Rabid: The Savage Spirit of Seneca Rain Read online

  She was always in here puttering around, mixing up ointments, arranging bandages, planning for births, and making natural remedies for our pack for things that didn’t need her magic. If only I’d been born with the gift too, then I would be valuable. I’d have leverage to apply to join a new pack and leave Burke and his unwanted attention behind.

  Instead, I’m nothing.

  I can’t leave without the alpha’s permission. Not unless I want to abandon the ways of my people and live as a human. Even then, I risk being discovered and returned. Pack alliances are fragile, which means even if I could find a pack that would take me in no questions asked, they might be at risk of attack from Twin Rivers. Who’s going to do that for a nobody like me?

  I sigh and reach up to gently stroke the dried petals of a hanging dog violet and glance around at all the things my mom won’t be using. An abrupt knock on the door makes me flinch, and I whirl around and rush out, passing the living room and kitchen to see who it is. Swinging the front door open, I find Hess standing there soaked through, with two bottles of beer in one hand and a grim expression on his face.

  I frown in confusion for a moment, but quietly stand aside while he clomps in. The old curmudgeon kicks off his wet shoes by the door so as not to track in water and mud, and we both know it’s because my mom would have given him a glare otherwise.

  “Did you walk all the way here from your house?” I ask, taking in the mud-stained hem of his pants, and the now see-through button-down shirt as I close the door.

  “Yep.” He walks straight to the kitchen where he flips on the lights and puts down the bottles on the bar before easing himself onto one of the stools.

  I hesitate awkwardly in the doorway, surprised that he’s here. Ever since my dad died three years ago, he’s been a good friend to my mom, but he and I never really formed any sort of relationship. I’ve always been polite but distant, and that was fine with him. I’m glad my mom was able to get through her grief with Hess’s help, but he’s not my dad, and we were never close, so this impromptu visit feels awkward.

  Hess tugs out a keyring from his pocket and uses a bottle opener to flip off both caps. Heartbroken gray eyes rise to meet mine, and he slides the second beer to the open seat next to him. “Sit,” he says, rubbing the dark blond scruff on his jaw as water drips from his wheat-toned short hair.

  I slip onto the stool, staring at the dark brown offering. “You know I’m not twenty-one quite yet.”

  Hess doesn’t even look over at me, just takes a long gulp from his bottle. “Please, you really want me to believe you’ve never had a beer before? Besides it’s just a month out,” he grunts. “I figured if there was any time you’d need a drink, it was tonight.”

  He lifts his bottle, and I take mine in my hand so he can clink them together. “To Delaney.”

  My throat goes tight at the sound of her name, at the wetness that gathers in his eyes.

  “To Mom,” I repeat.

  Together, we drink in silence, with just the rain and our sips to fill the air of the kitchen that’s splashed with greens and yellows and somehow feels so much less cheery than it ever has before.

  Hess and my mom bonded over the loss of their mates, and I thought for a while that maybe he had a thing for my mom. I even gave her my blessing one night as we made cookies and salves and lost ourselves to laughter and girl-talk. Turns out, they didn’t see each other in that way, they both simply understood loneliness and loss, so they made an effort to be there for each other.

  “She shouldn’t have died.”

  Hess looks over at me from the corner of his eye, and I wait to see what he’ll say.

  “Terrible accident,” he grunts out, but I don’t miss how he gulps down the rest of his beer in one swig.

  My heart drops at the way he’s already given in. There’s no one to challenge or question what happened to her, just me, and what can I do against so many? I feel even more alone than before. I want to be mad, but how can I really blame him? None of us are what we used to be. Burke’s made sure of that, made sure to turn our pack into a distrusting, cowardly lot who turn a blind eye to everything wrong.

  When his beer is gone, Hess pivots to look at me again. “You nervous?”

  I don’t have to ask what he’s talking about. “Yeah,” I reply with a nod, my fingers picking at the label on the bottle. “I mean, I obviously knew this day was coming, and I’m excited to finally get my wolf. But doing it without Mom or Dad…”

  “You’ll be fine.”

  I cut him a look. “The Flux can be agonizing. Some people die.”

  That used to be my biggest fear about the ceremony, that I wouldn’t be strong enough to take on my wolf, but now, it’s Burke that floods me with trepidation and dread.

  Hess shrugs and scratches the stubble over his chin, wiry gray hairs starting to mix in with the dark blond. “Yeah, maybe so. But for some people, it’s like being able to breathe right for the first time. Your mom for instance. When she got her wolf, she just smiled and sighed, like she finally felt at home in her own skin.”

  My lips tug. “That sounds like her.”

  The rain seems to slow its drizzle as I take another drink, the bitter bubbles pairing well with the tepid sadness inside of me. This is nice, actually. Sitting here with Hess, the one person left in this pack who’d actually talk to me about her. Maybe this is his olive leaf, maybe he’s showing me that even though she’s gone, I’m not alone.

  “Did your mom go over what you can expect?” he asks, and I can tell the question makes him feel uncomfortable. I nearly laugh at his venture into the Totemic Wolves birds and the bees talk, but he’s off the hook. I’m aware of how it all goes down.

  “Yeah, I know about the rituals and the preparation. That the Spirit Weaver will call down the wolf spirits and then give the bite to draw the wolf inside of the person it chooses.” I look down at my forearm as if I can already see the mark that will be there. “The Weaver will sing the old songs of our shifter ancestors while the pack offers fresh meat to the wolf spirits.”

  I purposefully leave out the rest about the pain, potential death, and the first shift if the Flux is successful. I also leave out everything my mom explained about claimings and wolf nature, and how the spirits we protect inside of us can drive us instinctually, more or less overriding logic or the human thought processes.

  Hess nods, and the kitchen grows quiet again as he stares unseeing at the floor. I wonder what he’s thinking about, but the look in his eyes tells me it’s deep and personal, so I leave him to it. We’re not close enough for me to go there.

  I tip back my beer, finishing it off with a couple of deep pulls, wishing it would help make all of this go away, but Hess was right. It’s not my first beer, and I have too high a tolerance for this to do anything anyway. I suppose that’s a good thing though. As much as I’d love a drunken escape, Burke is on the hunt, and I can’t take the risk of being black-out vulnerable around him.

  “Seneca,” Hess starts, and I can tell by the way my name falls out of his mouth that whatever he’s about to say is going to suck. He releases a deep breath and turns to look at me, his gray eyes filled with pain so raw it makes my breath catch. “I’m leaving the Twin Rivers pack,” he announces, and it feels like a kick to the gut.

  Surprise and disbelief war for my attention and my shoulders sag slightly with defeat. Just when I think I can’t be any more alone and exposed, my last line of defense against the predators here announces he’s leaving. Heat crawls up my throat, and I try to stomp down the hurt and betrayal I feel. He wasn’t here to extend an olive branch after all. He was here to yank the roots out entirely.

  “Oh,” I reply, my voice rough, not sure what else to say. I’m upset, but at the same time, I get it. If I had the luxury of leaving, I’d be right there with him, but I don’t. Burke will never agree to let me go.

  “I’m sorry,” he rushes to tell me in a rare glimpse of guilt. “I just can’t stay here anymore. There’s no
thing for me here. My mate has been gone for a long time, and now that your mother…”

  His nothing for me here statement stings, but I shove it away, burying it under all the hurt already weighing me down.

  “Where will you go?” I ask, my voice a little smaller than it was when he first walked through the door. Even though we aren’t close, I still counted him as a permanent figure in my life. To hear that he’s leaving is like a hit to the jaw.

  “My brother is alpha of Plummet Lake pack. But I... You should come with me,” he offers, and I’m taken aback by the gesture.

  Unfortunately, we both know that’s all it is, a gesture.

  I try to give him an understanding smile, but when he drops his eyes from mine with a gleam of guilt in them, I suspect it turned out to look more like a grimace. “I wish I could, but Alpha isn’t going to let me go just like that.”

  “There’s no guarantee that your wolf will accept him as a mate,” Hess challenges, some of the sadness sloughing off of him to reveal the dominant beta that he normally is.

  I raise a brow. “Do you really think Burke will care?” I counter, filling the question with more annoyance than I mean to. “I mean, if Mom was still here, he wouldn’t dare, but…”

  But there’s nothing stopping him now.

  I love what I am and where I come from, I just wish pricks like Burke didn’t have to taint it all with their lust for power and control, for their dislike of the word no. I also wish there were more wolves out there who would put a stop to alphas like him. Unfortunately, the pack leaders only get together once a year, and there’s not exactly a forum for members to attend where we can complain about the leadership or air our grievances. It’s our duty as pack members to submit—that one word completely ingrained into our culture.

  It doesn’t help that those who get their wolf spirits in the Flux have another side to them that follows a whole different set of rules. Animalistic rules that are more about brute and brawn and the strongest genes for survival. Wolves are about pack and hierarchy. It’s difficult to demand equality and rights when your animal happily submits to maintain pack balance and secure a strong mate.

  Knowing my luck, the spirit I get will be an omega, and then I’ll constantly be at war with my head and my soul, bowing down to anyone and everyone who demands it of me.

  Ugh.

  It’s sacrilegious and very frowned upon in our culture to hope for one thing over another. The wolf chooses wisely is what I’ve been taught since I was in the womb, but I can’t help but hope for a beta, or at worst, a delta.

  A howl rends the air, echoing from the distance, calling for a gathering of some sort. I groan and rub a hand down my face. I can probably ignore it since I have a good excuse for not wanting to be social. But I should leave just in case a certain asshole comes by looking for me.

  “You should go, Hess,” I encourage, pushing up off my stool. “Like you said, there’s nothing for you here. You deserve to be happy. Mom would want that for you, and so do I,” I tell him, tossing my empty bottle into the bin and thinking through the safest places I could go right now where none of the other pack members will be.

  “I didn’t mean it like that,” Hess interjects, but I wave his concern away.

  He did, and that’s okay. It’s time I start figuring things out and accepting that I’m all I’ve got now. No point holding a grudge against Hess who’s also trying to do what’s best for him.

  “I’ll stay until after the Flux. Make sure you’re okay,” he tells me, and I offer him a smile that I know doesn’t quite reach my eyes.

  If he’s leaving that soon, it means he already has permission from Burke, confirming my suspicions that his asking me to come is nothing more than a formality. I bet Burke signed that transfer order quicker than he’s ever signed anything. One more wall between us is gone, and he didn’t even have to kill anyone this time to make it happen.

  “I gotta go, Hess,” I announce thickly, and before he can object or so much as stand up, I’m out the door.

  My world is falling apart, and there’s nothing I can do to stop it.

  Outside, I see pack members heading into the woods, jogging away from their houses, but I don’t follow them. I need to be alone. I need to be safe. The problem is that I’m not safe here. My wellbeing isn’t a factor in anything that’s happening. My mom is barely cold in the ground and already, I’m wading through threats and thieves lying in wait to steal my choices, my freedom.

  I have to leave.

  The realization sinks into my spirit, dampening me more than the last of the light rain still misting from the sky. But as soon as I face the facts, I know it’s the right thing to do. If I get my wolf, I lose the last barrier I have keeping back Burke.

  I need to figure out how the hell I’m going to get out of here. Twin Rivers has been all I’ve known my entire life. I was born here, and I thought I’d die here. But as I start to run in the opposite direction of the pack gathering, the cool air doing nothing to soothe my fevered skin, I realize this place is no longer my home. It’s all just a trap. A trap that Burke is waiting for me to walk into.

  My hair flies behind me as I pick up my pace as though I’m running from something that I’m not sure I can escape. Alpha Burke is coming for me, but I’d sooner die than be claimed by him, the male who brought a pack war here to Twin Rivers. The male who let loose his band of rogues, killing our old alpha and countless others.

  Murdering my dad.

  If I stay here, I have a feeling it’ll be me who’s destroyed next. Maybe not in the dead in a grave kind of way, but certainly my soul will shrivel and shatter, and I’ll be broken beneath the rule of a cruel male.

  Somehow, that seems worse.

  Chapter Two

  My run lasts well into the night.

  A Cheshire cat grin of a moon hangs in the sky, ringed with a nighttime rainbow, the air heavy with cloying fog. Even though I don’t have my wolf spirit yet, I’m a natural-born Totemic shifter, which means I was made to share the body and soul of a sacred wolf. My senses are sharper than a human’s, my body quick and limber.

  Which is why it doesn’t bother me in the slightest to be barefoot in the wild, my soles soaking up every damp step in the forest. The smells and sensations are a balm to my battered soul, and it all makes me feel less alone. Like I can feel the people I love still watching over me through the canopy of the trees.

  My dad and I used to race each other through these woods. We would come home with brambles in our hair and splinters in our feet, and Mom would pluck them out one by one. She would scold us and then we’d all laugh and raid the kitchen to replenish the energy we just burned off. The memory fades, and with it goes all doubt and concern over what I’ve decided. This run was exactly what I needed. There’s a sort of clarity that comes with it, like my expanding lungs expand my thoughts too.

  Things are solidified now. I’m not going to go through with the ceremony that I’ve been preparing for my entire life. I’m not going to be able to take in my wolf. And as much as that grieves me, I know it’s my only shot at a life. A real life, minus the subjugation and threats that exist around every corner here, where I can choose for myself and be me without fear of being broken for it.

  I’ll have to live like a human. I’ll have to sacrifice my heritage, my ancestors, my second half, but it’s the only way. After the Flux, my wolf will have to answer to her alpha, whether Burke claims her for a mate or not, and I can’t willingly subject myself or her to that life.

  Bypassing the other pack houses, I skirt around the edge of the forest, my internal compass pointing me back home. The scent of pine trees fills my senses, wet needles and damp soil breathing out into the air like nature is exhaling with me.

  With trudging steps, I reach my dark and quiet house and head to my room, where I pass out in bed almost as soon as my head hits the pillow. It’s a choppy, troubled sleep, filled with dreams of a wolf crying at a moonless sky, lost and wandering in the spirit world.


  I wake up several hours later with sore, swollen eyes, like all the pent-up emotion has clogged them with unshed tears. Guilt tugs at my chest at the dream of my wolf spirit out there somewhere knowing I’m abandoning her, knowing that she’s going to come down during the ceremony and not find me there waiting for her.

  I’m sorry.

  I shove the regret aside and force myself to go through the motions. Showering again, I get dressed in jeans and a gray shirt, feet slipping into socks and worn-in sneakers. While my long brown hair air dries, I grab a backpack from my closet and begin to roll up carefully chosen clothes. Jeans, drab T-shirts, plenty of socks and underwear, nothing bright, everything as plain as possible so as not to draw attention.

  Toiletries go in next, and in no time, my bag is near bursting. I grab a waterproof jacket and consider the phone on my nightstand but decide against it. The last thing I want to do is make it easier for Burke to track me. Besides, who do I have to call anyway?

  For no other reason than it’s been hammered into me since I was little, I find myself making my bed, straightening my pillows, and tucking in my sheets, just the way my mom insisted. “Life can be messy, Seneca, so make sure the bed you lie in isn’t.”

  A sad smile quirks my lips as I step back, and then with my shoulder straps tugged tight around me, I walk out, forcing myself to head toward the door at the opposite end of the hallway. My fingers trail over the wainscotting, the family pictures hanging up above, covering nearly every inch of available wall. It’s like walking past paused memories that were once happy but now just feel haunting. When I get to the closed door, I have to take a steadying breath before I’m able to open it and walk inside.