Page 24 of Ravaged Wolf
I hurt everyone I love.
I don’t know what they say. My ears ring with the screaming in my head.
Howell Owens and the silver-haired male argue bitterly, gesturing wildly, interrupting each other. The silver-haired male slams his palm on the table. Howell steps toward him. Madog barks at them to stop and calls them up to the dais to huddle and argue more, but quietly.
In the end, Madog orders me to look him in the eye and says, “Trevor Floyd, you are hereby exiled from Moon Lake pack and all its territories, entities, and interests, for now, and forever.” His face is grim—conflicted—but his voice booms.
Mom bursts into fresh tears and clings to Dad. Dad hangs his head.
I did this. I failed them all.
How do I live in my skin another hour? Another minute?
Two males I don’t know grab my upper arms and lead me out of the room.
Mom cries, “Trevor! No!” She lunges for me. Dad holdsher back. My brothers stand at the bench and watch like sentinels as I leave.
I want to call to Mom and tell her not to cry, not to worry, that I’ll be okay, but my lungs can’t draw air, my tongue doesn’t work, and it’d be a lie anyway.
The males take me through windowless hallways to the loading docks. “Don’t think about running,” one says to me before he shoves me out the door.
I don’t. I can’t think at all. Flashbacks gore my brain, stabbing the soft tissue, turning it to pulp. The night air had been wet. When Izzy ran, the backs of her ankles flashed white in the dark. When I bit her shoulder, my fangs scraped bone. Her blood filled my mouth so quickly, I couldn’t swallow it all. It gushed down my chin.
I fold over and puke.
“Too late for that now,” a male says and drags me the rest of the way to a waiting van.
He throws me in the back. Another male climbs in after and squats, blocking the rear doors, and glares at me like a steaming pile of shit. I am. Worse than that even.
I glance around. There’s nothing in reach but a spare tire. A chicken wire screen separates us from the driver.
We pull away from the Tower and drive north. A few minutes after we leave Moon Lake in the rearview, my wolf wakes up, howling. He feels the distance growing between us and Izzy and races back and forth inside me, frantic, mindless with the need to stay close to her.
He launches himself over and over at the boundary between us, but he’s trapped. He has no chance against me, against the power of my guilt and shame.
Exile is good. I’ll never be able to hurt her again.
Never have to look her in the eye.
Never have to look anyone I know in the eye anymore.
We drive for hours, stopping a few times for the males topiss by the side of the road. They don’t let me out. They give me an empty peanut butter jar to use.
We’re still heading northwest, gaining elevation. Are they going to drop me in the no-man’s-land between Quarry Pack, Salt Mountain, and North Border where the ferals live?
How quickly will the ferals kill me?
Or will I lose the rest of my mind and become one?
The male guarding me never takes his eyes off me, like I might attack him at any moment, but I’ve never felt smaller or weaker, not even as a pup. My new bulk is a joke. I’m a shell of who I used to be.
I’m a stain.
When we arrive at our destination, the sun is setting. The male watching me jumps out the back and barks, “Get out.”
We’re standing in the shadow of Salt Mountain. Above us, a pocked dirt road rises into the hills with mismatched shingled roofs and smoking chimneys sprouting among the trees. Our way is barred by the rusty gate to their pack territory. For some reason, it reeks of young male piss.
An older blond male waits there to greet us. He has a younger blond male with him. Their matching faces are angular and cold.
