4. Dirge

FOUR

Dirge

I barreled into the silver-lined cell door, ignoring the burn and my own need to cower from the poisonous substance as I flung my entire body into the effort yet again. My mate needed me. She was wounded, grievously, and I was locked away inside this cell like an enemy of the pack.

How long had we been apart? I couldn't say, since I'd been sedated, and the cold lights overhead were sterile LEDs. A fact I knew with my human half, now come back to the fore. A small part of me thought I should shift back. They'd surely let me out then.

But I wouldn't. Couldn't .

So I launched myself at the door again, setting it rattling on its hinges. The smell of singed fur had burned my nose in the beginning, but now I was so used to it that my nose had gone numb.

The blood, though, from the pads of my paws where they came in contact with the silver still smelled somehow cloying. Probably because it wasn't constant. My fur insulated me more, and scratching at the door had yielded nothing, so I wasn't doing it as often .

I paced an anxious circle around the Goddess-damned cell, snarling low in my throat as I went.

Every few hours, the man's voice came over a speaker inside the cell—not just any man, I corrected myself. My brother.

Reed.

It was the same message every time.

"Dirge? I know you're in there. Please shift back so we can let you out. Don't do this to yourself."

Some part of me hurt to hear the pain in his words, over and over. His voice was wrung out with exhaustion, but that was a lower priority than her.

She was my everything. My light, my other half.

Even if I couldn't dare let the man out, I could still protect her, live at her side in wolf form. It was a half life, less than was meant to be. But it was all I was allowed by fate.

The thought sent rage boiling over inside me once again, so I flung myself at the door one more time. Sharp claws of pain lanced through my shoulder on impact. I bounced back, not landing on my feet this time, but rolling instead to my other side.

I shook myself, then climbed tiredly back to my feet. I ignored the crackle of the impending message, since I already knew what he would say. But it wasn't Reed's voice that froze me in my tracks.

"Dirge?" My mate's voice cracked on the simple word, pain, fear, and exhaustion warring for top spot among her emotions. I could sense each one, even with the wall between us. "Please, don't keep hurting yourself. I'm trying to get you out, but they say it's against Blackwater Pack law to release you in wolf form. The high alpha has forbidden it." Anger leaked into her tone at the last, and the speaker crackled again as her voice cut off.

I threw back my head and howled, sorry at even this small new separation spearing me. I needed her, needed to be at her side .

If I couldn't shift back, was there anything else I could do to be released? If they kept me locked in this tiny, silver-lined room permanently, I'd lose what little grip I had left on the man.

The thought knocked me back on my haunches with a whine. No matter how long or how far I wandered, I hadn't truly lost him, like most feral wolves. I was protecting him from his awful fate, keeping him locked away. And he knew it, so he lay quiet inside.

Shifting back wasn't an option, but losing the man to insanity would hurt almost as much as losing my mate. So what could I do?

I whined again, frustration and fear pushing me to move, to act, to keep trying to escape. But that hadn't worked, and now I knew my precious mate was watching.

How could I get them to see I just wanted to protect her? That I needed to be by her side, even if I couldn't shift?

When it struck me, the simplicity of the solution was undeniable. The only question was whether they'd understand and let me out, or leave me to rot in this cage for the rest of my life.