Wolfsong (Green Creek 1)

I felt it. I felt all of it.

The fire was hot against my face.

The songs howled around me were as loud as I’d ever heard them.

They hollowed me out. Made my skin brittle and tight. I was a shell compared to what I’d been only days before. I didn’t know what to fill the space with. I didn’t know if there was anything to fill the space with.

The fire died down, eventually. Until it was nothing but ember and ash.

It’d be spread later throughout the territory.

But for now, the strange wolves left.

Our pack remained.

We inhaled the smoke and it filled our lungs until we coughed it away.

Gordo left then. Hands in his pocket, head lowered.

Mark was next. He headed away from the Bennett house, deeper into the woods. We wouldn’t see him again for two days.

Carter and Kelly left with their mother, one on either side of her, holding her upright as she stumbled, legs weak.

It was just Joe and me then.

He sat on his haunches, watching the last lick of flame, the last burst of sparks.

I sat beside him, leaning against his side.

He huffed out a breath as he towered over me.

I pressed against him harder.

He snorted, eyes flashing.

The heat from the pyre began to fade away.

And still we stayed.

Night birds cried.

An owl called.

I said, “I’m here.”

Joe scratched the grass with a giant paw.

I said, “Whenever you’re ready.”

His ears twitched.

“We’ll figure this out.”

He whined in the back of his throat.

“We have to.”

He bent his head down, running his nose along my cheek. My neck. Behind my ear, huffing his scent onto me like he hadn’t done since he’d become the Alpha.