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The woods had been thick and while Isaiah was Varu, he’d been raised in a city and forbidden to run as the wolf. The first lesson of all young Varu was control. Control meant staying alive. Losing it meant bringing death to everyone they loved.
“I didn’t know how to track him, so I waited. He returned the next morning. He had blood on his clothes.” Isaiah should have alerted his father, but Jia had begged him not to, so he didn’t. “The militia had injured the Black Wolf, and Jia went to find him and heal him.”
“Was he a doctor?”
Isaiah curled his mouth into a half-smile. “Cana don’t need to know anything about medicine when it comes to the Fenrir. You bring them across. You can give them life. You can heal them when nothing else can.”
Luca gave Isaiah a questioning look.
“Blood is a powerful substance among us,” Isaiah said. “It can form bonds or heal us. The blood of a Cana is stronger than anything. They can use it to bring us back from the brink of death.”
“How?”
“You’ll have to tell me when you figure it out.”
Luca crossed his arms over his stomach. “You have to have some idea?”
“I suspect it has to do with how a Cana can call the Fenrir because if the Fenrir can’t leave the body, the Varu can’t die and the Fenrir can’t become lost. But it takes a lot out of a Cana to do it. And if they heal too many, it can kill them.”
Luca stared with a look of concentration at the door past Isaiah’s shoulder. Watching? Waiting? Isaiah couldn’t be sure.
After a long moment, Luca’s gaze focused. “You said the Anubisused upthe Cana. What if he’d been trying to heal it?”
Luca was so in love with Nash he couldn’t even see the Anubis for the creature it was.
What it was doing. What itwoulddo.
Isaiah had to make Luca understand. The fate of Isaiah’s people depended on it. “That’s exactly what it did.”
“Then why did you say it killed the Cana? If it was injured, then your people did it, or the armies sent after it.”
“It doesn’t work that way with the Anubis.”
“Why not?”
“Because the Anubis is already dead.” It was the epitome of death. “Its existence took life from the Cana. Not because it needed to be healed, but because it’s a black hole of nothing. It takes. It can’t give.”
Luca’s expression hardened. “Nox doesn’t take anything from me.”
“I know you want to believe that.”
“No.” Luca slammed a fist against the table. “He doesn’t. He takes nothing, and he gives everything. He protected me with his life, never asking for anything in return.”
Isaiah warned himself not to push Luca, but he had to convince him. If Isaiah didn’t, Luca would eventually succumb to the Anubis’s hunger. “Have you ever asked yourself why the Anubis craves violence and death?”
“Because it wants to experience the world.” Luca flipped a hand. “It doesn’t understand the difference between what we do and when it kills.”
Naïve, just like Jia. The thought sent a spear through Isaiah’s chest. “Luca, it kills because it’s feeding. It’s taking the life because it is hungry. Every life it steals lets it survive long enough to do it again and again until death spreads like a plague.”
The pain and anger flashing in Luca’s eyes almost forced Isaiah to submit, but again, he couldn’t. He would cut out his own heart to save this man.
“The only time the Anubis has killed anyone was to protect me.” Luca stood and backed away. “So. maybe you saw what you wanted to. Or you’ve lied so long you believe what you say.”
“When you shook my hand, you felt it.” That transfer of energy the Fenrir extended to the Cana. The connection that bound them together, circulating like a current. As long as it was unbroken, it brought Varu the wolves and allowed Cana to live for a long time.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Even a lie from Luca smelled sweet.
“I know you felt it because I felt it too. It’s why you sense me. You sense everyone without even trying. It’s why you see the wolves. You’re life, Luca. And we’re alive. We belong together, you with my pack—”
