Except Richard’s hand curved into black claws.
His raised his arm in the air.
I remembered the night of my sixteenth birthday when we’d danced in the kitchen.
The way she had smiled at me.
The soap bubble on my ear.
How she had laughed.
And as I pushed through the door to sing my family home, the hand of the beast came down across her throat.
The floor was wet, after. Around her.
The sound she made was wet.
Her eyes were wet. Her lips.
And her throat. Her throat.
Her throat.
And she started to fall and I pushed the door open and the magic held and it pulled and I screamed out my song of loss and horror and pushed through it.
When I came out on the other side, there was a hole in my chest where a bond had broken, and I knew. I knew, I knew, I knew.
And I sang then. I crawled on my hands and knees and sang.
I sang a song for my mother, heart shattered and soul-deep.
They knew. My pack. As soon as my song hit their ears, they knew.
Their answering howls were rage and fury and despair.
And I crawled toward them, calling back, begging for them to take away this pain. Begging for this to be a dream. A nightmare. But I had read that there was no actual pain in dreams. I remembered that through the haze of magic and darkness. I remembered that. And this couldn’t be a dream, then, because all I could feel was pain. It rolled over my whole body until I was gagging with it.
Joe reached me first as a wolf, shreds of clothes he hadn’t bothered to discard hanging off him. He pressed up against me and shuddered along with me, whining deeply as he rubbed his nose over me. He shifted and growled, “Ox, Ox. Please. Please just look at me. Please. Where is it? Why do you smell like blood? Did he hurt you? Please don’t be hurt. Please tell me what’s wrong. You can’t be hurt. You just can’t. You can’t ever be hurt.” And his hands ran over me, trying to find any injury.
Wolves flew by us, toward the house.
The sun was setting behind the mountains.
Joe took my face in his hands and kissed my forehead, my cheeks, my chin.
He said, “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” Like it was his fault. Like he had done this.
And for a moment, an awesomely terrible moment, I thought he had. I thought all of them had. The Bennetts. Because if they’d never come back, if I’d never met them, never heard them speak or seen their secrets unfold before me, my mom would still be with me. We’d be sadder. We’d be quieter. We’d be lonelier.
But we would be.
And the moment passed.
It passed because I had been given a choice. Between her and them.
And I’d chosen.
The air was warm and birds were singing and Joe’s hands were smooth, but I felt none of it. I heard none of it.