Chapter 29
CHAPTER 29
E mery
Wait, I don’t want to leave yet, I say through our bond simply because I adore the expression that overcomes Chance’s face whenever I speak to him this way. It’s as if he’s listening to the sweetest sound there is.
My voice.
It’s my voice that has the power to bring on that look.
However, a stern look quickly replaces his angelic expression.
You’re hungry. He declares. You need to eat and rest. You’ve just had your first shift.
I know that, typically, the first shift of a wolf’s life tires them out. Ms. Elsie and a few of the other pack members have told me they slept for days after their very first shift.
While there is a weariness in my bones that I know will eventually send me into a deep slumber, I want to put it off for as long as possible.
Food can wait . I tell him. Tell me about the drawings on the cave, please. Who made these? That’s why your wolf brought us here, right? He wanted me to see them.
Chance moves his gaze from me to the cave’s walls. He looks at the drawings, studying them with a neutral expression.
We don’t know who made them. They were found even before we permanently settled here. It’s part of the reason Chael decided to settle us here. It’s as if Mother Moon were telling us this is where we’re meant to be. And yes, my wolf knew from the stripe that runs down the fur of your back that you’re a storyteller.
He wanted you to see these.
I smile and lift my hand to the permanent gray streak in my hair. Though I’m certain my hair must be disheveled from the time I’ve spent with Chance inside of this cave, I couldn’t care less.
My wolf carries the same gray streak throughout her fur. It’s a complete contrast to the rest of her beautiful brown color.
Every storyteller has this trait in their fur. It signals to others your position and role within the pack.
My role.
I have a place within the Nightwolf pack.
Chance points to a drawing on the lower part of the cave’s wall. It’s of an injured wolf lying on its side. Blood spills out of the belly.
On instinct, I go to the image and crouch down, placing my hand over the picture. A gasp rushes out of me as immense pain pushes through my body. I snap my hand away from the wall and the pain dissipates.
I peer up at Chance who moves next to me. A frown mars his handsome face.
He looks at the painting then at me. While seers like Reese can see the future, storytellers recount the past. This is the fate of our pack’s storyteller, he says as he crouches next to me. He runs a hand over my tousled hair. Storytellers don’t just recount the events of our past. They tell them as if they lived through them, themselves.
Whatever the subject of your story felt, you will feel.
Tentatively, I reach my hand out again, but Chance’s larger hand grips mine, stopping me.
He gives me a slight shake of his head.
It’s okay , I assure him. It’s okay. I have to say a second time when he hesitates in releasing my hand. I run my hand over the side of his cheek.
I know you don’t want me to feel any pain. And I love you for it. But if this is my role, if I am to do this, whatever it is, I need to know it all.
A muscle tics in his jaw and I know he’s grinding his teeth, warring with himself. I can feel both he and his wolf fighting with their own desire to protect me from discomfort and their knowledge that this is part of my destiny.
Chance cautiously releases my wrist.
Again, I press the tips of my fingers on the injured wolf on the wall. Though it’s a light touch, a searing pain, once more, lances through me.
“Ah,” I gasp from the discomfort but I throw up my free hand when I see Chance move to disconnect my hand from the wall.
I squeeze his wrist as I swallow down the pain. I trace my fingers over the length of the wolf. It’s over the injury in her belly where the pain hits the most. As I move further down her body, to her hind paws and then tail, the pain doesn’t disappear completely but it eases.
I don’t see what happened to the wolf with my eyes. It’s not like a scene that plays out before more. It’s more like a knowing that downloads into my mind’s knowledge bank. As if I’m being told the story, not watching it.
“She was injured…” I say both out loud and through our mate bond. “…injured during a hunt. There were three wolves that attacked her. Strangers. She crawled in here to hide from them. Oh god,” I say as I pull my hand away.
I turn to Chance. “They found her when she tried to leave and they killed her.”
Chance’s Adam’s apple bobs up and down as she swallows. “Are you certain?”
“Yes. She tried to get back to her daughter. To keep her safe…” I trail off and strain the recesses of my mind, seeking out the name of the girl she was trying to save.
“Sera,” Chance says at the same time as the name suddenly downloads into my mind.
“Sera,” I say. I try to recall where I remember that name from, though I know I’ve never met her in person.
Reese. She mentioned Sera was a member of the pack who went off by herself for some reason.
Serafina, Chance tells me. She abandoned our pack months ago.
Reese told me. I ask. Why did she leave?
She never shifted. She doesn’t believe she’s one of us. Months ago, I was searching for a lead to help us find out how to help Sera. That was before our pack started having troubles with what turned out to be betrayal from Rufus Dalton.
Chance tells me he hasn’t had time to look into Sera’s background given recent events.
I nod and turn to look at the injured wolf on the cave wall. How is that possible? Her mother…
That’s not her mother. He tells me. That’s her aunt. The woman who raised her after she came to live here at the main commune of our pack.
No. I shake my head. When I touched the drawing, I clearly heard that this wolf fought to get back to her daughter. Could there be something wrong with my instinct?
Did I misinterpret the story somehow?
You have no idea where she is now? Sera?
She’s running from her mates. And us.
His voice sounds heavy. As if this knowledge brings him pain.
I squeeze his hand but don’t say anything. There are so many holes in this story. Something isn’t right but I can’t figure it out. The story I felt as I touched the drawing is incongruent to what Chance says happened.
We need to get back. You’re hungry and your wolf needs to rest.
His comment causes me to focus on the present and the fact that my stomach is growling. I’m hungry and that weariness I’d started to feel not too long ago, fills my body.
Wait. I wrap a hand around Chance’s arm as he brings us to stand.
Just one more.
I point at the image of a man and woman. The man has long black hair that touches his waist. He’s an even deeper bronze shade than Chance. He’s holding onto a brunette woman as he looks down into her eyes. She stares up at him with a glint in her eyes.
A full moon hangs directly over their heads. From the moon reflects a bright light that radiates around the both of them. It encircles them in the same way the light I felt during my mating with Chance, encompassed us.
Who is this? I ask the question, but I already know.
My mother and father. There’s a grimness in his voice as he answers. The Alpha and Alpha Queen of our pack before Chael.
He sounds detached. It’s like he’s speaking about a revered king and queen and not his parents. The people who birthed and raised him.
I turn to Chance.
This picture is from their mating night, wasn’t it? Someone imprinted their image on the wall.
His eyes shift from me to the picture and back to me again. Yes.
Tell me about them.
He shakes his head, making my shoulders slump. I move to place my hand on the wall, but he stops me.
You need to get back. I’ll bring you out here again but now you need to get home to rest.
I don’t have the energy to fight him. Despite wanting to stay, to take in more of the images on the walls. To ask about how they came to be here.
I want to know it all.
But my mate is right.
I’m drained and weary.
My wolf can barely keep on her feet. Yet, she’s rearing to break free again. To have one final run back to the commune before we’re forced to sleep.