Page 62 of From Frost to Flame

Lex

“Home?” Lex repeatedas he watched the town in front of him swirl again. “The lost Herculean Clan?”

No wonder he never talks about this terrible place aside from them being wiped out.

The storm of colors settled. Now they were on a hill, looking down at the village square full of people under the night sky. More in tune with their bond, Lex could faintly feel Silas's heart racing next to his own. “Hey, it’s going to be okay. I’m with you.”

Silas pulled away as if his touch burned. For the first time, he watched his warrior king slip into an insecure child. He didn’t look like himself. His body was crumpling and shrinking before Lex’s very eyes.

“I won’t touch you,” he said, pulling his hand away. “That’s fine. Can we stand by each other?” Lex asked, trying not to upset Silas too badly in this fragile state.

“You may not want to do that,” Silas said, avoiding his eyes.

“Why wouldn’t I?”

Shouts came from the square before he got his answer. He turned and watched the citizens of Hercules chanting about cleansing the village. The crowd parted as two werewolves joined them. One was a woman with sun-kissed skin and stark white hair that glowed like starlight. On her right was Silas's father again. In his arms was a thrashing little Silas.

“Let me go! Mom, tell him to let me go!”

She did nothing. She stared straight ahead, ignoring him as they walked through the crowd. Silas's father handed him over to a group of men.

“Mom? Mom!” He began to cry and scream in an anguished little voice as men wrapped him in heavy chains.

Lex wanted to burn them all to ashes.

Then, they lit their torches. A horrified gasp escaped him as he realized little sobbing Silas was sitting in the middle of brittle kindling. “No,” he said, as if his words could make it all stop.

His own mother was the first to bring the orange torch to the branches. The rest of the clan followed suit.

“We have to make it stop. We need to do something.”

“You can’t,” Silas said distantly. “It already happened. There’s nothing to be done.”

Lex knew he was right, but he still rushed down the hill toward the crowd. “It’s not real, right? Maybe if we interrupt it, it’ll stop. You don’t need to see this again.”

“Lex, wait!”

“Stop it! Stop it! Stop it!” Little Silas cried, but his voice began to change. It sounded off, like it came from underwater and echoed off invisible walls. Static filled the air. His pupils filled his eyes, turning them pitch-black. Inky tears flowed down his cheeks in thin charcoal rivers. “Mom!” His desperate pleas rattled the windows of all the homes in the village. Six thin black tentacles sprang from his back and snaked through the chains. They twisted and thrashed wildly as the flames grew higher.

Lex froze in his tracks, too stunned to wrap his mind around what he was witnessing.

A gale-force wind cut through the village streets until it crashed into the pyre, snuffing out the orange fire in an instant. Thick smoke and crackling embers shot upwards. The cloud curled and twisted unnaturally into a spiraling circle until The Ravenous One emerged from the black above them all. Her dress was made of rolling smoke and her hair moved as if she were lying in a pool.She landed on the pyre, and a thin layer of frost spread over the kindling and the chains wrapped around Silas.

Terrified screams and chaos erupted in the streets as everyone fled for their lives. To Lex’s shock, The Ravenous One didn’t acknowledge the stampeding crowd at all.

She was looking down at Silas wailing in fear.

With a delicate finger, she tapped the chains. A loud clang rang out as they burst. Little Silas scrambled away from her, but she scooped him up and cradled him in her arms. She had stretched her body so she loomed taller than the homes. Even though Silas was about seven, he looked like an infant in her arms.

Lex stared, mouth agape, as he watched The Ravenous One rock Silas in her arms with eyes full of concern.

“My little wolf, don’t cry.” She wiped his black tears with a fingertip.

Lex’s mind spun as he stared up at them.

Her sweet voice calmed Silas to sniffles. His eyes turned gray, and his tentacles receded into his body. “That’s right. Everything’s okay now. Let me take care of some things before I get you out of here.”

She turned her attention to the fleeing werewolves.

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