After she’s scanned the group with a challenge in her eyes and no one else protests, she turns and walks up to us. She sits back on her heels before Azrim. Emarza unwraps Rhysan’s head and lets his father give him one last kiss goodbye.
Azrim cries as he buries his bleeding face in Rhysan’s fur.
The Shifters that hold him back dig their claws in like they do to me when she offers me the same chance.
I lean down to Rhysan who has his mother’s coat and eyes. “You are strong. You are loved. One day, I will make us a family again. Promise.”
Azrim huffs like he wants to ask a question, but he can’t speak.
“Can you give him enough?” I ask Emarza.
She nods slowly. “Kinta did not survive his infection. Jorix is all I have. So I have milk for two.”
“I’m so sorry. I didn’t know.”
She hangs her head and silently cries. “You were fighting for all of us. What we need is stronger genetics. Better medicine. Leaders that aren’t so closed minded. If you can find that in the galaxy, bring it home.”
“Enough.” Tahliel calls her back.
Emarza looks to Azrim, whose anger has faded since she spoke of her own loss. “I will care for him and love him like he is my own. And I will tell him if you two, of Jezza, and of how much he is loved.”
Scarnis waves his hand toward the edge of camp. “Leave Azrim to his Night Stalking. Zorin…”
“My house is outside of your camp boundary. You have no right to speak of rules toourpack, what’s left of it. We make our own rules.” I spit blood at his feet.
Scarnis’ claws retract, and he wipes our blood off on his pants. “Do not show your faces here again, or I will be certain the pack destroys your tainted souls.”
Claws dig into my shoulders with wretched agony before releasing me.
Emarza stumbles back like she has not seen such violence. She hasn’t. Jezza had. But I am grateful that she hides Rhysan’s face from it.
Azrim fights with the Shifters but not as hard as before, not when Emarza’s emptiness has been filled, and Rhysan will be with a female that’s the closest to Jezza in the pack. But his world has shattered. And I know he may never shift back to his upright form again.
His time in the Mindoran Tactical Forces is likely over. Night Stalkers are destined to roam the woods at night, alone, taking out enemies and keeping the boundaries between packs clear of any strays looking to cause trouble.
Scarnis’ security team forms a wall between us and the camp. As Azrim, in Shifter form, sulks into the trees, I realize I am the one who must care for Jezza on her final journey.
Azrim has laid her in a patch of moss under a large tree. But he cannot carry her. So I slide my bloodied arms under her body, and stumble up the hill toward my home. Their den is off limits because it is inside the pack perimeter.
“I am sorry, Jezza.” I’m bleeding all over her. “I did not expect your pack to betray us like this. Everyone loved you.Everyone.”
Azrim leads the way. It is a long journey on foot. Before long, his dark fur becomes just a shadow, catching glints of gold under the early moonlight. He picks a spot on a hill just beyond my cabin, then starts collecting sticks for me.
After we have laid Jezza on her final bed, Azrim curls up with her body and howls. I am not much of a howler, but the heartbreak evident in his cry makes me shift, tilt my head back, and join him.
A star is missing from our sky tonight. I cannot bring this one back to life.
There has to be a way I can make us whole again, so Rhysan can return to us and Azrim can come in from the cold.
As Jezza rises into the sky as embers and winks out across the land, Azrim gives me one last glance and sulks into the dark woods.Goodbye, brother.
It shatters me to see how strong he was just yesterday and how hollow he has become.
I am always with you, brother,I reply.
His howls echo through the distant mountains as I stand guard by his mate’s ashes feeling sick in my soul.
Jezza accepted us, loved him more than life, and filled the future with hope. Now I am alone, and my brother is a ghost of a warrior, a dark wolf, the kind that no one wants to meet in the middle of the night.
