Page 166 of Her Psycho Beasts

Awaken that part, Aurelia. It’s time.

We must mourn the fallen, but we must be careful not to fall with them.

Perhaps in the next life.

Forever yours,

Scythe

The letter flutters to the floor from my hand as a crucial part of me quivers.

Scythe believes his fate is death. He believes he was doomed right from the very beginning. That we can never be together.

One part of me, the part that fell into his mind and saw the result of his psychosis, whispers,I understand. Of course, I understand.

But another part of me, the part that burned my father’s house down and set light to my mother’s funeral pyre, simply roars with fury and betrayal.

Outside, a wolf howls. I would know Savage’s voice from a mile away. I would know his pain from across countries, across worlds. His anguish is mirrored in the howls of the other wolves in the academy as they hear him, open their windows, and mirror their leader’s pain.

My feet do not feel like my own as I rise and walk out of the bedroom, the two sides of me warring, and I, unable to choose which voice to follow, simply become a ghost. A person in-between. A person who does not exist.

“Savage found these left for him,” Lyle says.

His voice draws me to the dining table, where a silver lighter in the shape of a shark and a matching silver cigarette case comes into view.

“I got this,” Lyle continues. He holds an envelope. Bigger and heavier than mine. Unopened.

“Open it.” My voice is faint. Barely there.

My lion obeys and I do not watch, my eyes staring blankly into space.

“There are plane tickets here,” Lyle says with surprise, holding out a number of tickets in a fan. “For all of us. To Singapore. They leave before dawn. There’s even some for Minnie and her pack…and Beak.”

He’d intended for us to leave, too.

“Beak lost his regina. The most powerful eagle in the school. He’d be a good candidate for you.”

He’d planned this all out. Probably for ages.

“Where is Xander?” I ask.

“Smoking outside. I think he suspected, but he didn’t know it would be tonight. None of us did.” Lyle’s voice is exasperated, and he runs a hand through his mane, then pulls me in towards him.

I push away.

“We do not react,” I say faintly. “We respond.”

“What?”

“We do not react. We respond.”

The cacophony of howls outside fades away as I feel Savage’s wild, frantic presence barrel back inside towards me.

“We have to go get him!” Savage says, his eyes darting around in panic. He storms up to Lyle and grabs his arms. “We’ve got to go now, before he gets too far out and I can’t reach him.”

My lion takes Savage’s face between his palms. “He’s gone, Sav. He wants us to leave too.” He holds up the tickets.

Savage slams the flat of his palm into them, and paper goes flying everywhere. “Fuck that, Lyle! No one is leaving.Noone!” Savage comes up to me then, taking my shoulders and shaking them. “Let’s go get him, regina.”

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