Page 17 of Moon Cursed

“So tell me your plan, Volana. All of it. And include the part where I kill that bastard.”

“Okay,” I replied, giving in to a request that I swore I’d reject when the time came. “But first, tell me about the shadow. Who are they? What do they look like?”

“I never found out his name or where he was from,” Nyx confirmed, deflating my hopes. “I also don’t know what happened to him after that day. All I can say is he’s tall—about six feet. He has dark skin and short, coarse hair that was already turning gray even though he looked like he was in his forties. He had a small scar on his left nostril and the upper corner of his lip. Almost like someone slashed at his face and nicked his nose and lip on the way down.” Nyx swiped his face, miming it. “But that’s it. Everything else about him was as common as it gets. Brown eyes, average looks, not particularly fit.”

“But you’d recognize him if you saw him again,” I pushed.

“Absolutely.”

I fell back on the pillows, gazing up at the vaulted ceilings. “But what are the odds of that? Long before we were chosen, I met and fell in love with Castor. Castor meets Edric who’s trying to save his sister from the council, because said sister discovers the council is rotten and untrustworthy long before the council has a chance to prove it to him the hard way.

“The three of us end up looking for the shadow, but you’ve already seen, faced, and survived him,” I said. “It does feel like fate was pulling us together long before we met on that rock. Maybe if we had come together sooner, Castor... Castor would still...” I trailed off, letting the wish fade away. It didn’t make sense to dwell in dreams and alternative realities.

Yes, Castor died looking for someone that Nyx identified twelve years ago, but there was nothing to do about that now. All I could do was take up Castor’s mission and kill that bastard... before I killed everyone else.

“Makes you wonder about Paxton, Orion, and Badr,” Nyx said, “and how they’re connected to all of this.”

“No it doesn’t. All I’m wondering is what happens now. Between us.”

He scoffed. “I thought that was obvious. What happens now is we call a truce, and go from enemies in this war to allies.” Nyx held out his hand. “Agreed?”

I hesitated, but only for a moment. “Agreed.”

I shook, and then I told him.

***

“WOW. THAT’S JUST... wow.”

“You’ve been saying that for the last ten minutes,” I sliced in, following the curve of the hallway around the corner. “Do you want to try another word?”

“Wow.”

Apparently not.

I kept up my end of the bargain and told Nyx my plan for the end of Wolf Nation as we knew it. As a result, he’d been broken for the last ten minutes.

I gave up on him two minutes in, got up, got dressed, and left the infirmary. He trailed after me, keeping up his impressive impression of a broken record.

“Nyx—”

“Volana!”

I jerked, nearly crashing into a wall. The mental shout blew the last traces of calm from my system.

“Volana, are you okay? What happened? Where are you!”

“What happened is your buddy Badr buried me alive. Do you still want to choose your little brotherhood over me? What does your wolf say about trying to kill your—”

Growls roared down the bond, bringing such menace with them it chilled my soul. “He’s dead!”

Edric retreated, his fury gone from my mind as quickly as it came. If Badr was still somewhere on the grounds after trying to kill the headmistress, he’d be found.

“My goodness, Volana,” Nyx breathed. “Wow.”

“Alright, stop saying wow,” I snapped. “I know it’s code for ‘you’ve lost your mind’ and I’m getting really tired of people calling me crazy. It’snotcrazy to kill a bunch of genocidal psychopaths that are hunting down your baby, so I’ll tell you right now, anychangesto the plan are not welcome and will not be considered!”

“Whoa, hey.”

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