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“What job?”
The entity chuckled, or I think that’s what it did. The sound horrid and strange, like a hollow, demented cackle. “Dear wolf, there are many things you don't know and probably wouldn’t understand. Your consort was only a pawn in a much grander game played by kings and queens of immense power.”
“She was never my consort. She’s a friend and fellow wolf.”
Another shrug from the entity. “Your friend contributed greatly to the growth of my kingdom."
Axel was fuming beside me. “In what manner?” He bit out.
But it was me who asked, “are you a king?”
“No. But I serve one.”
“Who? And where is this king of yours now?”
The room pulsed with something sinister. “Unleash me and I will take you to him. Or what’s left of him.”
My brows furrowed. “What do you mean, what’s left of him?”
Another hollow laugh, “war is eminent, Alpha. It's only a matter of time before the rest who come after me will succeed in their task and wipe every single one of you off the face of the earth. You and those vampire scum alike.”
“Vampires?” Axel asked, disbelief lacing his voice. I couldn’t believe it myself; they were but a mere myth.
But Hale went on, “what's left in the forest of Marillia are mere whispers of what is to come, Alpha of Blade Rock. Release me and I will help you choose the winning side. You know, history is written by the victor after all.”
I didn’t know what to think or what to ask anymore. He had jumbled my mind, filling it with things that didn’t make any sense. I’d come here hoping for answers of my mate, the girl I’d grown up with but only ever saw reflected in water or in the smoke of my campfire. She was always there, with me, whenever I exited pack grounds. The pull was unmistakable even without her having a physical form. Something must have happened to her, to all of them, the Shadow Folk. I couldn’t believe that she’d been born that way, without a physical form, without a voice. And if she had, why would Celene be so cruel as to pair me with a mate I could never have? Always together but always apart.
Beside me, Axel shook his head, “what about the scar? That burn mark on my sister’s shoulder?”
“The other Alpha had told me she was his, but she couldn’t possibly be his if she’d already been gifted to another,” the entity said.
At that, Axel lunged, throwing himself over Tanya’s dead body to get to Marie. I grabbed him before he could dig his claws into her and jerked him back to our side of the table. Hale didn’t even flinch.
“He’s in here,” I pressed my finger to the white sheet, to the body which lay underneath, “not in there,” and gestured back to Marie.
I had Axel’s shirt bundled in my fist, gripping him tight, waiting for him to calm the hell down before he attacked my packmate again.
His blue orbs flicked to me, wisps of golden yellow dancing within them. Then he turned his focus back to Marie and said, “I hope Celene has a very special place for you once you pass over.”
Hale or Marie cocked her head, the movement more animal like than human. “Dear boy, didn’t you know that Celene has been dead for more than two centuries?”
Celene, dead. Our god, our deity. The one whom we’ve always believed assigned our mates to us, dead. He might as well have run me over with a truck. Beside me, Axel kept speaking, asking him questions and seething at the answers he gave, but I’d gone still. Quiet as the forest in those seconds before a storm.
Dead, the word echoed through my mind. Could it be true? I stared at the pale sheet before me. Who assigned our mates, then? Who greeted us in the afterlife once we passed over? Had I been assigned a mate I could never have by mere chance or was there someone orchestrating these things? Some other divine being we didn’t know about?
I sank to my heels, burying my hands in my hair. The cold of the floor had worked its way into my boots and up my leg, but I wasn’t shivering. I too had died, somewhere between last night and what Lord Hale had just confessed. Blood still covered my boots, creating spots of rusty brown over the chocolaty leather. The sight of it didn’t pain me anymore. In fact, I didn’t feel anything.
“You cannot leave me here to rot away?” Hale said. “I have things to offer, precious things in exchange for my release.”
But Axel would have none of it and I… I simply didn’t care anymore. None of it mattered. All my research, the battles I waged within myself, years of unanswered questions, all of it useless. I would never have my answers and I would never have her, not in the way a mate bond was intended for. I would never be able to touch her, to hold her and to kiss…
“That’s enough,” Axel suddenly said. “I’ve heard enough.”
I looked up, finding him livid and staring at Marie like he was going to attack her again.
“Do you have anything else to ask?” He gazed down at me. I shook my head. Defeated. I was done. Tired beyond reason.
“Let go, Marie,” I heard myself rasp.
