Rabid: The Savage Spirit of Seneca Rain Read online

  Rabid

  Ivy Asher

  Raven Kennedy

  Copyright © 2021 Ivy Asher & Raven Kennedy

  All rights reserved. This book or parts thereof may not be reproduced in any form, stored in any retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or otherwise—without prior written permission of the author, except in cases of a reviewer quoting brief passages in a review.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Edited by Polished Perfection

  Cover by Hannah Sternjakob Design

  For all the broken, shattered, rabid ones who still came out on top.

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Epilogue

  Also by Ivy Asher & Raven Kennedy

  Also by Raven Kennedy

  Also by Ivy Asher

  Raven Kennedy

  Ivy Asher

  Chapter One

  The smell of rain tickles my senses and rides the delicate breeze as it winds through my hair. I can almost taste the threat of moisture all around me, feel the heaviness of the storm clouds as they move sluggishly closer. The change in weather feels fitting for today. It’s as though the sky is willing to open up and release its sorrow, something I still haven’t been able to do.

  Murmurs all around me pull my attention away from my wandering thoughts. I focus back on the shoots of greenery spilling out between the white flowers cascading over the top of my mother’s casket. They really outdid themselves with the arrangement, and I’m trying to appreciate the thought and effort put into it instead of thinking about how much my mother would have hated it.

  As pack healer, my mom despised premature death and useless violence in equal measure. Her feelings weren’t only reserved for those of our kind or the humans we so closely resemble when not in our wolf form. They applied to all living things. Give my mother a plant she could nourish and encourage to grow, and she’d love you for life. Give her a bouquet of flowers doomed to die the second they were picked, bundled, and handed over like some prize to revere, and that would earn you a lifetime of side-eye.

  She was strong in her convictions, gentle in her bedside manner, and the best mom I could have ever hoped for.

  And now she’s gone.

  I trace the lines of her casket with eyes that still haven’t cried, and I can’t help but feel like none of this is real. I know I’m still in shock, probably with a little denial sprinkled in for good measure, but I just never saw the day where I would be here without her unwavering strength and guidance standing right beside me. Especially not with the Flux being only days away.

  Hess, my mother’s closest friend, finishes his speech and wipes at his eyes. I look around to see if any of the gathered pack are looking at his show of emotion like it’s a sign of weakness, but instead of gauging how many challenges may be coming his way in the near future, my empty stare lands on a set of familiar, shifty black eyes. They watch me intensely, and a shiver of disgust licks its way up my spine. I force my grossed-out gaze away from the pack’s alpha and settle on one of the betas, who rises from his seat.

  His cargo khakis are wrinkled, just like his white button-down shirt. There’s an unkempt brown scruff on his cheeks and neck, all of which would be okay if he were grieving, but he’s not. No, his disheveled state is from the bender the pack had last night. Their antics and laughing were loud enough to reach even my house on the outskirts while I tried to prepare for today. It’s as though they were celebrating the loss instead of being crippled by it like I am. The disrespectful beta steps up to say a few words before it’s time to lower the coffin, and I want to growl at the absurdity.

  I can’t focus on what’s being said anyway, because I can still feel Alpha Burke’s eyes on me, and it’s making my skin crawl. I’ve had far too many run-ins with him since he showed up three years ago with his band of rogues and attacked us before successfully taking over the pack. He took an interest in me right away, but my mom was always there to intervene and keep things from escalating like they have with so many other females here.

  Gifted healers are hard to come by, and it seemed no matter how much Burke wanted to mess with me, he wanted my mother to stay and do her job more. But now she’s gone, and I’m alone. Maybe if I had my mother’s gift, I’d have room to negotiate for my safety, but sadly, that blessing skipped this generation.

  Now, I find myself trapped in what could become a very volatile situation. It doesn’t matter that I want to be left alone and have no interest in being claimed by the alpha or anyone else in this pack. If I survive the Flux and get my wolf, I know that I won’t be given a choice. I’ll be claimed by someone whether I like it or not.

  I do my best to ignore the weight of Burke’s unwelcome gaze as it roves over me. I try not to fidget or show any sign of weakness or discomfort. If I do, it’ll invite trouble, and that’s the last thing I need so close to the ceremony. I’ll need to come up with a plan, figure out what I’m going to do about my place here. But right now, I just need to bury my mother and come to terms with the fact that she’s no longer here.

  Seamus, the mountain-sized beta pretending to give a shit about my mother and my loss, gives me a nod that tells me it’s time. Pulling in a fortifying breath, I stand up slowly, walking to the head of my mother’s coffin. I stand there, numb, lost, and not nearly ready to say goodbye.

  Grief tightens my throat as I reach out and place my palms on the smooth shiny wood of her coffin, a hint of red in it that would have made her smile. I lean down and kiss the top of the box that will encase her until the dirt and the plants claim her for their own. My chest tightens as I step back, and then I watch as they lower her into the ground where I can’t follow.

  Cold anguish washes through me. My breath feels labored, my limbs exhausted, but the loss I’m drowning in still doesn’t prick my eyes. I exhale through the pain, robotically moving over to the pile of dirt and palming the shovel that’s been speared into the side of it. I stomp it all the way into the soil and lift out a small mound, waiting until her coffin rests solidly at the bottom of the hole the omegas dug earlier.

  When the straps are pulled up, I sprinkle my dirt into the earthen tomb, wishing I could crawl in and be buried right alongside her. The dark soil spoils the pure white of the flowers, but it feels like a fitting metaphor for what my life is now.

  The shovel is gently taken from my hands, and one by one, the pack lines up to help cover my mother and say their final goodbyes. I step to the side of the procession, but I can’t ignore the feeling like something inside me is dying with each shovelful of dirt dropped on top of her.

  Tilting my head back, I look up at the darkening sky. The vastness of it settles over me, and I try to feel less caged in, less trapped by my pain and my circumstances, but a large body steps next to mine, his heat and intentio
n impossible to ignore. I don’t need the senses of a wolf to know who it is.

  I look up to find hair as dark as pitch, skin the color of warm oak, and twisted black eyes. Burke is stacked like a house with enough muscle and brains to hold tight to the reins of the Twin Rivers pack. He’s gorgeous, he knows it, and he likes to act as though his looks and status entitle him to certain things. He doesn’t understand in the slightest that when you’re cruel and corrupt on the inside, it taints what people see on the outside. I like to call it the Gaston complex.

  “You’re going to be okay,” he tells me, as though I’m some distraught mess in desperate need of his half-assed consoling.

  “I know,” I reply simply, offering a weak smile to someone who pats me on the back as they walk by.

  My throat grows tighter as the grave quickly fills up, and all I want to do is wander into the woods I’ve spent my whole childhood in and get lost for a while. To be away from calculating eyes and the crowding grief.

  “You’ll have your wolf soon, and all of this will feel more bearable,” Burke declares, as though he even cares or thinks the loss of my mother is something that can be replaced by a pet.

  Shame instantly fills me for that thought. The wolf spirit that chooses us is not a pet, I inwardly chastise myself. I subtly move to put a few more inches of distance between me and my alpha. But he steps closer, as though my retreat is an invitation and not an expression of discomfort. I feel his hand land against the small of my back, and the ends of my long hair brush across his arm. He leans down, crowding my space, and as much as I want to pull away from him, I don’t.

  Fighting Burke’s advances spurs him on almost as much as being weak and vulnerable does. He’s a predator through and through. I was hoping to avoid him until I could figure out what to do, but I should have known better. Far too many females can attest that Alpha Burke doesn’t back off until he gets what he wants, one way or another.

  Just get through today, Seneca. After that, he and everyone else will be busy preparing for the ceremony, and then you can come up with a plan. Honor your mother, let him paw and get it out of his system, and then the Flux will be here before you know it.

  I hold my breath, my body going rigid as he practically buries his face in my hair. A few of the pack members skirt by us, their eyes locked on the ground, not interested in getting involved, no matter how wrong this is or how uncomfortable I obviously am.

  “Mmmmm,” is growled into my ear sensually, and I tamp down the revulsion that crawls up my throat. “Yours might be my favorite scent ever,” he declares, his chest brushing against my arm.

  I roll my eyes and lean away from him as much as I can, completely disgusted. What kind of male hits on a pack member who just lost her mom?

  Burke picks up a strand of my thick umber-brown hair and plays with it between his fingers before leaning back with a chuckle. Sometimes, I can’t tell if he’s oblivious to the nauseating effect he has on me, or if he likes it and pushes my boundaries solely because my discomfort does something for him. I look up, unable to stop the warning that fills my arctic blue eyes. It’s one thing to corner me around our home and pull this shit, but this is my mother’s funeral. I thought he’d at least pretend to care and show a little decorum. Now I see how naive and stupid that was.

  His black eyes glitter with amusement as I shove my hair behind my shoulder and step away from the hand at the small of my back.

  “I need to finish burying my mom, if you don’t mind,” I announce caustically, and his lascivious smile grows even wider.

  “Sure, you do that,” he tells me, his tone authoritative as though I require his permission. “But you and I need to talk about your living situation, so come find me when you’re done.”

  Confusion moves through me, and his words cause my feet to stop in their tracks. “What’s the problem with my living situation?” I ask, crossing my arms over my chest when his skeevy eyes spend too much time studying the neckline of the black dress I’m wearing.

  He lifts a shoulder. “It’s no big deal at all, it’s just that your home belongs to the pack healer, and...well, the pack doesn’t have one anymore. You have until after the Flux, but when the new healer arrives...” He doesn’t finish his sentence, but he doesn’t need to. Is he seriously going to kick me out of my home? My father built that house.

  I clench my jaw, swallowing down the vitriol I want to spew, refusing to take the bait. This seems to amuse him even more, because he flashes a wolfish grin at me like a starved person watching a loaded dinner plate being set in front of them.

  “Of course by that time, your wolf will have come, and you know what’s going to happen then, Seneca.”

  My spine stiffens both at his insinuation and the use of Seneca. I don’t want him to have any part of me. Nothing. Not even his mouth momentarily wrapping itself around my name for the second it takes him to speak it.

  “The Flux ceremony is about honoring the wolf spirit that chooses its host,” I bite back, while the rest of the black-clad and disheveled pack members trickle away.

  “Sure it is,” he replies with a cocky twist of his lips. “It’s also about the males choosing between the she-wolves who come to play and claiming one for himself.” His eyes skim over me. “I’ve been waiting a long time for this, and I’m going to enjoy seeing your new wolf immediately roll over to show me her belly. Once you have her, you’ll be begging me to claim you.”

  Bile rises up the back of my throat, but I say nothing. What can I say? The horrible thing is...there’s a very real chance it’ll happen exactly like that. And there won’t be a damn thing I can do about it.

  No one can control the Flux. When I give myself to the ceremony and take in the wolf spirit that chooses me, it’s out of my hands, and most females immediately submit to a male. It’s a sacred ceremony, one that should be honored and celebrated. But all Burke cares about is dominating. Claiming. Taking what isn’t offered. And the salt in the wound is...my wolf might want him to.

  As if he can see the fire dim in my eyes, Burke winks, and then he leans down, fisting some loose dirt in his hand before dropping it in my mother’s grave with an unceremonious toss. Then he turns and walks away with his hands in his pockets, whistling a damn tune as he goes.

  I hate him.

  Looking back at the freshly turned soil now covering the coffin, I swallow hard, ignoring the two gangly shifters waiting off to the side awkwardly, shovels already in their hands to finish securing my mom’s body in the ground as soon as I leave.

  She’s gone. My father’s gone. I have no other family left.

  Above me, the sky finally crumples, like it’s squeezing the clouds in its fist. Raindrops fall just as I turn away, unable to bear the sight of the grave turning into a muddy, puddled mess. My mom would’ve hated that.

  I walk away, the sky’s offering mocking my dry cheeks. Even knowing that I’ll forever be separated from her by six feet of cruel earth, I still don’t cry. Instead, the clouds mourn for me as if they’re trying to show me the way.

  If only I weren’t too lost to follow.

  The healer house, my house, is quiet.

  It was never quiet before.

  With a pack as large as Twin Rivers boasting several hundred shifters, our house always had someone in it being treated by my mother. That’s what happens when you’re the pack healer. Rain or shine, dawn or dusk, someone always needed her.

  Full moons were the worst. That’s when Burke runs the mandatory pack fights. To keep a healthy hierarchy, he always says. But really, he just likes watching pack members beat the shit out of each other. Since most of them don’t actually move up, it’s all for entertainment.

  My mom despised the fights, of course. A lot of the pack do. But leaving isn’t easy, especially for the families who’ve been on this land for generations upon generations. So, we all just wait and hope that the day will come when Burke is challenged and he loses.

  Until then, my mother was always there, ready to s
et bones before they healed too quickly, to use her magic to ease their pain and calm their wolves. If Burke wants someone to patch up his pack members by the next moon, he’s going to have to get a healer soon. And just the thought of someone taking her place, of living in my home...

  I shake my head and walk down the light-yellow hallway that suddenly feels too narrow. Mom painted it a happy color. She said it would wrap you up in a hug when you came home. But all I feel is cold and lonely as I head for my room. I don’t let myself look in the direction of hers; I don’t want to see the emptiness that’s a reflection of what I feel in my soul.

  The smell of lavender and vetiver greets me as I open my door. I peel off my wet dress and underwear, flopping them into the sink as soon as I walk into the bathroom. It takes me fifteen minutes of just standing under the hot spray of the shower before I feel whole enough to actually wash. Another fifteen to get myself out and dressed in leggings and a long-sleeved shirt, because even though it’s warm out, I feel cold to the bone.

  Another fifteen minutes go by, and all I can do is sit on my bed, staring at the sunset bedsheets we picked out together on our last girls’ day. My skin is crawling, the walls closing in, and I realize I can’t sleep no matter how exhausted I might feel. This used to be my sanctuary, my escape from it all. The four walls of this room have watched over me since I was a kid, but now they just feel as hollow as I do.

  I flee my own bedroom and head back downstairs, only to find myself standing in the doorway to my mom’s supply room. It smells like sage and oleander and something unmistakably her. She loved this room, and even with the clouds still crying outside, I have to admit, it’s calming. I especially love the dried herbs she always has hanging on the wire that runs along the length of it—a way to make the plant live on in the mixtures she made with them.