Moon Child (The Year of the Wolf #2) - Serena Akeroyd Page 0,18

my dreams before, but this time, I felt no compunction in shifting. Maybe it was the lack of the bow and arrow that was another prompt, or maybe it was just time—the time for action.

The time for dream to become reality.

As my she-wolf pounced into being, she did what I was too cautious to do. In my human skin, I stayed in the clearing, I remained watchful, waiting on the creature to come to me.

But in this instance, I didn’t. I leaped into action, darting through the forest toward that horrendous cackle which, now, had shifted slightly in this form.

My body didn’t react with unnatural fear. I wasn’t scared of anything in this skin. Or at least, very little. I was strong as a she-wolf, powerful. She would kill for me, protect and defend me in ways I would never think to as a human.

And this beast recognized the sound.

Another animal.

A very normal creature who was also a Mother’s child.

I didn’t know what it was until I saw it, and even then, it wasn’t like anything I’d seen on the nature documentaries. But then, of course, that made sense. Shifter wolves were a lot bigger than naturals, and it only figured that shifter hyenas would be the same too.

All I knew was that I scented the Mother on the animal, who, at the sight of me, paused, his eyes darting from left to right, which made me wonder if it was going to attack or run away.

Now it had seen me, the cackle had died off, which told me it was scared.

Well, good!

I was damn glad about that.

For months, that noise had been haunting me, making every night’s sleep restless, but tonight, I’d vanquished it, and I decided to vanquish the fucking beast who’d tormented me for what felt like far too long.

I dove into action, running after the beast, but when I leaped high, pouncing up into the moonlit sky so that I could take it down, I heard a scream. I remembered it from when I was young. From when Lara had yelled bloody murder after father had slapped her, and the scream entwined with sobs I just knew belonged to her too, and like that, I was torn from my dream and back into my bedroom.

My mates were asleep, dozing around me. Eli was curled up between my legs, which would have been hilarious if he wasn’t so fucking big. Austin’s face was tucked into my shoulder, and Ethan slept on the side where Eli usually rested.

I sat up though, wide awake and jarring them into the same state as I twisted around, needing to act.

All day, I’d been trying my mom’s number, but she’d been unresponsive.

I just knew she’d answer now.

How I knew, I wasn’t sure, but I just knew it.

Lara needed me. I felt that so keenly it was an ache in my chest.

My mates jerked into wakefulness when I started moving, and they watched me dopily, not even asking any questions as I scrambled to get my cell from the many wireless chargers on the nightstand.

As I sought out the number, a number to a person I’d never imagined wanting to call again, a number that I’d rang a dozen times today, I was actually relieved when I heard a rasped, “Who is this, and why won’t you stop phoning me?”

Her voice hadn’t changed in all these years.

That was my first thought.

It was soft and whimsical, a little lyrical. She’d told the best bedtime stories, and when she’d sung lullabies for us, it had been so easy to drift off to sleep, to ignore the sounds of a new pitch where we’d pulled up to park for however long we could stay before we moved on, and to just fall into a restful slumber.

But she was weak.

Always had been.

She’d never protected us from our father’s wrath, had never stopped him from slapping us. His favorite move had been to backhand us, just a gentle tap, but because Draga Krasowski was a brick shithouse of a man, it was enough to send us flying as we went soaring onto the floor.

Jana had even earned herself a scar on her lip where he’d split it open with his signet ring. I remembered that particular occasion so well, because her gift? An ability to get small glimpses of the future. A gift he’d tried to monetize. That one particular time, when he’d asked her to pick a winner of a football game and she’d messed up, he’d