Page 101 of Alpha Exile

We give thanks to the dead who bore us,

Raised us and kept us, taught us and protected us.

May they watch over us in this life and to the next.

* * *

The evening stretches long as I drive down the winding road towards the Elder Tombs, which rest on the other side of town, far from my father's old house built new, at the foot of the Mating Ceremony.

New life and old life, that's what he used to say. The dead watch over us as we come together in praise for them.

A small metal box sits on the passenger seat of my car. The guys offered to come with me—Lance eyed my belly more than once—but I wanted to do this alone. I appreciate all the love they have for me, but this is something for me, and for my babes resting sweetly within.

Well, mostly sweetly. Sometimes I swear they're doing jiu jitsu in there.

I pull into the small lot near the tombs, which are marked only by an aboveground mausoleum entrance. Torches burn on either side of the Roman columns, the flames fed continuously by some of the elders who lived in the nearby retirement village. Our people believe that it's best to confront the death that awaits you after a long life as a warrior, so many of the elderly pack members volunteer to clean the bodies before they're cremated and entombed deep within the underground vault.

Idly, I wonder who took care of my father's body. I don't have to wonder for long. I'm sure it was Niall, burying his grief as he said goodbye to his best friend, wondering what was next for the pack.

Taking the small metal box, I step out of my car and up into the torchlight by the tomb's entrance. The summer has passed and autumn has begun. Around me, the Pacific Northwest wilds sing sweet songs of fallen leaves of burnished gold.

"I hope you weren't expecting anything else," I murmur to the box, which is cold and silent in my hands, holding secrets I only discovered after going through my father's basement one last time. "There's probably another place where you were meant to be interred, but Kerry agreed that this would be best. She gave me time and space to do this, though. I wasn't sure if it was my place."

No answer comes from within the box.

I step forward, pull open the heavy stone door, and gingerly take the stairs down.

It's a long journey, mostly because my belly hides my feet quite thoroughly. I can hear Lance's disapproving voice in my head with each step. So I clutch tightly to the railing in the wall as I descend into the torchlit darkness, sliding my feet forward one at a time.

Somehow I reach the bottom without falling on my ass even once. Finn would be disappointed.

The tombs are gargantuan, marble statues of wolves and warriors standing sentry over hundreds of niches where the dead now rest. Plaques mark names and notable life moments.

Warrior. Beloved mother. Sister. Extraordinary Hunter. The Pack's Favorite Fool.

I walk down the long hallway, through an archway that leads to the very last chamber in the rear of the tombs. This is where the alphas are interred, their niches large and the plaques long with achievements. Many in the room are still blank, their uncarved faces waiting for the next line of alphas to die and find peaceful rest.

Walking to the end of the carved rows, I find the most recently placed plaque. It's a bright, burnished color, not faded with time like so many of the others. Placing my hand over the surface, I let my fingers dip into the shallow letters.

WILLIAM GLASS

THE ALPHA WHO FOUGHT THE IMPOSSIBLE

FATHER AND MATE TAKEN TOO SOON

"I wish you'd told me more," I murmur to my father's name, "though I understand better now why you didn't. You were fumbling around in the darkness, trying to find your way through. At least when you exiled me, you knew that I was safe. But we could've fought Delphine together—we could've had a chance."

My father's letters echo in my head in his voice, one line in particular jumping out."Our enemy is immortal, my darling girl, and I have no idea how to defeat her. I cannot lose you. Not in this fight, which is unwinnable. So I have to say goodbye."

He never folded that one up; there were no creases on the paper. It wasn't one he considered sending, because it contained all the secrets he dared not tell me, afraid that I would find my way home and he'd have to watch me die fighting.

I don't think he expected to pass away without at least finding a way to destroy her. No doubt he would've left it for me with the rest of his will, which was made years ago and remained unchanged. His endless scrawled notes of research have come to new light now that I know all he was aware of.

Curling my fingers under the lip of the plaque, I tug the door open, finding the delicately carved drawer inside. Pulling it out, I stare down at the single urn inside.

It shouldn't surprise me that he's in here alone, yet it does. Laura Glass was interred elsewhere, in the pack she came from. I remember the drive we made for the funeral, how little I understood as a child, the significance lost on me.

Opening up the latch on the metal box in my hands, I lift out the bag full of white ashes and set it gently into the drawer.

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