Chapter 37 #2
“I’m sorry for being an ass about it. Spending time in the barn made me think about a lot of things, including what you’d been trying to tell us. I attempted to retire.”
“After all the years you’ve put in? They’ll crucify you, and you won’t have someone like me to look the other way while you run for your life. Did you really think they’d offer a sniper who’s taken tracker missions a simple memory erasure?”
“At this point, memory erasure would be a blessing. I want to forget.” There was no lie in his voice. “After everything we’ve done, and everyone we’ve lost, I wish it would all go away. But Mordane wouldn’t allow it, hence the archives.”
Finally, a subject Elsie could agree with. Forgetting everything would be an easy out, but it wasn’t an option she’d ever consider. She’d cling to her memories with everything she had.
“I can’t leave. I’m stuck inside the barrier.”
“You’re still waiting for your mother? After all this time?”
“A raven came and spoke to me. It wanted to bring me to my father. I killed it, too.” She kicked a rock. “It’s impossible to stay constantly vigilant against a fae-touched spy that can fly at all hours of the day and night. Eventually, I’d mess up and get caught.”
“That sucks.” He glanced down at her belly for the first time and winced. “How did you end up with a hole that big in your stomach?”
Elsie told him the short version, and he scowled.
“Callum hasn’t breathed a word of his involvement to anyone. We need to report this. His idiocy and failure to follow orders caused your injury and led to two deaths!”
“Deaths caused by Saint and me. Callum is and always has been an idiot. Even when we were trainees together, he couldn’t help himself, and he hasn’t grown out of it. There’s no punishment the clan has that’s equal to the task of curing him of that problem.”
“You’re going to let it go?”
Elsie patted her tummy and shrugged.
“I won’t forgive him, or forget what he’s done, but a man died protecting that idiot’s life. I have to honor that. He should stay where he is, where he can be monitored by his betters and kept in line.”
“That’s so grown-up, it isn’t like you at all.”
“Rude.”
“All of this has changed you. You’re not the Elsie I knew.”
“It hasn’t. I’m the same old me, I just remember who that is now.”
“How will the hunters cope without you to save everyone’s asses?”
“That’s a problem for Mordane to figure out. Change is coming for the hunters, whether they like it or not. Too many irreplaceable lives have been lost. They’ll have to come up with a new system to bolster the numbers if they’re going to continue protecting the humans,” Elsie said.
“Sometimes I wonder if that’s even their main goal anymore.” Morgan quietly glanced around to make sure he hadn’t been overheard by anyone sneaking up on them.
“Careful, Morgan. Thoughts like that will get a man in trouble, your entire squad could turn on you,” Elsie snorted. They walked a little more until the bell rang for lunch service.
“I’m sorry, Elsie. I was wrong.”
“And now you get to live with the consequences of your actions,” Elsie muttered. “All of you do.”
“Marley's done what she can to make it up to you. She worked hard to convince Mordane that you wouldn’t have killed Clairemont if it weren’t for the medicine.”
“That’s ridiculous. I killed him because I wanted to. I should have done it sooner.”
“It may be ridiculous, but people will believe what they want to believe. Nobody wants to watch someone they admire fall from grace,” he replied.
They parted ways, and Morgan did not return.
She spent the next few days outside, soaking up the sun and throwing daggers at a target for hours, only returning for meals. Not once did another member of her former squad contact her.
She considered it a good thing. Now that her body was healed, her temper ran hotter with each passing day.
She’d lose it if Marley or Trenton were to make any attempts at communication.
Elsie wasn’t sure if she’d manage to keep her temper in check or end up a wanted criminal for starting a corpse collection, so she did nothing.
Nothing but grieve and seethe in impotent rage.
Two weeks to the day after she’d run Saint off, a cranky and flustered Marko came to find her swinging in the hammock she’d strung up between two buildings and made into her bed. She peeked over at the supply sergeant curiously.
“Mordane is demanding your immediate presence. There’s a strange woman in his office. She’s some kind of demon, but he hasn’t ordered an attack. Her magic makes the centipede look like a child, Chantraine, she’s the most powerful being I’ve ever seen, and she wants you.”
Elsie froze. She knew of only one person who fit the description, but instead of leaping with joy or succumbing to rage, she went numb. The one thing she’d hoped and prayed for was finally happening, and she wasn’t sure she wanted it anymore.
“My mother came,” she said woodenly, climbing out of the hammock. She took a step forward, then stopped and looked down at herself. Her clothes were dirty and worn out, and her hair was in a terrible, tangled mess. “I can’t face her like this.”
“There’s no time,” Marko stressed.
Elsie smirked. Mordane must have made his demand urgent.
“Too bad.” Elsie embraced the cold calm settling over her. “She’s made me wait for sixteen years. She can wait an hour while I clean myself up. Inform Mordane that I will be available at the old oak in one hour.”
Marko’s face soured, but he agreed. Turning on his heel, he ran back toward Mordane’s offices.
Elsie walked back to her room and took a shaky breath before opening the door.
She didn’t have time to fall apart. Going straight to her closet, she pulled out a pair of shorts, knee-high boots, and one of her current favorite tops.
She threw them in a pile on her bed along with supplies for the shower and a miniature armory of weapons.
Her daggers, throwing knives, and two swords that someone had taken the time to return to her room. One was hers, the other belonged to Saint. She wouldn’t leave it behind. Elsie took one last item, then ran to the showers to clean up and fix her unruly hair.
While in the shower, reality slowly set in, leaving her shaking with anxious energy. Her mother had come. Elsie was finally leaving safely and wouldn’t have to worry about the ravens anymore.
For the first time since she’d ripped apart the tether between herself and her mate, she felt something close to hope.
She’d follow that tattered bond back to him and beg his forgiveness.
She’d spend her life making it up to him if it’s what he wanted, even getting on her knees to grovel as she’d never done before.
Elsie would do anything for a second chance.
The weight of a thousand regrets lifted, vigor returning to her body and joints. She bounced in place, the first smile she’d had since he’d left tugging at her lips. Finally, she had something to look forward to.
Once clean, she used a dryer to speed things along, then got dressed. Strapping on every weapon but the swords, she pulled on the last item she’d taken from her room. One of Saint’s hoodies. It still smelled of him, and the hem fell just above the bottom of her shorts.
She pulled the front of it up to her nose and breathed deep, pretending for a second that he was still there. She’d be with him again soon.
Slipping straps onto their swords, she slung them over her back with the pommels angled for easy access. She glanced into the mirror, then practically skipped out the door and down the hall.
Marley and Trenton were together around the next corner, intent on speaking with her, but she put a hand up to stop them.
“Not a word. Morgan told me that not all of squad one sent Saint to that fucking torture chamber. I know that he and Perrie were willing to take responsibility for him until I healed. His and Clairemont’s deaths are on you. I guess I should have taken your hands after all.”
“Elsie!” Marley said sharply.
She walked away with a jaunt in her step that had been missing since even before the centipede. Her whole body was lighter with anticipation, almost as though she could fly. She was finally free.
She’d return to the family who would remind her of what kind of person she was supposed to be. People who would release the seal on her magic and teach her to use it properly, and she’d have her mate at her side the whole way.
She hit the doors with a grin spreading across her face, greeting the sun with a joy she hadn’t felt in ages. Even the air tasted better. Cleaner, fresher.
Elsie didn’t quite run to the barrier; she hadn’t completely lost her dignity, but she’d probably never walked faster in her whole damned life.
She crossed through the barrier and traversed the uneven ground of the dead zone.
It wasn’t until she drew closer to the massive old oak tree that she slowed, trepidation creeping in for the first time.
She loved her mother, but now she realized that Saint had been right all along.
She didn’t even know the woman. The goddess.
How different would her relationship be with Stolas, who had once patiently tolerated her only because she’d been a child who didn’t know any better?
What of the terrifying shadow wolf whom Santa Muerte forced to stay at her side?
What if her mother was disappointed in the woman she’d become? What if the goddess wouldn’t accept her anymore? Her steps slowed the more she thought about it until she tiptoed through the woods, creeping closer to the tree.
Santa Muerte sat on a fallen log, face turned to the side, speaking to a raven twice the size of the one Elsie killed. She stopped in her tracks at the sight of her. The goddess was everything she remembered and more.