Page 19 of Alpha's Fate

I looked over to where Weston was dozing against a nearby tree and smiled softly. He never acknowledged his own progress and accomplishments. I loved his humility. It was one of the best parts about him. There was none of the cocky, entitled attitude of a lot of the people I met, and it was refreshing to be in his soothing presence.

There was no way he would ever understand how I loved him, his personality and his heart. His physical appearance was the first attraction, but the love came slower and only with exposure to who he was. Everything about him made me love him more. His kindness and willingness to sacrifice, his determination andgrit to move forward in the face of adversity, his moral fortitude and strict adherence to his code of honor.

To watch him grow into himself was to watch as he transformed into a man of action, confident in his decisions whereas when I’d first known him he had been so unsure of himself and his decisions. I understood. He’d been thrust into the position of Alpha far before he felt he was ready. Everything we did was like on-the-job training for him, but he continually found himself working hard and improving every step of the way.

I’d had the benefit of being my father’s daughter. I was born into privilege and wealth, trained from the moment I was born to be an Alpha. My childhood had been carefree and light when I wasn’t studying and learning from my father. Weston’s mother hadn’t finished his growth by the time he was forced to take over.

I moved to pull him into the tent, him humming in protest, and stripped us to crawl onto the bedroll and sleep, finally. The night passed restfully, and I was grateful for that. The night before had been awful, but I’d never tell him that. I knew he was in pain.

The next morning, I took the artifact out of the box and set the smooth wood back into my backpack. I breathed in deeply as we approached the encampment, and as we approached there was a difference in the wolves. They parted for us as we moved deeper into their territory. I wasn’t sure exactly how to use the artifact yet, but running on instinct I made my way back to the cemetery.

Something there with the oldest of the pack must have caught my attention when we’d visited there before because I went straight to the obelisk at the back of the graveyard and searched it. It wasn’t as simple as placing the stone into a slot- of course not. That would make it far easier than it was.

Eventually Weston silently ran his fingers over a smooth panel in the stone, a place where it looked like writing should be. I looked up at him and he smiled slightly.

“Maybe they go here?” he asked softly. It was a good idea.

“Maybe,” I agreed. I looked from the cube to the blank space on the obelisk and hummed softly. It wasn’t like we had a stone chisel or anything, so I just stood, thinking. “Maybe I can pull them off.”

“Worth a try,” Weston agreed, and I could feel eyes on my back. I knew the Pack was watching me and I knew that they were waiting, desperation in their hearts.

I carefully turned the artifact in my hands and found where we believed the start of the text was. I gently plucked at the line of symbols, feeling them lift with me, pulling toward the cool stone of the pillar before me. I continued, rotating it to pull offline after line, filling in the blank spaces with the wandering runes where we believed them to go.

It took the better part of an hour to get the script right, a few lines going haywire as I made mistakes. After some time, I found it to be complete and I looked up at Weston, a cold spike of fear pierced my heart just before I turned back and placed the final rune into its spot.

There was a buzz of electricity and our hair raised as if we were about to be struck by lightning. I stepped back quickly, pulling my mate with me as I went. Something was going to happen, and I wrapped both my arms around one of his. The writing pulsed a sky blue once, twice, and then a strike of pure white lightning cracked down from the deep gray clouds above, the obelisk exploding outward a few inches, the stone held in stasis in the air for just a brief moment before it all clattered to the ground. A pulse of force radiated outward from it and there was a crashing like thunder.

My hands instinctively flew to my ears to block out the echoing sound of rumbling that followed after it. It rolled past us and I could physically feel it crash over me, nearly pushing me prone. I kept my balance, though, one leg going back to stabilize me so the force didn’t topple me. Once it was over, I removed my hands and breathed in what was no longer oppressive air. The faint, foul scent that had been on the wind, the chanting, the darkened skies were all gone. It was as though dawn broke over the pack and we could finally breathe.

I turned to look behind me, Weston mimicking my movements. I saw as the shadows melted off the forms in front of us, all of the wolves revealed in waves of lush fur, bright eyes, and one lone standing woman, nude in all her glory. The Alpha. She burst into tears, looking down at her hands for the first time in who knows how long? I caught her as she nearly collapsed, holding her in my arms protectively as she sobbed on my shoulder.

It felt like just the briefest moment, that human connection lost as she pulled away from me to inspect her body slowly. She ran her fingers over her skin, the hair on her arms standing as they felt touch for the first time in years. I turned back to the listless, motionless wolves. My eyes sought out the woman Weston connected with and he was already there by her side. She shifted slowly, unused to the feeling before she lifted her now human head to meet his eyes.

Weston helped her into a sitting position carefully and as the rest began to struggle to their feet, some shifting and some not, we went about helping each of them up. It was as though they could barely stand, unused to it after centuries of inactivity. I made my way back to Weston and sat next to his wolf. She raised her hand to take mine and looked up at me with hollow eyes. I could see the trauma there and knew nothing could ever bringback what she wanted, but maybe we could provide her with hope.

“You’re alive,” I whispered softly. “You’re alive.”

“For the first time in centuries. She’s long gone,” she murmured. “But that I should live for her is my most precious task, isn’t it?”

“It is,” Weston smiled softly. I stood and turned to look at the rest of the Pack as they shifted and stood, breathing deeply, and stretching, moving around, touching things. Life breathed back into them. My heart ached in two places. There was a moment of bittersweet pain as I looked around, torn between the mourning of the loss of the forest and the aching joy I felt when looking at these people in the face. It was an intense moment of emotion and I returned to my mate, wrapping my arms around him.

“We’re,” one of them started, voice wavering. “We have skin again. I can feel the blood moving through me as my heart beats in my chest. I can feel the ground beneath me and the air around me,” he was in awe, looking at us like we were gods. Like we had descended from the heavens to save their souls.

Chapter twenty

Weston

After the pillar Cora had spent so much time on crumbling and the roaring wave of sound had stopped echoing there was a moment of eerie silence. It was as though the forest died, I thought. As though it faded into black and white and nothing strange was left. I felt my heart slow down and a feeling of deep loss overtaking me as I took in the mundane greens and browns of the forest around us. Everything was normal.

The twisting shadows were gone, and the faint shine of the foliage was gone. The shuffling in the leaves had ceased. There was no more whispered melody on the breeze, just the quiet sound of it weaving its way through the trees. There were no creatures around us, nothing glowing or mossy passing through the distant trees. There was only silence until the forest returned to ordinary life.

There were birds chirping in the trees, the flutter of wings beating in the air above us. The leaves blew past us in the breeze, rustling around our feet through no magical means. Just the wind. Nothing felt the same. The majesty of the wood just the normal fascination of being in nature. I couldn’t help but think of our trek back and how much easier it would be to leave this place than to enter it. We could just walk out and leave. The forest wouldn’t guide us, but we knew where we were going now. We’d be able to just go home.

I felt that deep melancholy that had settled in my chest well up inside me again. The stillness and quiet of the wood bothered me deeply, but looking around I knew that it was just the weight of our decision that hung over my heart. This was our fault. This normal forest turning to fall was our own decision in action. It was a difficult realization to confront. I turned to Cora who seemed to be recovering from the booming echo that faded into the trees. I wanted so desperately to go home.

There we could mourn in peace, dulling the pain with our mundane tasks. We could bury ourselves in the work we would need to catch up on. Paperwork, missives, proclamations. Training regimens and building our new home. Tending the garden with my people to beautify the land and gather fresh fruits and vegetables. I felt that longing to return now that the task at hand was over, but we still had work to do. There was still help we could offer here. As I crouched by the woman I’dconnected with I took a deep breath and smiled, offering her my hand.

Cora and I spoke to her, then to more, then to the Alpha. Now we could see her. She could actually sign our contract. I took a few deep breaths and began to move. We carefully tended to those who needed tending to and helped people up. Luckily there were no wounds to tend to, something I had been concerned about. I didn’t know how their physical bodies would come out. I’d been very concerned that they would come out wounded or fade into dust, the oldest long dead. My heart pounded in my chest, gladness rising in me that they were all whole and uninjured. They were young and old, men and women, people of all races and colors. It was such a sight to see and experience with all of these strangers.

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