Chapter Eleven

The sounds of snarls ripped through the air, and three huge wolves raced towards the four of us. Cole lifted his chin, taking one small step to put himself in front of me, and the three wolves skidded to a halt as one, cowering down just a few feet from us. With an audible cracking of bones, one of them shifted into a guy in maybe his early twenties, but he stayed in a crouch with his eyes averted, making it hard to be sure.

"Forgive us, Alpha Heir," he said quickly. "We saw the portal, and—"

Cole brushed aside his explanation. "What happened here tonight?"

The man twisted his head round to glance at one of the wolves crouching on his flank, and Cole stiffened.

"Does he somehow know something you don't, Owen?" he demanded in a low voice.

Owen quickly snapped his gaze forward away, shaking his head and tucking his chin even further.

"No, Alpha Heir. I— There was an attack—the Black Wind pack. They breached the perimeter but we fought them back."

Panic turned my blood to ice. They'd been here. Kallan had been telling the truth. Which meant…

"My mom."

I pushed past Cole. I needed to get to her, now.

Behind me, I heard Cole curse. "Jax, go and find Blaine. Meet us at the clinic."

"Your father—" Owen protested hesitantly.

"I'll pay my respects to the alpha in due course," Cole snapped, and then he was at my side, grabbing my hand and stopping me breaking into a flat out run. "Cali, calm down."

"Kallan's been near her, she could be—" My throat closed around the word and I thought I was going to throw up. "She was supposed to be safe here, Cole, you promised."

"We don't know anything has happened yet, Cali."

"We know they were here!"

"Yes." He yanked me to a halt and I rounded on him. "And you're acting like an idiot."

"Me?"

"Yes, you. We don't know that the area is secure yet, and you could be running headlong into a trap."

"You think I care about that? My mom—"

"I care about that! Dammit, Cali, you think I could handle it if anything happened to you?"

I froze, staring into his eyes, and the anger slowly faded from his. He lifted one hand and swept a stray lock of hair from my face.

"We'll go to her together," he said softly. "But please let me make sure it's safe. When we get to your mom, she won't thank me if I've allowed her daughter to be mauled by a stray wolf."

I swallowed, and nodded.

"Okay," I whispered. He was right, I was being reckless and I could get both of us hurt. But that didn't make the cocktail of fear and urgency churning in my gut any less vicious.

Cole ushered me behind him, keeping one hand lightly on my wrist as he guided us through the shadows, pausing every dozen steps to listen and scent the air, and the slow, cautious approach was like acid on my frayed nerves.

At last, the medical center came into view, and Cole's hand tightened on my wrist, dragging me to a halt right before I bolted for it.

"You smell that?" he asked grimly, and then shook his head. "No, of course not."

"Smell what?" I asked, the hairs standing up on the back of my neck.

"Nothing."

"Cole!"

"It doesn't mean anything, Cali. We know they were all over the town."

"Cole," I growled.

He blew out a sigh and uttered one word that made my heart clench in terror. "Kallan."

I wrenched my arm free from his grip and barreled through the doors into the small medical center, then stopped dead. The small reception room couldn't have looked further from the orderly, calm space I'd seen every other time I'd visited here. A dozen shifters were scattered around the room, some on chairs, some slouched on the floor, all of them with blood dripping from slowly healing wounds. In one corner, the smashed remains of furniture and fabric had been tossed into a pile.

"Fletcher," Cole said, stepping around me and making for someone squatting in front of one of the injured shifters. I hurried behind him as the pack's doctor rose to his feet and turned around, blood marring his aging face where a jagged wound was slowly healing. I swallowed a gasp; half his face was black and blue, and I could see the bruising went below the neckline of his shirt.

"Alpha Heir Cole," he greeted him formally, dipping his chin in respect.

"Where's my mom?" I asked, cutting over their formalities. I didn't have time for pack politics. Because if the doctor looked like that…

"In her room," Fletcher said, and for a moment I thought my legs would give way beneath me, and then Cole's arm was wrapped around me.

"She's okay?" I said, my hoarse voice barely a whisper.

"She's…unharmed."

"What does that mean? What happened?"

I swept my eyes round the room, picturing shifters—Kallan's pack—tearing the place apart, smashing furniture, attacking anyone who stood in their way as they searched for—

"She's shaken, but we were able to push them back before they could get close enough to hurt her."

"Thank you," Cole said, clapping one hand on the doctor's shoulder. "Take care of your patients, and please, let me know if there's anything I can do to help."

The doctor nodded, and I buried my guilt that he'd been hurt defending my mom—there were no other patients here, at least, not normally—and pushed my way through a side door, then hurried up the flight of stairs behind it. I'd know the way blindfolded, I'd spent so much time here over the summer. And blindfolded, I wouldn't have seen the smear of blood on the walls, or the six-inch gouge in the woodwork.

She's fine, I reminded myself. They didn't hurt her.

At least, not physically.

But her recovery, her hard-fought battle to cling to whatever was left of her sanity… I ground my teeth together. I was going to kill Kallan.

"She needs you," Cole murmured in my ear. "Everything else comes later."

I drew in a steadying breath and nodded.

"But later?"

His eyes burned with the promise of violence and retribution. "Whatever you need is yours, princess."

I touched my lips to his, tasting his vow, and my palm rested on his chest, feeling the steady thud of his heartbeat.

"Go," he whispered against my lips. "I'll guard the door."

I nodded once, shakily, and pulled away. With a hesitant hand I knocked once on the door, and then a second time.

"Mom?"

"Go away go away go away." The voice was barely a whisper, too low for a human to hear…but apparently I wasn't one of those. Never had been. But that didn't change anything, not for either of us. I pushed the door open.

My mom was curled up in one corner of the room, arms wrapped around her knees as she rocked back and forth slowly. She twisted round at the sound of my arrival, but I wasn't sure she could see me.

"The darkness is here, the darkness is here, the darkness is—"

I crossed the room quickly. "Not the darkness, it's just me. It's Cali, it's me."

Her eyes fixed on me and she blinked sharply. "Callista."

I rolled my eyes and squatted in front of her, taking her hands in mine and squeezing softly. "You haven't called me that since I was seven years old."

"The darkness—"

"Shh, I know. The darkness. It's okay, it can't hurt you here. You're safe."

I forced the word out. Safe? She should have been. But Kallan had been close enough to lay eyes on her, to do this to her. Every hard won inch in her battle had been undone, and she was as bad as I'd ever seen her. As bad as…that night. The night I'd almost lost her.

"Come on, let's get you onto the bed, yeah?"

She didn't resist as I helped her to her feet, and she shuffled sluggishly towards the bed with my arm around her. Too sluggish. Like she'd been—

I almost dropped her in my horror. She staggered back a step and I quickly regained myself and pressed one hand to her back, guiding her to the bed.

She'd been drugged.

Fletcher had given her something, and she was still this bad. The nausea came rushing back all at once. What the hell would she be like when the drugs wore off?

"The darkness is—"

I pulled back the sheets and helped her under them. "Rest, mom. The darkness will be gone soon, I promise. Just sleep now."

As I tucked the sheets up under her chin, her eyes slid shut. I watched her for a long moment before turning and slipping back out of the door.

Cole's arms were around me the second I stepped into the hallway, and I fell into them, releasing the sobs I'd kept hidden for my mom's sake. For the sake of whatever was left of her. Cole said nothing, just stroking the back of my head as I let it out, holding me close against him.

We stayed there like that until I heard footsteps coming up the stairs. I straightened, dragging an arm across my eyes.

"Blaine," Cole said, jerking his chin in greeting.

"Cole. I'd say it's good to see you, but…"

"Yeah. Where's Jax?"

"Waiting in the kitchen. With his…companion." His eyes locked onto me. "Interesting company you keep, Cali."

"I'm less interested in my company than the company my mother had today," I ground out, and Cole placed a hand on my arm, but Blaine only chuckled humorlessly.

"Still fiery, I see. How is Angela?"

"How do you think?" I spat. "What the hell happened?"

"How about we head down to the kitchen and have this conversation in private?" he suggested, arching a brow at Cole.

The dynamics between them were complicated—Blaine was Cain's alpha, which meant that technically, he outranked Cole. But Cole was the alpha heir, poised to take Cain's place one day—as Blaine's future alpha. And that might matter if there wasn't a shit ton more than power dynamics going on between the two of them. As far as I was aware, Blaine was one of the few people who knew about Cole's secret political engagement to Thessalia—before yours truly crossed his path and fate threw us all a curve ball.

The three of us made our way down to the medical center's small kitchen, where Jax and Ling were talking in terse whispers. They broke apart as we stepped inside and I shot Ling a quizzical look, but she just shook her head.

"Why don't you go and talk to Fletcher, Cali?" Blaine suggested, running his eyes over me. "You and your…friend."

"Forget it," I said firmly. "I want to hear what's going on. And anything you can say in front of me, you might as well say in front of Ling, too."

Blaine glanced at Cole, who dipped his chin in a curt nod.

"Fair enough," Blaine said, shutting the door. "But what I'm about to say does not leave this room, am I clear?"

Jax ducked his head submissively at once. "Yes, Beta Blaine," he murmured.

Ling gnawed at her lower lip and gave a hurried nod of her head.

"Cali?"

"Yeah, I get it."

"I hope you do, because what happened tonight…"

"It was Black Wind, then?" Cole asked, but Blaine shook his head.

"What happened tonight was a retaliation."