Page 168 of Her Psycho Beasts

“He made his choice,” Aurelia repeats quietly.

Savage cries then, his shoulders shaking as he clings onto our regina’s legs. She puts her arms around him and kisses him softly on the forehead, letting him shed his grief.

Eventually, I find myself sitting on her other side, rubbing Savage’s back and eventually handing him tissues. The entire time, I watch my regina, monitor her breathing, her heart, the way her power moves in waves around her.

It’s then that I realise it, perhaps with a bit of relief: although her outward demeanour gives nothing away, she isfurious.So furious that the rest of her body has shut down its expression to give way to it. It pulses in the field closely around her skin and I know what Scythe would say if he were here.

“Watch her.”

Chapter 90

Savage

“The call was too strong,” Marduk says. “A great beast.” He shakes his head. “A great beast.”

“Don’t speak about him like he’s dead!” I cry. “Don’t do that, Marduk!”

“Apologies,” Marduk says, placing a hand over his heart. “I only wish I had known that the last time he spoke to me, he was saying goodbye.”

I frown between my hands where my plate of steak lies untouched. Aurelia draped a blanket around me and put the plate in my hands, saying that she would be back after visiting the animas for dress try-ons, no boys were allowed. “I don’t remember what he said to me now,” I say to Marduk and Yeti. “Why can’t I fucking remember?”

Maybe it was important? But as much as I try to make my mind search for the memory, the words, I come back with nothing.

“Let’s run.” I set my plate aside and shift. My joints feel irritated, like acid burns between my bones. Ineedto move to get it out. Yeti and Marduk shift and together, we head for the jungle gym.

When we get back, Yeti and Marduk return to Minnie, and I enter our suite, ready to take a shower. I hear the low drone of voices in the living room. Lyle and Aurelia must be having private time in there. As I pass by, the door opens and out stalks Xander, his eyes flashing black, then white.

“What are you doing?” I ask. “Where is Aurelia?”

“In there.” He jerks his thumb over his shoulder, and I change direction to see her.

She’s sitting on the couch, in the dark, chewing on a fingernail. When she sees me standing in the doorway, her eyebrows knit together and she sniffs.

The backs of my eyes burn, and though I’m streaked with sweat and dirt, I stride over to her and pick her up off the couch. “Have a shower with me, regina,” I say, kissing her on the cheek.

I’m worried about her. Whatever is going on in her head, it can’t be good. But the things going on inmyhead aren’t good either. I must take care of her. Scythe would want that, and he would definitely be cross with me if I didn’t do a good job. So I take my regina into the bathroom and wash her tears away together with my own.

Chapter 91

Aurelia

The next week passes in a blur, and it’s punctuated with something toxic every time I see Beak’s face. Rage boils up within me, making the classroom floor shake. The worst part is, no one understands why I’m so upset, and I can’t tell anyone out of my pack except Minnie. Xander and Savage glance my way far too often, as if I’ve got grenades strapped around my chest, ready to go off.

There’s truth in that.

So much truth that it hurts.

Each day is mechanical and a repeat of the last. I eat when my mates tell me to; I shower when they take me there; I sit in class and pretend to listen and I turn my head whenever someone calls my name. Savage makes Xander take him back to the sea every evening. Each dawn when he returns, empty handed and smelling of salt, he crawls into bed and holds me tight. I kiss his shoulder and bring him food and I can tell that he eats only because I order him to.

Minnie sometimes clutches my hand under the classroom table, and I catch Yeti hugging Savage one afternoon. Raquel knows something is not right, as every wolf suspects, but my favourite anim has the grace to keep quiet about it.

I feel dead on the inside. Like one of Ghoul’s shadows has opened up within me and gobbled everything good. Only darkness and stillness remain. I know Savage thinks he might return still. I know he has his ear poised for that cold rasp in our group chat.

I know it won’t come. So do Lyle and Xander.

Scythe doesn’t do anything by halves. He made his choice and will stick by it unless something exceptional forces him to change his plans. It’s not in his nature to look back. The plane tickets lie on the dining room table like omens of doom and one night when we’re having dinner at the dorm, I pick them up, tear them all into little pieces and toss them in the bin.

And that was the end of that discussion.

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