Chapter 4 #2
“I’m sorry, Rowan,” he says gently. “I should’ve come clean after your mother died. And again, when you decided to make this trip. But all Jocelyn ever wanted for you was a normal life.”
He climbs up my leg like this is some sort of routine morning yoga stretch, then settles on my shoulder again like we’re on a walk through the park. I flinch, but not hard enough to knock him off.
“She made me promise to do whatever it took to keep you away from this world once she couldn’t anymore. If I’d known how fast things would spiral here, I’d have tried harder to stop you from coming to NightShade.”
“You really were sabotaging our trip,” I whisper, eyes wide. “I told myself it couldn’t be. But after you hid my keys, my phone, and even tried to trap yourself in a vending machine, I thought I was just seeing what I wanted to see. Making excuses.”
I squeeze my eyes shut, like maybe the darkness behind my eyelids will grant me a reset button. Some kind of cosmic do-over that doesn't include growling alphas, shape-shifting ferrets, or my grandmother committing attempted murder upstairs.
But no such luck.
When I open them again, all three of them are staring at me—waiting. Probably taking bets on my unraveling.
A very loud, very stubborn part of me still wants to bolt for the door and never look back. But the longer I stand here, the more that part shrinks. Because if even a fraction of what they’re saying is true, then I need answers. I need to know what my mother never told me.
I let out a sigh, and my shoulders sink like they’ve been carrying a backpack full of boulders this entire time. “Can I at least have some ice cream while you all have your way with turning my life upside down?”
Archie perks up, ever the enabler. “Mint chocolate chip with fudge topping. Liz will bring it along.” He pauses, then adds casually, “And a hot chocolate with caramel.”
My comfort foods.
Of course, he knows. And somehow that hits harder than the fact that he can change size on a dime and also talks like a grumpy English professor.
I blink at him, wide-eyed. “You’re really just…speaking. Like this is a normal day.”
He shrugs. At least the ferret equivalent of it. “I’ve had a lot of practice.”
Iris is quieter than I expect as she leads us down a hallway, but I can’t stand the silence, so I ask, “What happened to the man who broke in through the window? Did you kill him?”
She huffs, not looking back. “He probably wishes I did. Did he feel familiar to you at all?”
Her words hit sharp, like she’s trying to dig into my brain and pull out something even I don’t know is there.
I lift my chin. “No. Was he supposed to?”
“I don’t know yet,” she mutters, voice thick with something that’s definitely not joy. There’s malice in her tone, but I’m smart enough not to poke that particular bear again.
We stop at a door, and Iris doesn’t hesitate as she opens it, gesturing me inside.
The room is decked out like some kind of dark academia fantasy: high ceilings, a massive crystal chandelier, deep charcoal wallpaper, and gold-framed artwork that’s either really expensive or really haunted.
A bookshelf lines the entire back wall, and in the center, a sleek black oval table is surrounded by leather chairs.
“Take a seat,” she says, and this time, I obey without sarcasm. Mostly because, now that my adrenaline has worn off, my legs are giving out on me.
Archie stays on my shoulder, all calm and wise and unsettlingly there. I want to set him on the table and process how my emotional support animal just went full Cujo on us, but I don’t. Because deep down, he’s still my weird, clingy, furry family. Just with more secrets than I signed up for.
Liz isn’t with us yet, and I half-expect we’re waiting for her, but Iris clears her throat.
“Do you want the whole story, including a detailed account since before you were born? Or the highlight reel, and you can pick what you want filled in later?”
I glance over at Archie. His eyes meet mine—black, glassy, but filled with something far more familiar than before. Something old.
This is insane. I’m asking a ferret for life advice.
“Highlights,” he answers without hesitation. “I can always explain more once you’ve had time to process.”
Exactly what I would’ve picked.
I nod, slowly looking back toward Iris. “Highlights will do.”
Her face is pinched as she glares down at Archie, then turns back to me.
“All right then. Your mother was a Hollowborn—just as I am and just as every first-born woman in our family line has been for generations. We’re charged with connecting the supernatural world to the human one without ever revealing they exist. We can’t die by supernatural means, but we still age, we still get sick.
We’re not exactly human, but we don’t have magic either. ”
A lump forms in my throat, thick and unyielding. I think of the months I spent watching my mom slowly waste away from cancer. So much pain. So little dignity. If we’re supposed to be some kind of mystical bloodline, where the hell were the perks?
Iris’s voice is quieter now. “Your mother broke one of our cardinal rules. She fell in love with a wolf shifter. That’s how you came into the world. You never—”
“Hold up.” I throw a hand in the air like I’m in class again. “My dad is a what now? A wolf shifter? What does that even mean?”
Iris lifts an unimpressed brow. “I thought you asked for the highlights reel?”
Touché.
I bite the inside of my cheek and wave for her to continue.
“After your mother found out she was pregnant, she knew there’d be consequences.
And she refused to let you be one of them.
So, she ran, leaving me behind, along with her duty to NightShade and your father.
All of it for you. It took me over a decade to find her again.
I tried to convince her to come home, especially after I had a witch shield your bloodline to hide what you were.
But Jocelyn wouldn’t budge. That’s when I sent Archibald.
He was supposed to guide you toward the truth slowly and carefully, but,” she narrows her eyes, “clearly he failed spectacularly. Traitorous little vermin.”
Archie doesn’t even flinch. “I did exactly what you asked. I kept her safe. Until you meddled and dragged her into this circus.”
One point to the talking ferret. Zero for Psycho Granny.
“As I was saying,” Iris continues without missing a beat.
“When your mother left, that meant, if I retired, NightShade would then be passed to a new lineage of Hollowborn. But our family, the Prescotts, has run this manor for nearly three hundred years, and I couldn’t let it go to another.
After your mother died, I saw an opportunity to keep this place in the family.
Call it selfish all you want. I call it heritage.
And I’ll be damned if I hand this place over to a bunch of fern-sniffing flower covens who wouldn’t know a Hollowborn if she smacked them upside the head with a curse. ”
There’s so much to unpack there, but I don’t ask her to clarify. Mostly because I can’t feel my body anymore. Instead, I turn to the one thing I think might still make sense in this world: my talking, possibly immortal, and definitely not normal ferret.
“What does any of that mean?”
Archie steps forward and places a tiny paw beneath my chin, like he’s delivering bad news at a funeral.
“It means the moment you delivered that whiskey upstairs, your life changed forever. There was a bomb—magically rigged and set to go off when Iris entered. But instead, you did. You took the full impact, and it killed you.”
My stomach flips.
“But because of who your parents are—your bloodline—it also triggered your wolf gene, which activated a prophecy called the Ashmark. One that makes you a weapon they could possibly wield or that will destroy our world as we know it. And the other supernaturals? They’ll kill without question to make sure it’s not the former.
At least that’s what she should have said instead of talking about this damn place. ”
I stare at him, completely blank, my brain buffering like a spinning wheel of death.
I was murdered, and I’m part of some prophecy that will likely kill me for real this time.
Yep. That’s a thing we’re just tossing into the conversation now. Cool.
Before I can think of anything somewhat reasonable to ask, there’s another roar that echoes from upstairs so loudly that it feels like the person is standing right next to me.
“Oh, and the man who broke in through the window?” Iris announces so casually, I’m actually tempted to punch her in the face once I hear her next words.
“He’s also a wolf shifter and says you’re his mate and he’s hellbent on keeping you safe from the curse you’re supposedly meant to become to his kind. ”
“Who’s ready for ice cream?” Liz says as she bursts into the room with a cart covered in bowls and toppings. Yet, nobody smiles.
Especially not me.