to do so, they take a step back.
“I can’t open a death window. Fay’s body isn’t down there. If I’m wrong, it’s a terrible mistake. If I’m right, then I have a terrible suspicion I’m trying not to let myself think about. Please, dig up her grave.”
Leiza hesitantly moves to the grave, but when her paws start digging, she makes quick work about it, clearing a foot of depth at one end in less than a few minutes.
Tiara moves to the other end and begins slinging up the earth. The two of them reach the sleek, black metal casket with ornate, silver embellishments, in no time.
My stomach gets queasy as I drop into the hole and lift the top half of the casket…only to find it empty.
Dirt.
A little dirt is all that’s in here.
Leiza whimpers, and Tiara begins pacing, as my heartbeat starts drumming in my ears.
“Take me to her death spot. Now,” I state a little too insistently.
Leiza doesn’t waste time, and I struggle to keep up with her, as she weaves in and out of the trees with quick feet and agile movements.
Tiara stays at a slower pace, deliberately remaining behind me, as the two of them hurry me toward something I hope I’m wrong about.
“Because he’s never there. And you probably wish he was around. Then he shows up and you feel angry,” Fay once said to me when she was relating to me about my father issues.
Leiza takes an abrupt turn, quickly darting in the next direction, and I stumble when I try to turn too abruptly. Quickly, I right myself and continue to chase after her.
“Is Fay’s father a beta?” I once asked Emit.
“Fay’s father? I think he died as a mortal hundreds of years ago,” was his response.
My stomach tightens, because I remember even back then I found Fay’s acknowledged resentment far more recent than a full century ago.
Leiza barks at me, turning and circling a spot on the ground. I hurriedly kneel at it, putting my hand on the ground and desperately reaching for any sort of death window.
The window quickly opens, but it isn’t through Fay’s eyes. It was one of the others in that minor pack. I see Ian, as he hacks through a wolf’s neck with no mercy, his teeth bared, as he snaps through the bone.
I’m stuck in a small window that doesn’t pan wider, with the gaze only focused on what’s going on directly in the line of vision, as though the soul’s memories stained here were from a wolf who was left to die.
Another wolf falls, and I quickly recognize it as Fay’s wolf. It collapses to the ground with not even a whimper, neck barely still attached.
Ian finishes up, stepping back into frame, as he shifts back to two legs.
“Leave them for him to find,” Ian states to someone. “We’ll lose our weak alpha and stop Idun from ever returning all on our own. The Portocale dick says that without the Head Alphas, Idun will never rise,” Ian is saying.
“Yes, master beta,” the guy says, lowering his head. “But we should leave before he catches scent of this. Fay was one of his.”
“Fay’s the fool who knew better. She stirred this shit. She pried for information. Something she’s never done before, because she’s simply too omega. She knew the risks, and she’d be loyal to him. Not us. Keep your fucking omegas away from our alpha’s own minor pack from now on.”
“Of course, Master Beta,” the man says, keeping his head bowed.
They waste no time hurrying away, and I watch, as the dimming vision stays fixed on Fay’s motionless body.
If Fay really died here, then why couldn’t I open her death window from this spot? Why is her body missing from her—
The one who called Ian the Master Beta returns, silently slinking through the woods. He looks around a few times, and then he kneels to press Fay’s head back to her shoulders.
My breath is sucked in sharply when I see her neck starting to reattach to the skin, and I watch with even wider eyes when the fur starts to recede, revealing a form.
A groan comes from the woman, who is certainly not Fay.
Just as I feared…
Idun.
I didn’t know she could imitate a wolf’s form. Or maybe I knew it and forgot, since this world is total chaos with the abundant droves of never-ending information.
My heart is thudding so loudly when I watch her quickly heal, no stitches necessary, as she grins over at the