , of this bond… I just…” I needed to pull myself together. “I just want to make sure I’m sure before I make any big decisions.”
“Can I touch you?”
It was such an odd request. He’d never asked permission before, and he’d never needed to. I gave a sharp nod of my head.
He pulled me into his arms, and I melted into his warmth, feeling his hand cradling the back of my neck. I could sense the protective hold he had over me, a hold that felt more like home than anything I’d known. “Take all the time you need,” he murmured, his voice low and close to my ear. “When you’re ready, if this is where you want to be…I’ll be waiting.”
I nodded, swallowing the lump forming in my throat. I wasn’t sure what to think, what to feel. This was such a mess.
He pulled back slightly, his gaze searching mine. “And if you realize that being here isn’t right for you, Willow…” The words lingered between us, raw and real. “Then you never need to come back.”
“You’d accept that?” I asked. “You’d accept me wanting nothing to do with you?”
Caleb grunted as if in pain. “It would hurt like hell,” he admitted. “But that was the last thing I held from you, no more secrets. If you choose to never see me again, then I will accept your decision.”
“My choice .” My eyes narrowed as I watched him. “You’ll accept it?”
“Of course.”
Wrapping my arms around myself, I took in the beauty of the pond and the waterfall. “You know, before this, I wasn’t leaving because I was unsure of us , Caleb. I was leaving because I want to make sure we’re building something real, something lasting and that I can live here. Safely.”
He watched me carefully.
“And then you tell me that, and now I’m questioning everything .”
“I know.”
Turning, I looked at him. “And you told me anyway.”
“I don’t want to hide anymore.”
God, this man.
“Will you be okay without me? You and Eamon?”
“We’ll survive,” he said with a faint smile, though his gaze held a hint of longing. “And when you’re ready, or wherever you decide you belong, I want that choice to be yours.”
I took a breath, nodding. “It will.” My chest felt too tight. “Just…don’t kill Eamon, okay?”
He chuckled softly, his eyes softening. “I’ll try my best.”