1. Prologue

Icouldn’t remember how I’d gotten here, or how long I’d spent in this… space. Void. There was nothing there in the blank white expanse that surrounded me apart from myself and my charcoal colored wolf.

For all of my twenty-seven years, my wolf had been with me. A constant presence in my mind. A comfort in harder times and my fiercest protector.

All that I got from him at that moment was confusion and worry. His bright silver-blue eyes darted around the space, watching, alert and wary. Yet there was nothing there that he could fight. Nothing to protect me from.

We wrapped around each other, sharing memories and wishes in a way we’d never done before. Giving each other comfort. My fingers in his fur. For an unknowable amount of time, I got to know my wolf better than I could have imagined. I’d never taken the time to know what my wolf wanted from his life, always assuming that I would be in charge of our fate.

The longer we spent there, the more control that we had over it. Soon we could broadcast our memories like movies, seeing three-dimensional images in the brightly lit area.

I discussed our recollections with my wolf, allowing him to share his version. Seeing the world from his point of view changed my perspective of events.

Together, we watched our upbringing alongside our twin, Chase, and our baby brother Blake. My heart ached for my twin. Where was he? Was he sick, too?

My last memory had been of fever sickness, a weakness in my limbs and bone crushing tiredness as I tried to console my brother, to reassure him I’d be fine. Being unable to wake, to pull myself from this void, was not fine.

Chase had been sick too, but not nearly as bad off as me. I prayed to The Luna that Chase was well and helping our Alpha, our brother, Blake, to run things in my absence.

If he was sick, why wasn’t he here? All our lives, we’d shared everything. Our wolf alters were also twins and my wolf worried for them as much as for me.

In this place, we were powerless to do anything but remember or dream. Once we had recalled all of our most precious and tragic memories, recalling the birth of Blake and the death of our mother, we moved on to our innermost wishes.

For what felt like a long time, I fought against letting out the deepest of my desires. My secret wish that made my heart burn with bitter envy and the bleakest feelings of grief for what I couldn’t have.

Eventually, I shared with my wolf what they had already known. I could keep nothing from my wolf. After all, he knew my innermost soul. He had been there since the beginning.

Together we grieved. He shared my pain and longing and sought to give solace in the bond that we had. My wolf mourned with as much feeling as me, since his wishes and mine matched. In most things, we agreed.

Another amount of time appeared to pass as we lay together, my head on his stomach, his head resting on my chest.

Slowly, the landscape changed, and we saw Sweetwater. Our pack was divided, with most of the betas still sleeping. I saw flashes of myself in a bed in a home that I vaguely recalled was Dakota’s, though I’d never been inside.

My gasp broke the silence when I saw Chase. He didn’t look like himself. He was altered. Thinner. Stress marred his face with a frown. He stayed glued to my side even as people I didn’t know moved around him.

There. I saw someone new. Somehow, something blocked their face from my view. Everyone that I didn’t know already were blurs. Just shapes.

A voice broke the quiet. Ethereal in its beauty. Ageless but female.

“Choose. You must make a choice. I can offer you what you most desire, Axel, but it is the more difficult path to follow, for you must learn to trust your heart over your head.”

“What do you mean? Who are you?”

“You already know who I am. If you listen to your inner self, you know what I offer. However, you must know this. There is a price for this gift. Love may be its cost.”

“So I could have a life without true love, but I’d have what I most desire?”

“Yes.”

“Then you already know what I choose.”

“So be it.”

Waking was like wading through molasses.

Sounds came first. The beloved sound of my brother telling a story for laughs. I remembered that day, and had shown it to my wolf. He had revealed that was when he had realized the true depth of my alpha brother’s power.

Chase was deep in storytelling mode. “He was so upset. Little Blake chased us all around the house, yelling at me to give it back. I don’t even know why Axel was running. Maybe he thought I was going to share it with him. I wasn’t.”

“You were.” My voice croaked with disuse.

I felt the entire room still in reaction to my words. I attempted to open my eyes. To say something more. Everything felt disconnected. I wasn’t quite there yet.

“Wha—“ Chase again. “Did you hear that?”

“I did.” Two voices spoke at once. One familiar to me. Dakota. The other was beautiful, melodic, with a strange accent. I wanted to hear it speak again. My consciousness surged upwards to wakefulness, that was just out of reach.

After a pause, Chase continued. “So, we stopped, out of breath, and Blake squared up to us. He demanded I give the cookies back, not noticing that there was only one. I refused because I wanted it.”

“Brat,” I muttered. We had been annoying as kids. Chase more than me, obviously.

There was only the briefest pause this time.

“We were at an impasse because I wasn’t giving up the cookie on the principle that Blake wanted it and he was our dad’s favorite. I didn’t get that it wasn’t a good thing until much later. Blake got really mad and his eyes started to glow. His voice got really low. It was pretty scary, actually.”

My laugh burst from me. Goddess, had Blake been scary. It was funny now, but I’d almost peed myself with fright then. Even at four years younger than us, he had been so strong.

I felt Chase’s hand in mine and twitched my fingers, trying to clasp him closer, to use him as an anchor as I swam to waking.

So close. The surface was only inches away. I heard the break in Chase’s voice and tears stung my eyes.

“This voice just came out of him. Drop the cookie, it growled. And I did as compelled. Dropped it there and then. Right in the dirt. As soon as Blake saw it, he burst into tears and ran into the house. Mama saw him crying and found out what had happened. She was so mad at us. Dad, though, was proud when he found out. He actually asked Mama to make Blake a batch just for him.”

Mama had lectured Blake not to abuse his power, especially over us since we weren’t alphas. I missed her so damn much.

“He gave me some.” Finally, I broke through, my eyelids fluttering open, my throat dry and scratchy. “Water?”

Instantly, Chase and Dakota rushed forward to help me, raising the hospital bed I lay in and resting a straw at my lips. I gratefully sipped the water, quenching the burn in my throat.

Then my eyes settled on him. The most perfect being I’d ever set eyes on. “Who?”

They stepped forward warily, and it was then that I noticed the pointed ears that answered what this being was. An elf. Here in Sweetwater.

Our eyes locked, and I sucked in a breath at the most startling turquoise eyes I’d ever seen. His eyes were deep pools I could drown in. Ageless and full of wisdom. “Much has happened while you slept. I’m… I’m a friend of the pack. Teárlach.”

My heart skipped a beat as he said his name, my eyes never leaving his. It settled deep into my soul.

I repeated his name, matching his pronunciation as closely as possible. If he had been gorgeous before, he was otherworldly when he smiled.

“We need to tell everyone you’re awake!” Chase got up from where he’d been perched on the side of my bed, pulled his phone out of his pocket and called our brother. “Blake! He’s awake! You need to come.”

I didn’t try to listen to the other side of the conversation, as much as I wanted to hear Blake’s voice and check that everything was okay. The male elf beside me captured all of my attention. It was him I looked to for answers.

His focus hadn’t shifted from me despite the flurry of movement and excitement my waking was causing. Easily, he read my thoughts and answered my unasked question. “You’ve been asleep for a few weeks. Chase has been awake for two weeks now. He’s one of the few betas awake.”

A few weeks? A memory came to me of someone saying a month. I’d lost an entire month.

“Huh.” What he was saying matched what I recalled from the void. The longer that I was awake, the less I remembered. It was like trying to hold water in my hands. The memories were slipping through my fingers the harder that I held to them. “The others?” I asked.

“I’ll go check.” Dakota left the room, and Chase stayed close to the window, complaining about poor service.

Still, Teárlach stayed next to me, watching my every expression with a look of rapt wonder. It felt like we were the only people in the world.

Was it possible to fall in love with someone the very instant that you met? All I knew was that I had to be next to him. By his side was where I belonged.

We shared a smile at Chase chatting to Blake, his excitement infusing the room. A wide yawn split my face. The last few minutes had drained all of my energy.

“Sleep, Axel. I see your exhaustion. Don’t fight it. I’ll be here when you wake.”

“You promise?” I whispered.

“I swear it.” His words, pitched low and only for me, followed me into my dreams.