I didn’t need to claim it. There had been a time when I’d thought I would go on to lead my clan. I’d been raised to be a leader. The territory that should have been mine was out of my hands now.
My beast raised its head to say that my chances were not gone, not completely. This place, Lakesedge, needed an Alpha who could end a generation of tyranny. I didn’t know if I could be that Alpha, but my dragon wanted it. The beast wanted to sink its claws into the earth and hold on tight.
“You’re thinking,” Ness said around a mouthful of pizza.
“Shush. Eat your food.”
She snorted. I gave her a sidelong glare. She grinned, perking up a little. My heart danced excitedly, but I kept it from showing on my face.
I couldn’t be mad at her for lying. She might think that the omission had tainted my opinion of her forever, but I couldn’t look at her without seeing the sadness she buried deep. It made me want to pull her close and see if I couldn’t ease some of that grief.
Ness had pushed me away, though. She didn’t want me like that. At least, she didn’t want the mess that I had become. She’d never even gotten a chance to meet the person I was before I’d stained my hands. Ness had only ever met a murderer. It was no wonder she would never feel safe with me.
Even as I thought this, Ness settled back down and put her head on my thigh.
Had I been wrong? There, she sighed and seemed to deflate, becoming even smaller than before. I hesitated, unsure of what to do. However, she began to snore before long.
I settled back into my seat and watched her, my thoughts tumbling one over the other while my dragon purred happily. The conflux of thoughts and emotions left me exhausted. I barely had the energy to pluck one thought from the mess to examine it.
After a moment of hesitation, I set a hand on her shoulder. She didn’t rouse. Instead, she inched closer. I pulled her hair away from her face to make sure she was still asleep—she was.
Anger simmered deep within my gut. I considered myself a stranger to her, and yet she passed out on me as if I were the safest place in the world. She should have felt safer in the company of others, but her pack had denied her any kind of solace. They kept her at a distance and made her feel alone.
When she stirred, I didn’t dare move. She deserved a little more sleep. I knew she had to be exhausted. But, Ness slowly sat upright. I watched her blink as the last shreds of sleep fell away, and she fixed her attention on me. Her eyes dropped to a small wet spot on my pant leg where she must have drooled on me. Her cheeks turned red as she wiped at her mouth with the back of her hand.
I laughed. “That’s not the worst bodily fluid I’ve had on me.”
She glared at me. “The way you say that makes it sound dirty.”
“How was your nap, Princess?”
She snorted. “If I’m a princess then this is an old school Grimm fairy tale. The kind where everyone dies at the end.”
My laughter faded. The beast made my stomach clench tight. The beast snarled viciously at the thought of Ness getting hurt. I held the sound back and tried to remind the beast that Ness did not belong to me. I couldn’t stay for her. Ness was determined to make her pack better. She clearly wanted to stay here.
I couldn’t stay with her.
It would only put her in more danger. Which was why I needed to figure out how to leave, even if it meant leaving her behind.
The desire to reach out and brush a curl behind her ear made me tighten my hands into fists. I didn’t need to get any closer to her. Leaving would only be harder if I allowed myself what I wanted.
She wiggled, straightening her spine before she looked me in the eye. “Can I ask a favor? I will understand if you say no. This isn’t the brightest idea, but I can’t think of anyone else I can do this with.”
Her words sent images tumbling through my mind. My blood turned hot.
“Can you help me practice with my arcana…the commands. I’m afraid of hurting anyone else.”
The heat turned to ice. I blinked at her. “You want to give me commands? Like an Alpha?”
“Well, kind of. I guess? I’m not sure. All I know is that my arcana lets me do something similar. I wish I had a better understanding of this, but I don’t have anyone I can turn to.” She paused, biting her lip. “There was a passage about another Barghest in one of the old records, but someone ripped the pages out. The only reason I know it was even there is because they missed a page.”
“Someone is trying to keep information from you,” I said. “That likely means they’re afraid of what you could do if you knew everything. That’s a good place to start. Let’s do this. Try to give me some commands.”
She swallowed audibly. “Are you sure? This could go wrong. I don’t want to hurt you. I’ve already done enough of that.”
“Ness. You haven’t hurt me.”
Ness wouldn’t look at me. I leaned forward and captured her chin in my hand. Still, she kept her gaze downcast. I growled, tempted to use the command in my own voice to make her look at me. There was no guarantee that it would work since she wasn’t mine to command.