fate of the alpha - episode 3 (11 page)

“You did very well today, Ainsley,” Ophelia murmured.

A lingering warmth spread through Ainsley’s chest. It was a bit like the last time she had pleased Ophelia, but this time there was no tingle of submissive attraction.

“I’m proud of the way you handled yourself,” Ophelia purred, snuggling so close she practically melted into Ainsley’s lap.

The incredible, comforting warmth spread through Ainsley’s whole body. The tall grasses around them fell away, then Erik’s house, then all of Tarker’s Hollow grew distant and unimportant. Only Ophelia’s warm praise, and the midnight pools of her eyes remained.

Ainsley’s submission had never allowed her to gaze unfettered at Ophelia’s eyes before. They were lovely. And Ainsley was so tired. It would feel so good just to rest with her alpha now.

Just for a minute.

A fierce snarl rent the air, knocking Ophelia out of her arms.

As soon as their physical contact broke, Ainsley snapped to full alertness.

A slender, silvery wolf circled Ophelia, hackles raised.

Cressida.

The moonlight lit up her lustrous pelt, making her look almost ghostly.

Ainsley tried to stand, but her legs gave out, and she slumped back into the grass. What had Ophelia done to her?

She lifted her palms to the air and called to her energy. A few blue sparks bounced half-heartedly in her hands.

Desperately, Ainsley tried to make contact with the pack.
Come to me!

But she felt no answering call. In fact, she could barely sense her pack at all.

The crunch of running footsteps approached from the woods at her back.

CHAPTER 17

G
race couldn’t shift, but she was fast.

She tailed Cressida as closely as she could through the trees. Branches whipped her face, but she ran on, doing her best to navigate the gnarled tree roots and loose stones.

She would feel this tomorrow, but tomorrow didn’t matter anymore, now that—

Grace pushed thoughts of Julian from her mind.

She could just see the moonlight on the grass through the last of the trees, when she heard Cressida snarl. She pushed hard and burst out of the woods.

Grace struggled to get her mind around the scene that greeted her.

Cressida circled the naked and battered-looking Ophelia, hackles raised and growling. Ainsley sat in grass nearby, a lost look on her face. She didn’t have any clothes on either.

“What’s going on?” Grace asked, rushing to her friend. “Why is Cressida fighting Ophelia?”

Ainsley opened and closed her mouth several times, but no sound came out. She took a deep breath, closed her eyes and tried again.

“That’s not Ophelia,” she managed.

“
Nad-Loo-Shee!”
Ophelia said, in a voice that sounded like several voices layered over each other, then spat at Cressida.

Even Grace knew that was a mistake. It didn’t matter that Ophelia wasn’t Ophelia, or that she sounded like a Greek chorus. What little she knew of Cressida told her that the she-wolf wouldn’t put up with being spat on.

Cressida lowered her silvery head and charged directly for the thing that was not Ophelia.

Not-Ophelia cringed.

Cressida froze.

Not-Ophelia backed up slowly.

Cressida shifted.

She was so utterly naked that it took a moment for Grace to notice that she also had one eyebrow raised.

Grace would never understand how these wolves could just be naked in front of each other, and apparently everyone else. If she had to shift, she’d definitely invent some kind of inter-species clothing to avoid the sudden nudity.

Though at this point she was beginning to feel over-dressed.

“She’s afraid of me? Cressida asked. “What the hell?”

“Ainsley?” Grace asked.

“Kill her,” Ainsley said immediately.

Grace drew her weapon and advanced on Not Ophelia.

The edges of the creature began to shimmer, then it melted into another shape.

It was Charley Coslaw, right down to the brown corduroys. At least he was dressed.

Julian had told her the moroi could take the form of creatures it fed on, but she hadn’t expected the results to be so uncanny.

“Grace,” he said, hands raised, “you’ve known me all your life. Can’t we find a way to work this out?”

She shot him directly between the eyes.

The bullet simply disappeared.

Charley smiled.

Grace unloaded the gun into him.

He smiled again.

“I expected more from you,” he said, as his edges began to shimmer.

The next moment he was a gigantic grey wolf.

The wolf turned back to Cressida.

Cressida melted into her slender wolf, and lowered herself on splayed paws, ready to dodge.

The larger wolf charged, and Cressida darted away. It charged again. Again, she sailed away.

Grace could see that Cressida was no match for the larger wolf. She might use her agility for some time to escape, but eventually it would wear her down.

They were far from the station, Ainsley was sitting weakly on the ground. By the time back-up arrived they might all be dead.

And Grace had no power to hurt the thing.

She closed her eyes, willing herself to think of something.

Something tugged at her.

At first, it was a tiny, tingling pull at the corner of her mind — similar to the electric sensation she had when Julian touched her.

Then, the buzz spread through her whole body, and quickly receded from all but one spot.

The shard of the key.

She slipped her hand into her pocket and felt the key launch itself into her palm. It crackled with magic.

Good magic.

But could she control it?

It cried out to her to be shaped.

Grace focused on the shard. As it began to warm in her hand, Cressida yelped, and her concentration was broken.

“No,” Grace whispered to herself. “Focus.”

Light, as black as Ophelia’s obsidian eyes, began to pour from the crystalline shape in her palm.

As Grace moved her hand back and forth, the light began to solidify and take shape.

Grace redoubled her efforts, guiding and coaxing the light. In her mind’s eye, she could clearly see what the key wanted to be.

She closed her eyes, willing the shape from her mind to her hand.

When she opened them, she held a curved, obsidian sword.

Grace looked up to a terrible sound as the giant wolf pinned Cressida on her back.

Without a second thought, Grace launched herself at the larger wolf and slashed at its back for all she was worth.

The magical sword winked as its arc cut through the moonlight, then sliced into the evil wolf’s pelt.

The moroi-wolf fell off of Cressida, howling in agony.

Cressida hobbled away, dragging herself closer to Ainsley.

Grace took a deep breath and squared her shoulders. It was up to her now. She would defeat this thing, or join her beloved.

The moroi-wolf snapped at her with impossible speed.

Grace lifted the heavy blade just in time.

Again it howled.

Suddenly, the hollow feeling Grace had been fighting was filled with furious energy, like molten steel. Instead of waiting for the thing to attack again, she went after it with vicious intent, slashing and stabbing.

The wolf backed away. Grace cut again and again, until they reached the edge of the bamboo forest that led down to the creek.

The wolf fell, defeated.

Grace stood over it, sword raised, ready to deliver the killing blow.

Its edges blurred once more, and Grace caught her breath as she recognized the familiar yellow raincoat.

Lilliana.

For one horrible second, Grace hesitated.

“I came to you for help,” Lilliana said in a tremulous voice. “You let them kill me.”

Grace lowered her sword.

Lilliana withered before her into the dried up husk they had found under the field house. The form began to crack. Pieces of Lilliana’s cheeks crumbled away, then the rest of her crumbled too. The debris that had been Lilliana morphed into a thousand tiny red snakes that darted into the bamboo before Grace could react.

Cursing herself inwardly for her weakness, Grace slashed desperately at the bamboo, but the little snakes were gone.

The moment she stopped wielding it, the sword shrank back into the shard of a crystal key.

She placed it carefully in her pocket and walked slowly back to her friends.

Cressida curled around Ainsley’s limp body.

“Is she okay?” Grace asked.

Cressida nodded.

“Just passed out, it looks like.”

“What about you?” Grace asked.

“Banged up, but okay. You?” Cressida asked lightly.

Incredibly weak and stupid.

“I’m fine,” Grace said quickly. “How did you know it wasn’t Ophelia?”

“How did you
not
?” Cressida asked.

“I can’t believe I let it get away,” Grace said softly.

“
I
can’t believe you
shot me
.” Cressida replied.

“It’s not like it was silver,” Grace said. “You got better.”

Indeed, there wasn’t even a scar on Cressida’s shoulder from where Grace had shot through her to kill Garrett.

“What do we do now?” Cressida asked.

“Let’s start by getting her home,” Grace answered.

It had been a long, horrible night. To her credit, Cressida nodded and hopped up.

Each of them slipped an arm around Ainsley and headed toward her house.

CHAPTER 18

A 
insley drifted in and out of fever-dreams.

She dreamed of all things wolf and woman, but twisted, and terrible.

She ran through the bamboo forest on wounded paws.

She baked a cake and frosted it with ashes.

She howled at a blood-red moon.

And all the time she was searching, tracking the pull of her mate. But he was nowhere to be found.

An oven glowed orange, singeing her snout.

A child cried out in anguish.

And Ainsley dreamed on...

A few times the fever released her from its grip to toss her casually in its hand. During those cool moments of flight, she heard snippets of the waking world.

“—no, Grace, she’ll be fine,” Thad Volker said, like they’d been talking a long time already. “She just needs to rest.”

“Did it really kill Ophelia—” MacGregor’s soft voice began.

But Ainsley never heard the rest.

She was already walking barefoot in an endless blueberry patch, plastic pail on a string around her neck, searching for a ripe berry in the wintertime.

“Ainsley,” sang the rich oboe of her mother’s voice.

Ainsley turned quickly.

Her parents stood between two rows of blueberry bushes. They wore fluffy white bathrobes. Mrs. Connor held their old cat, Mr. Purrington, in her arms, stroking him slowly. The air filled with the scent of the gingerbread they used to bake on rainy days.

Ainsley tried not to cry.

“We’re so proud of you Ainsley,” her father smiled, with that twinkle in his eye. Then he quoted Dostoyevsky. “
The soul is healed by being with children
.”

The air went cold and a huge rumble shook the ground.

Ainsley crouched into her fiery wolf, and spun to see the world melt into darkness.

A single light harshly illuminated a man with golden hair.

He looked up and smiled at her, blue eyes flashing in the spotlight.

Julian.

But why was he happy?

“Ainsley Connor,” Ophelia Winter boomed.

Ainsley blinked and the alpha was before her.

“Your pack has failed in its duty,” she scolded. “There is nothing left for the wolves of Tarker’s Hollow. And there is no new blood to give you strength. I cast you out.”

At these words, Ainsley felt herself forcibly shifted back into her human form. She was naked, humiliated, and her soul was shattered.

“Ainsley,” Erik whispered. “Oh, Ainsley.”

She closed her eyes and followed his voice with every fiber of her mind.

No. Please, no.

If Erik had joined the parade of visiting ghosts, it meant he was dead, too.

If Erik was really gone, she would never go back to the cool brightness of the real world. She would rather chase the ghost of him through this purgatory forever.

She sensed his presence nearby. Something had changed about him. Though she knew it was impossible, she swore she could feel his touch.

His fingers slid through her hair, tugging it gently at her temple as he always did. She could feel the tickle of his rough calluses on her skin, and smell the rich spice of him.

“I missed you,” he whispered.

“I missed you too,” she whispered back through tears, not daring to open her eyes.

The world shook and then he was holding her, curled around her, his chest to her back. He felt so warm, so real. As always, his touch sucked away her sadness like a sponge.

She opened her eyes, praying for the vision to continue just a little more.

They were in her parents’ bed. Soft light poured through the sheers, just like a real afternoon, in her real home.

She knew if she rolled over to look at him directly, he would be gone, but she couldn’t help herself.

When she turned, he didn’t vanish. Instead, he gazed directly into her eyes with a smoking intensity. He was her Erik, but not the same Erik. Not exactly. He was taller or stronger, or maybe smarter. Though he had always been all of those things.

She searched his face, desperately trying to memorize him, to learn each tiny wrinkle near his eyes, every hair on his shadowed jaw, before the vision of this moment melted into another.

He lowered his face to hers and she gave up and let him kiss her.

His lips were so warm and soft. She shivered as they brushed hers, so gently, too gently.

Ainsley knew it was only her broken heart, telling her that this was real, but she was so starved for her mate that even a whisper of him was enough. A welcome warmth settled into her as he kissed away her sorrow.

When their lips were raw, he nuzzled her neck. Every nerve ending in her body thrummed with life.