Page 79 of Veradel
Lucan grabs my chin and forces me to look at him. “Listen, Saskia…”
“No. It didn’t work.” I jerk away. “It wasn’t enough. I—”
“You stubborn woman.” Lucan grabs hold of me by the back of the neck, amusement and exasperation clashing on his face. “Haven’t you learned to obey me yet, or do I need to teach you a few more lessons?” He smirks as I splutter. “I saidlisten.”
My mouth pops open to protest, until I realize his own mouth has already snapped shut. His eyes narrow in concentration, and I realize what he means bylisten.
I do, straining to pinpoint all the sounds of the night. The hooting of owls. The whirring of crickets. The creaking of tree branches in the wind. The breathing of the pack members who stayed, still watching this very exchange. The subtle beat of Lucan’s heart beside me.
And something fainter. Something so faint, it’s almost undetectable beneath the layers of everything else, like the crackling of frost as it melts under a piercing streak of moonlight.
“Is that…?” I whip my head toward the Wall again and lean forward, until my nose is nearly brushing the stone—or what’s left of it. The veiny, hardened material looks thinner, practically translucent in two blooming areas around the injection sites.
“I told you it would work,” Lucan says smugly.
With a great collective gasp, the rest of the pack members surge forward to see for themselves, elbowing and bumping into each other to get a good look. Right before our eyes, the stone continues to dissolve, revealing two cloud-shaped sections of gnarled wood, each about the size of a fist. Then the size of a dinner plate. Then bigger and bigger, until the sections merge and spread, and a door stands in front of us surrounded by a halo of stone.
A verywoodendoor.
The mood in the air quickly spikes from excitement to something sharper as everyone stills, each of us probably imagining how easy it would be to kick that door in. Our way inside.Theirway inside, finally, after five hundred years of being locked out, is right here.
“Saskia.” Lucan’s voice cracks. “You did it, baby. You did it.”
He turns, clutches both sides of my face, and fits his lips to mine with a kiss that spits fire into my bones. Then he turns to his fellow pack members, and I can hear the alpha overtaking his voice as it turns deeper, more commanding, like he was born for this moment.
And maybe he was.
“Merrick, Vivian, go get weapons. Soren, get torches. Mom.” His eyes flick over all the heads to meet Stella’s. “Get the children and the elderly into the bunker and donotcome out until we’re back.”
Stella looks like she might try to argue, but at the set of Lucan’s jaw, she squeezes her eyes shut and nods. Opening them again, she surges forward to gather both Lucan and me in a crushing hug.
“Be careful, my children. Come back to me in one piece. Both of you.”
Then she casts us a longing look before turning back toward the woods, her long white hair winking in the moonlight. Without hesitating, Merrick, Vivian, and Soren spring into their werewolf forms and follow, their silhouettes quickly swallowed by the trees as they hurry to obey Lucan’s commands.
“The rest of you.” Lucan’s eyes glide over the remaining werewolves—including Gabriel, who must have whipped around when he heard the commotion. “Are you in?”
“Absolutely,” Ashe says immediately, and several others express their instant agreement, cracking knuckles and loosening shoulders. Kyra glances over her shoulder at Gabriel, whose eyes flick from the Wall to me.
I hold his stare, knowing what he’s telling me without words:prove it.
Then he inhales and jerks his head at Lucan.
“I’m in, alpha. Of course I am.” He hurries toward us again, averting his eyes, but Lucan’s attention is already back on me.
“You’ve done your part, my dream.” He brushes a strand of my hair out of my face with astonishing tenderness. “If you want to go with my mom, no one would—”
“Not a chance,” I cut him off, catching him by his wrist. “I’m coming with you.”
He gives a sigh. “Of course you are. But I had to try, didn’t I?”
I flash him my best grin and turn to Taika, who’s definitely staring at the wooden door with misty eyes that I pretend not to notice as I cup a hand on his shoulder.
“I wouldn’t have known how to do it without you.”
He blinks back at me, wiping at the glimmer of tears on his cheeks, and says, “You make an excellent apprentice, dear. When those bastards are dead, we’ll be able to make antivenom for everyone they’ve ever hurt. So make sure you win.”
“I will,” I promise, my words coming out about ten times more confident than I feel.
