Chapter Two
Bast O’Connor
Fists and Funeral Pyres
I burst out of the barn. The slightly illegal boxing match I just won has my blood singing with adrenaline. The scent of fear and sweat from the humans inside still fills my nostrils—intoxicating and distracting. I breathe deep, savoring the distraction from the pit where my feelings have been dwelling lately. My split lip throbs, and I run my tongue over it, relishing the coppery taste of my own blood.
That’s when his scent hits me—Liam.
I whip my head around, a growl rumbling low in my throat before I can stop it. He’s leaning against his truck, arms crossed, face set in that particular blend of disappointment and concern that only an older brother can master. My hackles rise instinctively.
“Enjoyed that?” Liam’s voice carries across the yard, dripping with sarcasm.
I spit a glob of blood onto the dusty ground. “What are you doing here?” The words come out as more of a snarl than I intend.
Liam’s eyes narrow, and I catch a whiff of his own anger. “You forgot, didn’t you? Meredith’s funeral is today.”
The name hits me like a rival’s claws to the gut. Meredith—the witch we all considered a favorite aunt. Lost. Gone. She saved our lives, but she’s just another reminder of why I’m out here, letting the beast loose.
I force my lips into a smirk. “Sorry, I lost track,” I say, trying to goad him into hitting me. The fight helped, but fighting humans isn’t the same as taking a hit from another Moonbound wolf.
My skin crawls with unspent energy, my bones aching for the impact only preternatural strength can deliver. A human’s punch might bruise, but a wolf’s blow could break something—and right now, that’s exactly what I need. The pain would ground me, give my restless wolf something to focus on besides the numbing grief of losing a brother and not being able to do a damn thing about it.
Liam pushes off his truck, taking a step toward me.
He’s not going to take the bait and fight me for acting like an ass.
“This isn’t what Jackson would have wanted, Bast. He’d be ashamed to see you like this.”
The mention of our dead brother’s name ignites a fire in my chest. My vision blurs red at the edges, the wolf surging forward with a roar of grief and rage.Low blow!
“Fuck off, Liam.” I bare my teeth. My wolf threatens to emerge, itching to lash out, to make someone—anyone—hurt as much as I do. “You don’t know shit about what Jackson would want. He’s dead, remember?”
The words hang in the air between us, sharp and poisonous. Part of me—the human part—recoils at the cruelty. But the wolf…the wolf just wants to howl its pain to the sky. The wolfwants to paint the mountain with the blood of the people who killed my brother and Meredith.
The silence stretches between us. Liam opens his mouth, probably to lecture me some more, but I cut him off.
“Save it.” I turn away from him. “I’ll meet you at the Court.”
Liam’s gaze bores into my back as I stalk toward my beat-up truck. Part of me wants to turn around, to apologize, to howl out my pain alongside my brother. But the wolf is too close to the surface, too raw. I need space. It’s not like I don’t recognize that these deaths hurt him too, but at least he has his mate now.
“Don’t be late, Bast,” Liam calls out as I yank open the truck’s door.
I don’t respond, just rev the engine and peel out of the makeshift parking lot, spraying gravel like bullets from an automatic rifle.
The mountain roads twist and turn as I head toward town. The steering wheel creaks under my grip, the wolf still simmering beneath my skin. But by the time theWelcome to White Forksign comes into view, my breathing has finally steadied.
White Fork is a postcard-perfect little Colorado mountain town, all rustic charm and tourist-trap quaintness. As I cruise down Main Street, there’s an extra flurry of activity. Colorful banners flutter in the crisp mountain breeze, proclaiming20th Annual Renaissance Fairein flowing script.
Despite everything, I feel the corner of my mouth twitch upward. The whole town goes nuts for this thing—Jackson and I were no exception. We’d go all out with our pirate getups, hamming it up in fake sword fights for the kids. For a second, I can almost hear us trash-talking each other, feeling the sun on my face as we playacted like idiots.
It’s a small bright spot in all this darkness, yanking me back to the good times instead of drowning in what I’ve lost.Doesn’t make it hurt less, but it’s something to hold onto when everything else feels like it’s falling apart.
Outside the Rusty Nail Saloon, a group of men are constructing the arena. And farther down the street, Mrs. Henderson is arranging an elaborate window display of “medieval” costumes in her fabric shop. Even from here, I can see that most of them are about as historically accurate as a motorcycle at a jousting tournament. But hell, the tourists eat it up every year.
As I idle at a stop sign, a group of giggling teenagers crosses in front of me, arms filled with fake swords and shields. One of them, a gangly kid with a mop of red hair, catches my eye and freezes like a deer in headlights.
Right. I probably look like hell, fresh from the fight. Even with the faster healing ability my wolf gives me, my bruises won’t be gone until later tonight.
