Page 3 of Primal

If I admitted to Seren how my wolf is feeling, I have no doubt it would only make her fight me harder. She knows how vast and devastating the disconnect between my animal and me is. Her knowing my wolf’s presence is amping up the closer I get to my old pack’s land would only aid her campaign for my immediate return home. Shit, if she were here and picked up on my heightened emotions with her charmer gifts, I just know that she-wolf would be scheming up a way to hogtie me and toss me in the back seat until I was home safe.

“I know you can face this. All I’m saying is you shouldn’t have to face it alone.” Seren’s tone takes on a somber cadence. “This is heavy, babe, and it’s a lot to take on. I just want to be there to support you. Or bite that bigoted Alpha on the dick tip—hard—if he doesn’t agree to let you spread Thalassa’s ashes.”

An image I haven’t conjured in years fills my mind and it instantly has my inner beast baring her teeth. MerrittFallamhain. The long-standing Alpha of the largest pack in Idaho. It’s not the way he was a walking, talking wall of sinewy muscle or that he had a permanent scowl on his face that I remember best. It’s the coldness that lived in the pitch-black depths of his eyes. There wasn’t a hint of warmth in those obsidian orbs.

Knowing I will have to look into that chilling gaze today and beg for a favor I, by all accounts, am not entitled to as an exiled member of his pack has me wanting to pull over and purge my vanilla latte onto the side of this mountain road. But that would be a waste of precious espresso, and we don’t fuck around with caffeine in my house. That sweet nectar of the Goddess is sacred.

“While I continue to endlessly appreciate your colorful brand of unwavering support, Ser, I will be okay.” If I’m being honest, I don’t know if I’m trying to assure her or myself with those words. “I found the phone number for the Alpha’s assistant this morning. The woman who answered was shockingly kind and she assured me she’d squeeze me into the Alpha’s schedule. Which is more help than I was expecting. The way I see it, there’s two ways this can go. Option one, I have an awkward conversation with him. He tells me no and to get the hell out of his territory. Option two, some kind of blessing by the Goddess occurs and he agrees to my request. I spread Mom’s ashes and I’m back on the road home in a matter of hours.”

I don’t admit there’s a third option. One where I’m met with open hostility and somehow end up in a precarious situation. The harried way Mom rushed us out of the territory back then is the reason this last option is on the table. Most of my memories of that night may be hazy, but the way fear darkened her features is something I’ve never forgotten. In all my years at Mom’s side, I’ve never seen her react like that to anything else. And we’ve gotten into some sketchy-as-hell situations with our secret little operation.

The growl of frustration that comes from the woman who’s all but become my adopted sister since she showed up in our lives is downright animalistic. “Fine. I don’t like it, and I will be holding a grudge about it for the next five to seven business days, but fine,” she relents. “But just know, if you don’t text me the second you get through those gates and don’t provide me with adequate updates, I will drive there and drag you home.”

I can’t help but snort at this. “As if you’d interrupt Ivey’s naptime to drive to Idaho and get me.” The infant’s sleep schedule is inflexible and any disturbance to it is not tolerated in my dear friend’s book.

Seren scoffs so loudly I can visualize her powder blue eyes rolling in her head. “For you, I would. I’ll leave her with the coven if I have to. Those crones love fussing over her, and Ivey likes when Amara makes random shit float in the air. It’s a win-win for everyone.”

“Ah, yes, I’m sure the very powerful coven High Priestess and elementalist would love to hear you’ve relegated her gifts to ‘making shit float’.”

The High Priestess of the Ashvale Coven has long earned her position and our respect. The only person I’ve ever met more gifted than Amara was my very own mother. A feat not easily accomplished seeing as Mom wasn’t a full-blooded witch like the Priestess is. Wolf shifters born with magic in their blood are often called charmers. They are rare shifters who descend from a powerful coven of witches who mated with a pack of shifters about ten generations ago. The power from those unions still runs in their descendants’ blood. Often, it presents in miniscule ways, like basic scrying or surface-level healing, but in scarcer occasions, it presents as pure boundless power. The kind of power that can only be gifted by the Goddess herself. My mom was blessed ten times over with that kind of power.

In the end, it didn’t matter how much witch’s blood ran through her veins. It wasn’t enough to keep her here with me.

“You wouldn’t dare.”

“Try me,” I counter, smiling my first full smile of the day. “You and I both know you needed to stay and watch over Potion & Petal, anyway.” The second the apothecary’s deed was transferred into my name, I promoted Seren to an official leadership position. In my absence, there is no one else on earth I trust to leave in charge of our precious establishment. “We still don’t know if Nightingale is going to show up. Her call to the emergency line was cut off, but she sounded terrified. Someone needs to be there in case she finds her way to us.”

Nightingale. A code word Mom came up with for the little birds we take in and help. With all the things my mother could have used her vast power for, she chose to selflessly dedicate it to fighting the abuse and neglect that so many innocents face in the shadowy corners of our world.

Seren exhales a breath. “I know you’re right. One of us needs to be here to man the fort and keep everyone in line. I’ve been worried sick since I heard that call, too. Fingers crossed she makes it to the town borders on her own. Amara will know when someone passes her shields, and she or Lowri will alert us like they always do.”

I’m not sure how she did it, but Thalassa Alderwood managed to accomplish the impossible—convincing the famously reclusive and insular Ashvale Coven to join her secret endeavor. I watched her not only befriend the High Priestess but also persuade her to stand with us. In that moment, I swore there was nothing my mother couldn’t do. In my eyes, she became Goddess-like.

Amara believed in our cause, and once she committed, the rest of the coven followed. And with them came the all-female wolf pack led by Amara’s alpha wolf lover, Lowri Craddock.An alpha with a similar cause to ours who brings in females who have been exiled from their old pack or are running from something in their pasts but still long for the stability and sense of community that a pack can offer. A lot of our Nightingales end up joining the Craddock Pack when they leave us. being part of pack.

Their support is the backbone of everything we do. Without the assistance and safety the Ashvale witches and the Craddock Pack offer us, we wouldn’t be able to save half the people we do. Our sanctuary—our underground refuge—wouldn’t exist at all.

“Keep me updated. You know what to do if she makes it to our doors, and if she does, text me immediately. I’ll drop everything and head back.” Nothing is more important than a Nightingale. My mother instilled this in me and that’s why I know she’d understand if I had to further postpone finally laying her to rest. “I’m thankful for your fussing and your willingness to act as my savior on the off chance I need one, but I’ve got this. I promise I’ll be home soon. Love you! Kiss the baby for me!”

I end the call before she has a chance to try and talk me out of this. Again.

The rest of the drive, I can’t bring myself to turn on the radio or listen to my current audiobook. It’s just my restless wolf pacing her cage and a singular thought I keep repeating in my head that keep me company…

What the hell have you gotten me into, Mom?

“Someone will meetyou in front of the house,” the young beta male on shift at the pack’s security shack instructs after handing me an obscenely bright yellow visitor’s tag to place on my dash. Nothing says you don’t belong like being branded with blindingneon. “I’ll call up there once you’re through the gates and tell Rhosyn you’re headed that way.”

Behind my dark sunglasses, I glance toward the familiar massive iron and pine gates. The last time I drove through them I was barely eighteen years old and was more confused and heartbroken than I’ve ever been in my life. Confronting the gates that literally and figuratively closed that chapter of my life brings forward the sorrow I thought I’d long since buried. My wolf, whose anguished howls join the thundering drumming of my heart, echoes my emotions.

“Okay, thank you for your help…” I trail off, realizing I’ve already forgotten what he introduced himself as when I’d pulled up.

“Danny,” he tells me with a kind, albeit noticeably wary smile.

Anticipating the worst, I braced as if I was going to get smacked in the nose when I had first rolled down my window to greet him. To my relief, Danny has shown no outward signs of disdain, only mild curiosity and caution. Both of which only appeared once I’d given him my name. Up until that point, I had been secretly clinging to the hopeful delusion that after spending nearly a decade away from this pack, my surname and the history associated with it would have dwindled into nonrecognition, but it appears the notoriety has lingered.

His lack of hostility does little to soothe my pent-up beast. My inner wolf doesn’t appreciate or take kindly to the attention of men. It’s been a mystery for as long as I can remember as to why she reacts like she does when in the presence of a male. Alpha or beta, she doesn’t discriminate. The only male I’ve been around who didn’t set her teeth on edge was a rare omega male I interacted with years ago. Her severe reaction to the male population has made dating a no-go and trust me, I’ve tried to push her on this. Latent or not, it’s not in a wolf’s nature to bealone. We are meant to find a mate. In the end, it just winds up causing us both immeasurable stress. After my last attempt, where I pushed her issue further than I ever had before and it ended in disaster, I gave up on the issue entirely. That was nearly four years ago.

“Danny,” I repeat, offering him a smile of my own. This pack may have rejected me, but I can’t find it in me to be rude in retaliation. Besides, it’s not like this young guard played a hand in my exile. He would have been a kid himself when it happened.

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