Page 96 of Tethered to the World
He looked a little disappointed but not surprised and gave her a nod. “Be safe. Get us out of here alive, and the wolves will owe you a debt.”
He disappeared out the door before she could protest. The last thing she wanted was the attention of the wolves. She had enough trouble with them already. Getting mixed up in their business was very unlikely to be a good thing.
She headed down the hall, her head throbbing with each step, the ferret rubbing itself along her jaw to soothe her. She passed two empty rooms, and a chill snaked down her spine when she saw each room had at least a dozen cots ready and waiting for more patients.
They were ready to go into mass production.
Which meant whoever was in charge knew the truth about her and planned to drain her dry each day to do it.
The next room was different. One bed stood in the middle of the room, the single occupants a boy only one or two years younger than herself. He was strapped into the bed, his arms and chest hooked up to a number of tubes.
He was different from the others, not one of the kids being harvested. She was about the close the door when a hand reached from inside the room and yanked her forward.
And she came face to face with Terrance.
“How did you get out?” He sounded weary, unable to meet her eyes as he pulled her toward the door, clearly intending to return her to her cell.
“You know this is wrong.” She dug in her feet, the rubber soles chirping against the floor.
“I don’t have a choice.” He reached for the door, his grip firm but not bruising. He had no intention of letting her go.
“We all have a choice.” She grabbed her own wrist, twisting her arm toward his thumb to break his hold the way Camden showed her.
His eyes slid over her shoulder, landing on the bed behind her, and a muscle jumped in his jaw. “You don’t live in the real world if you believe that. Shifters don’t get to live their own lives. They live and die by the pack.”
“And you think what you’re doing is going to save him?” Annora asked softly. “Drugs aren’t the way to do it.”
Terrance met her eyes, the emotions completely burned out of them, everything except defeat. “I don’t touch that poison. I refuse to even sell it.” Rage hardened his face. “I only procure the stock to create the drugs.”
Annora glanced back at the bed and understood. “For him.”
He swallowed hard, his throat moving. “He’s my brother. He’s the only pack I have left. I can’t leave him. That drug is the only thing keeping him alive.”
“What do you mean?” She glanced at the boy, but there was a stillness to the kid that said he was completely lost to this world and had been for a while.
“He overdosed on the drug. It destroyed his wolf and drove him insane. A tiny dose is the only thing keeping him docile. If he goes too long without it, he begins to wake up and goes into withdrawals so hard that he seizes violently enough to snap bones. Without his beast to help heal him…he’s vulnerable.”
When Terrance turned his attention back to her, resolve hardened his face. “So you see, I really don’t have a choice.”
Annora skipped out of his reach, watching annoyance cross his face as he took a step after her, and she raised her voice, “And if you had a choice?”
He hesitated, indecision crossing his face for only a moment, before he shook his head. “No shifter comes back after losing their beast.”
“Then why keep him on the drug?” She glanced at the kid on the bed, noting his waxy face, his hair limp and greasy against the pillow. “If you know he will never wake, never be the same…why?”
Anger darkened his face and he grabbed her arm, once again dragging her toward the door without answering.
“What if I could wake him up?” She yanked at the sleeve of his shirt, twisting the fabric to get his attention. “What if I could take away his addiction?”
He lifted a brow at her. “Then what? What kind of life would he have without his wolf?”
His tortured question brought a lump to the back of her throat, and she lifted her chin and faced him directly. “What kind of life does he have now?”
Terrance suddenly stopped moving, staring blankly at the door, his head bowed. “I can’t let him go. He’s all I have.”
Annora edged in front of him, waiting for his eyes to lift to hers. “Would he really want you to be killing people just so he can live the rest of his life as a vegetable on that bed? Would he rather be dead, or live as a human?”
Hope and despair warred on Terrance’s face. To lose their beast meant leaving the pack. If he woke his brother, he would have to choose to live without him or live as a lone wolf, an outcast who would never be accepted by other shifters.
