Chapter 25 - Maisie

In the worst moments, I see his back.

I’ve become accustomed to the way it looks. I know every detail of the nape of his neck. I would stare at it as he led me to the car, I recall, after every party and dinner, every gala and gathering of socialites.

In my worst dreams, I see it. He’s always walking away. I distinctly remember the unhappy line of it as he stalked away from me on the lake, the first night we kissed, the first night I thought maybe, just maybe, he might want me like I wanted him. There was something wild and unhappy in him I couldn’t place that night, a woundedness. I saw its presence follow him as he walked away from me.

I watch his back now as he sprints down the street, hurtling toward the explosion on the other side of our small town. Going, going, gone.

Gone again.

I force myself back from the window. Standing at the window won’t bring him back to me. I could scream for him, but he wouldn’t hear me now, not over the din of distant gunfire, the roar of ensuing battle. My breath comes shallow as I move through the space. Suddenly, my clinic feels tiny. The walls are closing in on me, or it feels like they are. The tremor in my hands is small but constant.

The world is so loud outside, but in here, all I can hear is the hum of the old heater in the corner, the dripping of the tap in the back room, and the faint twinkling of the wind chime in my bedroom window upstairs.

I’ve loved this clinic for so long. When I first started working here, it proved to me that I could support myself. It proved to me that there was a place for me, or so it seemed. In here, I had somewhere to be. I had a person to be.

Now, I find myself staring out through the glass onto the street, my heart thudding painfully against my ribs. Two shapes move in the gathering dusk, flying past my sightline. Ado and Keira, sprinting side-by-side toward the smoke, guns strapped across their backs, wearing bulletproof vests and combat clothes. Their hands are joined between them, and they’re so in sync that it isn’t slowing them down even a little. My chest tightens at the sight of them vanishing into the night.

I touch my lips, still warm and tingling from Zane’s kiss. Too much and not enough. Too big and too brief. A promise made, but only half kept.

The enormity of my doubt clashes fiercely against the size and scope of my love. The battle is vicious.

Another explosion rips through the night, this one closer than the first. The ground beneath my feet shakes—the clinic’s windows rattle sharply, a high, tinny sound. I flinch, my heart lurching painfully in my chest as I grip the counter for balance.

That was near. The clinic is right in the center of Rosecreek. And if the explosions are getting closer, that means the enemy could be successfully infiltrating.

We could be losing.

A cold thrill of fear washes over me, a bucket of ice water. I’m supposed to stay in the clinic. It’s my station. I’m supposed to wait for the wounded to be brought to me, to keep myself out of harm’s way for the sake of the baby. That was the deal—I promised Keira I’d listen, and at the time, I meant it.

But every second that passes claws at me like a raw wound. My brash, unrelenting restlessness settles deeper inside me with every echoing boom and crash outside. Each explosion feels like it’s shaking loose something of my certainty.

Go. Run. Help.

My hands shake as I pack and repack my medical go-bag, trying to distract myself. I can’t help but imagine Zane out there, surrounded by chaos and violence, blood staining his clothes, fighting for his life—for our lives—while I sit here, useless.

The look in his eye as he kissed me is a sight I know I’ll never forget. No matter what happens tonight.

I hear another explosion, this time followed by a distant, blood-curdling scream.

My heart seizes, and before I can stop myself, I’m at the window again, peering out into the night. The horizon glows with flickering firelight, the western edge of town swelling with smoke. The pack must be struggling to contain the enemy.

It’s going worse than they anticipated.

My stomach twists. Something inside me bends, then snaps.

It’s no longer up to me. I can’t stay here. Physically, it is impossible; I can’t sit in this dark room, listening to the sounds of my family being torn apart just outside these walls. I’d sooner die.

I look down at my hands—still trembling slightly but strong. These hands have healed countless wounds, patched up broken bodies, and brought people back from the brink of death. They’re capable. I’m capable.

If things keep going south, soon, they’ll be bringing me bodies, not patients. Or they’ll bring me nobody at all. The town will burn, and I’ll burn with it.

“I’m sorry, Baby,” I murmur into the darkness, one hand hovering over my stomach. “We’re going to be okay. I promise.”

I’ll keep us alive.

I grab my medical bag and swing it over my shoulder, my decision made. A high ringing sound screeches in my ears. I run for the door. My hands hover over the knob for a brief moment. There is the distant rumble of another explosion, then a ripple of panic sweeping through me like a cold wind. I could stay. I could be safe.

But safe won’t protect them.

I push the door open and step out into the night.

The first thing that hits me is the smell; smoke, wet earth, and the faint metallic tang of blood hang in the air. The wind is heavy, thick with the stench of the coming storm.

I start running, my feet pounding against the muddy ground of the town I love, each step kicking up a spray of water from the puddles left by the late summer rainstorms.

Rounding a building, I see it.

The west side of town, where the Haverwoods have approached from, is on fire.

Orange flames lick at the night sky. The smoke is thick, black tendrils curling upward as more explosions rumble in the distance, in the deep woods, followed by the clash of gunfire and the guttural roars of wolves in battle.

The sounds send snakes into my stomach. Fear gnaws its teeth into me and roots there.

I know this isn’t where I’m supposed to be. I’m not a warrior like the others. If I play my cards wrong, I’m a liability. But I can help in my own way. I have to.

I sprint west in the opposite direction of Halfmoon Lake, away from downtown and the pack center, away from the clinic. They’ve attacked where we’re most vulnerable, our residential district, but every soul living there has been evacuated, thank God. I can smell burning pine, scorched soil. I move faster, weaving between buildings toward the fight, the distant glow of fire illuminating the smoke-choked air. My heart pounds against my ribs, a mixture of adrenaline and fear coursing through my veins. As I round the corner, the battlefield comes into view.

It’s chaos.

In the ruins of what was once a wooded square, host to a footpath running between pedestrianized streets of family homes, the pack is locked in brutal combat with the enemy. Through the firelight, I can hardly see which side is which. Burning trees teeter toward the ground, crashing down upon the earth, sending sparks and embers swirling toward the dark sky. Wolves slam into each other with terrifying force, grappling, teeth gnashing. The air is filled with snarls and growls, the clash of claws and teeth, and the screams of the injured. Gunfire flashes from around a building fifty feet away. Whose gunfire, I don’t know.

I can barely make out faces in the chaos, but I see flashes of fur and bodies tumbling to the ground. Blood stains the dirt. The scent of it is overpowering, mingling with the acrid smoke.

Then I see him. Zane.

In the heart of the fight, he’s a force of nature, moving with a speed I’ve never seen from him before. He’s transformed. He leaps over a burning log, snarling, body twisting and teeth flashing in the flickering light. Blood sprays from an artery, arcing high into the air, as he takes down an enemy wolf with a primal growl that sends a chill down my spine.

Skidding across the wet ground as shots ring out, he transforms back in a heartbeat, just fast enough to scoop his rifle from the ground and counterfire. His black hair is in his face, blood at the corner of his mouth, skin shining with sweat over the dense network of tattoos on his arms. He’s covered in dirt and sweat, eyes almost alight. He’s magnificent.

But he’s also in danger.

My breath catches as I spot a pack member on the ground nearby, clutching his side as blood pours from a deep gash. I recognize him as one of the younger Rosecreek pack members who volunteered to stay and fight. Instinct takes over, and I rush to his side, dropping to my knees beside him, my field medical bag already open.

“Hold on,” I say, my voice steady despite the chaos around me. “You’re going to be alright.”

My hands move on autopilot, pulling out bandages and pressing them against the wound over his ribs. Blood seeps through my fingers as I work, but I don’t stop, don’t hesitate. I stuff the wound with gauze to stabilize my patient, then begin wrapping his torso tight and fast. It doesn’t have to be clean. It just has to keep him alive.

The man groans in pain, his face pale and slick with sweat, but he’s still breathing. I can save him. I will save him.

Another explosion rocks the ground, closer this time. I flinch, but my hands don’t stop moving. I secure the bandage with a splinted tension knot over his stomach, pressing hard to stem the bleeding.

“You’re going to be fine,” I say, more to myself than him. “I’ve got you. You’re going to be just fine—”

Then I feel it. Time seems to slow to molasses. A rush of air, a shadow looming over me.

I look up just in time to see an enemy wolf barreling toward me, his teeth bared, claws ready to tear me apart. In the firelight, he’s terrifying.

My heart skips a beat, panic rising in my throat—

An instant before he is on top of me, Zane is there.

He slams into the wolf with a feral roar, his body moving like a blur of fur and fury. He takes the wolf down in a single, brutal motion, his claws sinking into flesh, then his teeth. He rolls from the shifter’s still-gasping body and to his feet, transforming in a single fluid motion, then whipping around to face me.

For a moment, everything else fades, and our eyes meet across the battlefield.

His gaze is wild with fear and rage. In his fury, I see every inch of his love for me spread out as if in a tapestry. Through the blood on his face, the split down his upper lip, and the staggering of his steps, he would fight a thousand more to keep me out of harm’s way.

My wolf knows he loves me. She knows it acutely. And so do I.

Time speeds back up, slowly, and then all at once.

“Maisie, get back!” he shouts, his voice rough, commanding. “Get to safety!”

But I won’t. And he knows I won’t.

I shake my head and keep it raised up despite the terror gnawing at my insides. “I’m not leaving! I’m helping whether you like it or not!”

His face twists with frustration. But there’s pride there, too.

He knows me. He knows I won’t back down.

Another explosion shakes the earth beneath us, and as I look up at Zane, I see the realization in his eyes that we’re doing this together.

Smoke billows into the space between us like sand in turbulent water, and then suddenly, he’s fighting again, and I have to set my bloodied hands to work on my next patient.