Page 40 of Fallen Heirs

We’d been able to make progress beyond the skills aspect too with Orpheus away so much atExemplarwith my father, learning the ins and outs of all of that.

It had enabled us to move beyond the warded grounds and out into the world, to actually set out on achieving our overarching goal.

It had taken time and a lot of patience, something Alena was struggling with, but we’d managed to pick up on Constantine’s scent.

It hadn’t been fresh and it had petered out, then disappeared entirely, meaning he’d teleported out, bringing the trail to an abrupt end.

Wherehewas concerned.

But not where those whom he’d met with were concerned.

We’d explored the surrounding area and found traces of his scent a few miles beyond where we’d lost the trail. Traces around those he’d been in close proximity to.

And now, here we were right on the edge of Forrester Wolf Pack lands.

The pack had been razed, ravaged, and utterly decimated by Constantine’s acolytes during the recent war when he’d been launching all those attacks across the supernatural world.Exemplarhadn’t managed to save it. As had been the case with a lot of things lately, they’d been too late.

And it bothered me immensely that my father was still at the helm when he, himself, was anything but slow. He was so efficient with everything he did. But the weight of all the rules and systems associated with the organization dragged him down. And now he was the face ofExemplarall on his own with Abigail gone. He was the one who people saw when they levied blame upon them. He deserved better than that.

I guess Orpheus was that to him, something better, something that could change the tide.

But the fucked-up thing was that Orpheus didn’t fit withExemplar.His personality alone and then the choices he’d made over the years, the actions he’d taken. So I didn’t get why he was doing it, especially when our brief talk about it in the kitchen the other day had brought to light that he wasn’t really happy about doing it.

He had to be up to something.

Or maybe it was about him being shaken after everything that had happened and now finding security and comfort in toeing the line, somethingExemplarwas all about.

Who knew? It was hard to get to the heart of things with Orpheus Hart. Especially when he wasn’t ready to reveal the truth of what was going on. He could bullshit with the best of them and dance around things in a very effective way. The best approach in a bid to seek out the truth with him was to take a roundabout route, to come at it from an indirect path or angle and try to hit close to the truth that way. Yeah, it definitely wasn’t ideal. Although, it had worked a couple of times in the past.

“I can’t feel anything,” Alena whispered to me as we breached Forrester Wolf Pack territory, coming at it from the dirt road off the forest.

Before I could get a word out, she went on, “I can’t scent anyone either. It’s just Constantine’s scent lingering. Either it’s the spell running out of juice after us being at this for a couple of hours straight tonight, or—”

“Or, they’re cloaked.”

“Or there’s actually no one here at all and Constantine was out scouting the location itself for some nefarious purpose.”

“Also a possibility,” I agreed.

“Well, there’s only one way to find out.”

She started forward, but I snagged her wrist, holding her back.

Her gaze shot to mine. “What is it, sweet thing? Did you sense something?”

“No. It’s… we agreed just to do recon.”

“And we haven’t yet. We know Constantine was here, but not his purpose for coming here. We need to look around, figure it out. He should have recovered from what my mom did to him by now, so it begs the question as to why he’s still lying low,still off the grid. He wouldn’t just give up on his megalomaniac goals because of adversity.” She grimaced. “Especially now that my mom is gone, which means the biggest threat to him is now out of the way. He must be planning something, or preparing for something, to strike again. We need to discover what that is before he can make another devastating move.”

Damnation.“All right. But we proceed carefully.”

“We will. I don’t want you to get hurt.”

She didn’t wantmeto get hurt? There was no same concern for herself, though. And that worried me greatly. She was showing signs of tunnel vision, her determination to track Constantine and disrupt his plans taking her over so much so that she didn’t care about the fallout—at least when it came to herself. At least there was an exception there. Us. Her love for us was likely the only thing preventing her from completely forgoing the stealth and safe approach here.

“Alena—”

She pulled her wrist from my hold. “Come on,” she said, walking ahead.

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