Chapter 12 - Devon

They were deep in Rosewood territory now. It was just a small group, Devon, Jonah, Caleb, and Emma. Beth had begged to come out with them, but he'd refused, knowing how she'd feel about the trespass, but it'd killed him to watch the resentment flare in her eyes after working so hard to stifle that particular fire.

His paws hit the ground, and he was driven onward without conscious thought and without having to choose where to go. He just knew. The place was so familiar to him that the idea of it being a trespass was almost laughable.

They slowed as they neared it. A single, nondescript rock at the base of a tree, nestled in green, springy moss. Emma walked up to it, head low, a keening whine coming from her that put Devon's fur up. He sniffed the air, scenting for recent Rosewoods passing through, and found nothing but pine and dirt.

Emma didn't wait for his nod. She shifted, on her knees in her human form with her head bent low before the grave. Her mourning was her own. The others looked away, standing vigil, giving her the rare moment to let down the walls she had built up so high.

Only the four of them knew the significance of this place, knew it was buried beneath that stone.

Devon's brother had been the youngest of the family, twelve years younger than he was and a decade younger than Emma. Sick as he was, human as he was, he had been especially vulnerable when an illness raced through town.

It was Emma's idea to turn him. She believed the wolf form would save his life, but he'd been too weak to handle it and pass the point of saving, with or without the wolf form's strength.

They'd lost him on a cold night as the throes of transformation set in. Their father was nowhere to be found—he'd long ago disowned Jonathan in spirit if not on paper, unable to accept a child that lacked his edge.

Devon paced around the glen. Each time he visited, the memories came back as fresh as if he were there again, holding Jon in his arms. To Emma, she might as well have lost her own child. It was the beginning of the end for her, the death of everything good she saw in life.

And her blame had landed everywhere. On Devon, who had let Jonathan venture into town that week when he caught the illness, on their father for not being there, and on herself for trying to transform him. Now, on the Rosewoods, who had extended their territory onto the place where they had buried him.

Emma moved away from the grave, hiding her tear-strained cheeks behind her hair before she shifted back into wolf form, taking Devon's place at the edge of the glen. Dread filled Devon as he neared the grave.

"Hey, Jon," he said, crouching down in front of the stone, keeping his voice low. He didn't care so much about the others overhearing; it was more about the nature of the place demanding it. Jonathan had never raised his voice. "You're not going to like this latest update. I've got myself a mate. You'd like her, I know that much. She reminds me of you in a way. That part's all good, but you wouldn't like how I got her. Well, I stole her from the Rosewoods."

He paused, imagining Jonathan's disappointed face.

"I know what you're going to say,, ‘Well, give her back,' but I'm afraid it isn't that easy. Anyway, if you were here, I think maybe you'd be able to show her we're worth sticking around for. But then again, if you were here, we wouldn't be in any of this mess. Didn't mean to start something like this, did you?"

And, of course, it was not Jonathan's fault. His death had been a catalyst, a tipping point, but it was not the boy's fault.

A growl broke through Devon's communion. He spun just as Emma barked a warning and found a pair of wolves darting into the glen. One was coming right for him.

Devon shifted and lunged for the wolf. He was enraged, bristling at the intrusion into their private place, their moments of grief. It did not matter that they couldn't know what they had stumbled upon, it only mattered that they had.

Jonah and Caleb had the other wolf cornered, back against a tree, and that was all Devon had time to see before the first wolf was on him, recovering from the crash he'd taken when Devon had hit him. They locked jaws on their hind legs, and they could not break in and find the vulnerable spot at the throat.

Beth's voice came to him like an unwanted alarm, wrenching him out of his state of unthinking violence. A reminder that they were trying to do better. Trying to make peace with the Rosewoods. If he spilled blood here, now, on this sacred place he would never forgive himself.

But before he could pull away, Emma was there. She caught the wolf in her jaws, dragging him backward by his scruff while he screamed and yelped. He tried to spin, but she had him like a mother carrying her pups, her strength superior despite her smaller size.

A mother's rage. That was all Devon could think of, seeing the hatred in her eyes. She would kill him for this unforgivable sin, this desecration of Jonathan's space.

No matter how badly he empathized with her feelings, Devon couldn"t let her. She released him for a second just to realign her jaws, now set over the spine in a way that, with a hard enough bite, would paralyze the wolf.

There wasn't time to talk. Devon shoved Emma aside, and her jaw snapped shut in the empty air. The wolf wasted no time, ducking out of the way and making a break for the trees. Emma caught his back leg when he ran by. Devon heard the crack of bone, felt it in his chest, and the poor wolf's howl of pain reverberated through the forest. The Rosewoods would not ignore a call like that, and they couldn't afford to be there when the rest of the pack arrived.

If the Rosewoods came to that place, they'd see the gravestone. They'd question it. Maybe dig it up. They had to get out of there, and quickly.

We have to go. Devon forced his thoughts into the minds of the others with a force that made them cower, except for Emma. She was shaking the wolf's broken leg, worrying at it like a dog with a toy.

He didn't have time for disobedience. He took a page from Emma's book and caught her by the scruff, biting down until she whimpered and released the Rosewood. It bolted off, followed by the one Jonah and Caleb had cornered.

She spun on Devon when he let her go, but he'd been expecting it and leaped backward out of her range.

There's no time, unless you want them to find this place. That shook her out of it. She took off, heading for the White Winter house, her muzzle red with blood.

Devon followed, and Caleb and Jonah took up the rear. It was a long run back to the White Winter territory, time enough for Emma to find her voice.

You should have let me kill him.

Any other time, and he would have flattened her for her disobedience. Once again, she was questioning her alpha. Maybe Beth was softening him. He couldn't find it in himself to lay her low so soon after she'd knelt at Jonathan's grave.

We can't afford that, not right now. You need to wash at the stream.

At least in this form, she couldn't throw one of her withering glares at him.

So your precious luna doesn't know it's Rosewood blood? Either she's a White Winter, or she's not.

They hit the territory line and stopped at the stream's edge. Devon shifted first, kneeling by the stream to cup a handful of water into his mouth. It was cold and clear, bubbling over rocks as it wound its way through the forest.

"Fuck, that was close," Jonah said, kicking a rock into the water. "They don't usually patrol up there."

"Something's got them worked up." Caleb knelt and splashed water over his face. It dripped down onto his shirt and left splatters there.

"Something?" Emma finally shifted, wiping blood off her chin with her arm. "You mean like kidnapping one of their members? That kind of something?"

She glared at Devon but bent and rinsed the rest of the blood in the stream. He held his hand in his hands.

"Maybe we should just let her go," he said quietly. Jonathan's imagined reprimand was ringing in his head like a bell. Would his brother even recognize who he had become?

Emma scoffed. "Seriously? Now? No, Dev. You made this plan, and you need to see it through. Go back on it now, and everything falls apart."

Devon turned to her in surprise. "I thought you'd love to get rid of her."

"Don't get me wrong, I think this was an idiotic decision, and I think she's weak as a wet paper bag. But she's yours now. Why are you getting soft on me now? Don't tell me. You're starting to really like her."

But she read everything she needed to know before Devon even opened his mouth. Her lips thinned.

Devon held up his hand to forestall her vitriol. "I don't need to hear it, and I don't want to fight right now, not after… not after that. You're right, though. I can't let her go now. It would make all of this meaningless."

Jonah clapped him on the shoulder. "She's coming around. I think you're really starting to win her over, and I think, despite everything, she might be good for us. Don't give up now, man."

"Yeah, I kind of like having her around, much as I never thought I"d say that about a Rosewood." Caleb chimed in.

"I wouldn't go that far," Emma drawled.

Their words helped, but they did not smother the pang inside of him that grew each time he thought of how Beth was a prisoner, that despite this growing… something between them, she was not there because she wanted to be.

"And how do you think she will react to hearing you broke a Rosewood leg, exactly?" Dev asked, pointing at Emma.

She shrugged, uncaring. "This time, they attacked first. I don"t think I'm to blame here."

Somehow, Devon didn't think Beth would see it that way.