Chapter 8
Chapter eight
We found them at midday.
The plateau opened up without warning — one moment we were climbing through a narrow pass, the next we were standing at the edge of a vast white expanse. The wind cut through my layers, but I barely noticed.
Because there, at the far edge of the plateau, shadows moved against the snow.
Wolves.
Cal went rigid beside me. Through the bond, I felt recognition crash through him like a wave.
"How many?" James asked quietly.
I counted. Five shapes, dark against white. They'd seen us. They were watching.
"Five," I said.
We moved forward slowly. Cal took the lead, his body language careful, submissive. Non-threatening.
As we got closer, details emerged.
They were thin. Desperately thin — ribs visible through matted fur, haunches wasted. Their coats were filthy, tangled with ice and old blood. And their eyes—
Empty.
These wolves had nothing. Just hunger. Just fear. Just the hollow stare of animals who had forgotten they were ever human.
All five were male. All five were growling.
The sound built on itself — five voices blending into a wall of threat. Low. Constant. Promising violence.
"They're terrified," Neal said quietly behind me. "Look at them. They don't know what to do with us."
He was right. They weren't attacking, but they weren't running either. Just standing there, growling, trapped between fight and flight.
Cal stepped forward.
He moved slowly, deliberately. Then he yipped.
The sound was soft. Almost plaintive. A greeting in the only language they might still understand.
Four of the wolves went still.
I watched it happen — the way their growls faltered, the way their ears swiveled toward Cal. Something flickered in those empty eyes. Not recognition, exactly. Deeper than that. Older.
Pack memory. The bond that had connected them.
One by one, four of them lowered their eyes.
Cal made another sound. A whine, high and desperate. Through the bond, I felt his grief — years of guilt crashing down on him, the overwhelming relief of finding them alive.
The four wolves crept closer. Cautious. Wary. But drawn to Cal like they couldn't help themselves.
"It's working," James breathed.
"Wait." I was still counting. Four wolves approaching Cal. Four sets of lowered eyes. "Where's the fifth?"
I scanned the plateau.
Found him.
He stood apart from the others, near a rock formation to the left. I didn't know how I'd missed him before — he was massive. Bigger than any wolf I'd ever seen, shoulders nearly reaching my chest. His fur was black, matted with old blood, his body a map of scars and half-healed wounds.
He wasn't growling like the others.
He was silent. Still. Watching.
And he was looking directly at me.
Our eyes met.
My breath caught.
No.
The word came from somewhere deep inside me — a warning, a rejection, a desperate attempt to stop what was already happening. Because I felt it. The hook sinking into my chest. The bond trying to form, reaching for him the way it had reached for Cal, for James, for Neal.
But this was different.
This was violent.
I stumbled. My knees buckled.
"Lumi!" James caught me, his arms wrapping around my waist before I hit the ground. "What is it? What's wrong?"
"I feel him." My hand pressed against my chest, against the place where the bond was trying to take root. "Here. I feel him here."
The large wolf's lips pulled back from his teeth.
He'd felt it too. The bond reaching for him. And he was rejecting it with every fiber of his being.
Rage.
No.
Fury.
He was tearing at it. Clawing at the thread between us, trying to rip it out of himself before it could take hold.
The pain made me gasp.
"Lumi, talk to me." James's voice was urgent. "What's happening?"
"He's fighting it. The bond. He won't—" I couldn't finish. Another wave of rejection hit me, and I doubled over in James's arms.
The large wolf started moving.
Not toward the other ferals. Not toward Cal.
Toward me.
His movements were wrong — stiff, jerky, like something was fighting for control of his body.
Cal stepped into his path.
My wolf positioned himself between me and the alpha, body low, ears flat. Not aggressive. Pleading.
The large wolf didn't even slow down.
He hit Cal with his shoulder, sending my mate sprawling into the snow, and kept coming. His eyes never left mine.
Golden. Bright. Burning with a fury that had been building for years.
"James," I whispered.
"I see him."
"He's going to—"
The large wolf stopped. Ten feet away. Close enough that I could see the individual scars on his muzzle, the old bite marks on his ears, the teeth behind those pulled-back lips.
He was shaking.
Not with fear. With the effort of holding himself back.
But he was losing.
I felt it through the thread between us — the rage cracking, something else bleeding through. Something desperate. Something that might have been loneliness, or grief, or the terrible weight of years spent holding a broken pack together.
For one moment, his eyes met mine.
And I saw him. Not the wolf. The man underneath. Buried so deep I could barely sense him, but there. Present. Aware.
Then the wolf surged back.
The growl that ripped from his throat was like nothing I'd heard before — deeper than thunder, louder than the wind. It echoed off the peaks and rolled across the plateau, and the four other wolves scattered, retreating to the edge of the clearing.
Cal scrambled to his feet, positioning himself in front of me again.
The large wolf didn't care.
He gathered himself. Muscles coiling. Weight shifting.
"Lumi," James said. His voice was too calm. The voice of someone who knew what was about to happen and was already calculating how to survive it. "When he moves, you run. Understand? You run and you don't look back."
"I can't—"
"Promise me."
The large wolf's eyes locked onto mine.
"James—"
The wolf lunged.