Page 59 of His Claim
She looked older than me, but not by a lot.
“I’m sorry,” I said softly, surprising even myself. “About your baby. About what they did to you.”
Her jaw tightened. She looked away into the fire. “Wolves are no good,” she muttered. “That’s all there is to it.”
The silence stretched, thick. Then Varek leaned forward, his gaze steady on her. “Tell me more about the Watch.”
Elsie glanced at him. She studied him like she was deciding how much he deserved to know. Finally, she huffed out a short laugh.
“The Watch isn’t just a ragtag band of rebels hiding in the mountains. They’re everywhere. A worldwide network of humans who never forgot what we lost when the Collapse came. They share information, weapons, whatever they can… usually. Their goal? To take back our standing in the world. To stop bowing and bleeding forwolves.”
Her voice hardened. “Some of them are just kids with knives. Some are ex-soldiers. And some… some are radicals who’ll burn everything down if it means no wolf draws breath again.” Her eyes flicked to Varek, narrowing. “But every one of them hates your kind. They don’t make exceptions.”
Varek didn’t flinch. “Then they’ll have to learn. We are not all bad, not all like the Council.”
Elsie snorted. “Good luck with that.”
She poked at the fire with the barrel of her rifle, sending sparks spiraling upward into the damp air. Her face was all hard lines again, but her eyes stayed on me and Varek like she was measuring just how much of the truth we could handle.
“Tell me more about them,” Varek pressed.
“You want details?” she asked, her tone almost mocking. “Fine. But it’s a little hard to define. The Watch is always changing, adapting.”
Varek leaned forward, his elbows resting on his knees. “Go on.”
“There are branches of the Watch in every region I’ve ever heard about, from old cities to coastal ports, even in the frozen wastes up north. Each one does what they can: smuggling, sabotage, assassinations when the wolves aren’t watching too closely.” She smirked faintly. “Sometimes we even share information. But not always. Trust is a rare commodity to come by.”
I swallowed hard. “And the rage serum? Was it only here?”
Her smirk slipped. She looked at me like she wanted to lie but didn’t bother.
“No. This wasn’t the only place.” She tapped her temple. “I’ve heard whispers, other branches trying their own recipes. Different strains. Some failed outright. Others created… abominations. Not Nyktos exactly, but close enough. Things that didn’t know if they were human or wolf or monster. Vicious things that didn’t last long.”
The fire popped loudly, making me jump. Elsie didn’t blink.
“Most of those tests ended in death,” she went on. “But there’s always someone in the Watch who thinks the next batch will be the miracle. That one day we’ll find the formula that turns humans into weapons strong enough to wipe wolves off the map without destroying themselves in the process.”
“Does the Council know?” I asked.
She barked out a humorless laugh. “Not a chance. If they did, they’d burn every human alive. No, the wolves think they’rethe only ones running experiments. That’s why the Watch hides theirs in places the Council doesn’t think to look.” She leaned back again. “So when I say it’s everywhere, I mean it. The Watch is the closest thing we’ve got to a human army.”
My throat went dry, as I considered what a worldwide army of desperate humans—some of them willing to poison their own just to see wolves burn—would be capable of.
It was a terrifying thought.
I leaned forward, shifting the firelight’s focus back to her. “What about you?”
Elsie’s piercing gray eyes snapped to mine, suspicious. “What about me?”
“You said the Watch found you,” I pressed gently. “But what was it really like? For you.”
For the first time, she didn’t smirk. She looked down at the rifle across her lap, fingers tracing the metal. The firelight caught the scar on her jaw, and in that moment, she looked more tired than fierce.
“They saved me,” she admitted after a long pause. “At least, that’s what I told myself. I was half-starved when they picked me up, bruised and broken from the last time the wolves put their hands on me. I’d been thrown out with nothing, damaged and used, with nowhere to go.” Her mouth twisted. “The Watch gave me food. A weapon. A reason to live. At first, that was enough.”
Her voice went quieter. “But they’re not saints. They used me too. Pushed me into missions, told me my anger was useful.” She shrugged, gaze flicking back to me. “When you’ve lost everything, purpose feels like a gift, even if it cuts you bloody.”
My chest tightened. I wanted to reach for her, but I wasn’t sure she’d let me. “You didn’t deserve what they did to you. Any of it.”
