Filed to story: Alpha's Regret: His Wrongful Rejection
Aunt Nola swayed. The scent of her fresh terror lashed my face.
Abertha pushed her. “Go now. I can’t see to both you and the pup. Go! I’ve got her.” Her voice was as hard as stone.
Aunt Nola stumbled in the direction of the stairs, and then she ran. Her bare feet left trails in Orla’s blood.
For a moment, the crone just stared at the couch, as if she was gauging its weight, but then she sighed and said, “I’ve got an idea.”
She reached under her skirt and took a knife from her leather ankle holster.
She held it so I could see, and then she placed it solemnly on the tile in front of her, hilt toward me. “The tip is poisoned. You don’t even have to stab someone. Just nick his skin, and he’ll die in agony.”
My gaze homed in on the blade. I wanted it so badly. It was so close. So sharp.
The crone nudged it forward. “You know who gave that to me? Darragh Ryan. The Mercenary. The Haunt of the Hills.”
I’d heard of him—everyone had—even though he’d left the pack before I was born. The males got shifty when his name came up, but their dismissive laughs always rang false, like they were whistling past a graveyard.
“Go on, Annie-girl. Take it. We have to get out of here before they come back even angrier.”
The voice inside me had nothing to say. Abertha was telling the truth.
All I had to do was reach out and take it. Let go of the slat and grab. It was so close.
I willed my fingers to let go of the slat. To reach and wrap around the knife’s handle.
I sucked in my belly and scooted out from under the sofa.
Abertha held out her hand, her eyes pleading. “Good girl. Come on now.”
Boots pounded down the steps, so quick, too quick for me to do anything but look at a huge male skid to a halt at the bottom of the stairs, his mouth curling into a sneer.
The knife slipped from my fingers, clattering to the floor.
“Shit,” Abertha muttered under her breath.
“What have we here?” the male said. He bared his teeth and licked a canine. It wasn’t human. It was wolf.
Run, my wolf urged me with all her might. Run, run, run.
“I can’t,” I whispered back. “My legs don’t work.”
Abertha moved to block me. The male laughed. “I have enough for you, too, witch,” he said as his hand went to his belt buckle.
“Now or never, Annie-girl,” Abertha hissed.
I looked down at the knife. So did the male.
Run, my wolf begged.
I bent. Curled my little fingers around the knife’s hilt. The male came for me.
Abertha shielded my body with hers, covering every part of me except for my arm. That, she tugged forward, covering my small hand with hers, squeezing it like a vise, and with an impossible strength, she lunged and stabbed the male with the knife in my hand, tearing my shoulder from its socket as she plunged the blade into his stomach. Hot blood spurted over our hands.
The male blinked down at the red stain blossoming on his shirt.
Abertha bolted for the stairs, towing me by my blood-soaked hand, dragging my entire body when my legs buckled, faster than I’d ever have imagined she could.
I couldn’t tear my eyes from the male. He was still standing. He glanced up from the knife, his gaze narrowing on us, his gray face twisting into a howling maw, his fangs descending.
“Abertha, he’s not dying in agony.”
He was wrapping his clawed hands around the hilt.
“Life lesson—magic doesn’t always work, but your feet do,” Abertha huffed. “Run, Annie-girl. Run!”
We scrambled up the last few stairs, tearing through the lodge and out through the kitchens, fleeing into the dark woods away from the eerie, red sky over the burning commissary.
I take a long sip of my cooling tea, bringing myself back to the present.
Until today, I don’t think I’ve ever run so fast and far as I did when I escaped that basement. After that night, I became some kind of burrowing animal, living life hiding in plain sight with my eyes screwed shut. But I can’t hide from this.
I mated a wolf from Last Pack. His seed is inside me right now. I can’t pretend it didn’t happen. Not yet.
“I can’t have a pup,” I say. A babe would be vulnerable. It would need me. I can hardly take care of myself, and I’m definitely not strong enough to protect it from this world.
Abertha doesn’t even blink. “Are you sure?”
Am I sure? What choice do I have? You mate, and then, unless you get really, really lucky, you have a pup. And I’m not lucky.
I have heard whispers, though. Some females don’t keep their babes. I don’t even know where I heard that, or how I know, but I picked it up somewhere, the same way I learned how to pitch my voice when a male is angry and that when a male tells you to smile, that’s a threat and he’s dangerous.
There are ways.
The crone would know them.
“I can’t—” The words stick in my throat. I can’t be a mother. But I can’t make the choice not to be, either. I don’t have that power. I don’t want it. I’m scared, too scared for any of it.
I want my mother. I want her back.
“Can’t what?” Abertha asks, so very gently.
“I can’t have a pup.” And I can’t make the decision not to. “But I—” I can’t say it. Fate will surely strike me down if I do. What’s done cannot be undone.
“There are ways,” she says, pushing up from the table and padding to the kitchen. She takes a mason jar from an overhead cabinet and spoons loose leaves into a metal ball strainer. My nose twitches. The blend smells medicinal.
I watch her like a mouse watches an eagle. She shuffles back to the table, downs the dregs of her tea, and then drops the strainer in and pours a fresh cup of hot water.
Is that poison?
“I can’t…can’t do that to a pup.”
Abertha’s face hardens. She holds the strainer by its thin chain and dips it into the water. “We’re not talking about a pup.”
“We aren’t?”
“Not at this point.” She lets out a long, tired breath. “What do they even teach you at that academy?”
I shrug. “Literature. Geology. Calculus.”
“What is that?”
“I don’t know. It’s math about figuring change. Continuous change.”
“At least that sounds useful. Change is continuous.” She gives her head a shake and returns to the subject. “You’ve learned no basic anatomy and biology, though, I’m guessing. How do I put this…we’re not talking about a pup because there is no pup. No bun in the oven yet. Just ingredients. Or possible ingredients.”
“What’s a possible ingredient?”
“Well, to be specific, the egg. The egg is still in the fridge. It’s not even in the mixing bowl yet. And an egg in the carton isn’t an ingredient, right? Who knows what you’re going to do with that egg. You might throw it at someone’s truck. You might drop it.”
I have no idea what she’s talking about. I think the bowl is my vagina, but the rest—I’m lost. I did take biology and anatomy, but it was mostly about the mechanics of shifting and how we’re different from humans, so we need to be careful not to hurt them by accident.
Abertha sighs again. “Okay, let me put it this way. Is an egg in the fridge a cake?”
“No.”