The druid, who watched me constantlyanyway, was now practically perched everywhere I looked. Those mismatched eyes following me constantly, waiting for my next mistake.
Because I was making mistakes, no question. My nose caught the scent of orchid and vanilla, and I knew she was close. Rowen, perhaps the only thing I hadn’t fucked up yet.Yet. Was that because I’dalreadyfucked up with her and we were now past it or because she was genuinely the only good thing to come of all of this?
I looked across the grassy knolls, to the path that led deeper into the Hollow. Did my answers lie at the foot of the Heartwood? Would the Goddess answer me this time if I asked my questions?
I knew now why I was drawn back to Blueridge Hollow. I mean, I’d always known, because of Rowen, but coming here to ensure my first heartbreak wassafewas a helluva lot different than returning here to find a true mate and become alpha of a pack when I already had a pack, ahappypack, west of here.
My head dipped as I looked down at the mist curling over my feet as I stood here. The grass was greener here; everything seemed fueled with magic. Magic I didn’t understand and, frankly, didn’twantto know.
But…what happened the other day with my Will…it shook me. It literally shook the Hollow. I avoided using my Will because a good leader, a strong alpha, shouldn’t need to use it. But I’d never heard of itbuildinglike that. It had unnerved me, and I hadn’t beenunnervedsince the afternoon I decided to kiss Rowen for the first time when we were younger.
My body felt fine—better than it should, considering how fatigued I’d felt after it. But my mind hadn’t caught up.
Or perhaps my issue was that my mind hadn’t stopped. Thinking over and over, again and again, of what was happening under the surface of this Hollow. Corrin was in the cells, half-broken. Galvin was still in his chair in his home, smug behind the protection of age and the fact that I couldn’t find anything to actually pin on him. Which he knew.Bastard. One of my own guys—Cody, Axel, Brand, hell, even Thalia—they took turns watching his place, but so far we’d seen nothing.
This pack was splintered by more than a merger of two packs. Loyalty lines were fractured, and those cuts ran a lot deeper than a new alpha in the Hollow. We hadn’t even begun to uncover how deep it ran, and as I stood here taking in the sacred Hollow, I wondered if we ever would.
If it was a coup, which everything pointed that it was, then who was in the shadows, waiting to take my place? Malric had no sons, so it wasn’t an overlooked heir. His heir stood by my side,supportingme. I frowned. I still needed to talk to Rowen about suspecting her. Goddess, there wassomuch I still had to do. I wanted to return to Stonefang, run the stone of the land that was my home. But I couldn’t leave. I couldn’t leave this pack right now. Luna only knew what the hell I’d return to.
A bush rustled, and I held back the heavy sigh. “Do you grow tired of watching me?”
“I thought I would,” the druid said calmly as they stepped out of the shrubbery. “But I haven’t yet. Isn’t that fascinating?”
“No.” I turned to look at them. “It’s fucking creepy.” I looked them over, ash robes torn and tattered at the hems. “Please tell me you weren’t actually in the bushes watching me?”
A smile played around their lips, but they held up their hand, showing me a black bundle which, on closer inspection, revealed the half-mauled carcass of a crow. I drew back with a scowl.
“Need new feathers?”
This time their smile was wide. “I was seeking a dove, but I came across this and thought, why waste what is already provided?”
“And you were looking for the bird of peace for…”
The druid looked at me and raised a brow. “Peace. Obviously.”
“Obviously,” I muttered. “Nothing says peace more than an animal sacrifice.”
The druid walked towards the patch that led to the Heartwood. “Exactly.” They didn’t look back. “Come, you can join me.”
It wasn’t so much an invitation as a command, and with no better reason not to, I followed.
The Heartwood stood tall and solid, its trunk rising far into the low mists that seemed to cling to it no matter the weather. Dark green leaves glistened in the low light, and I wondered if anyone had ever seen it in direct sunlight. The Hollow was thick with tree canopy vegetation and Appalachian mists; it was a wonder the tree grew at all.
“She climbed it when she was five,” the druid told me conversationally as they knelt before the tree and started plucking the feathers from the crow.
“What?”
“Rowen,” they explained. “She was alone, there was nowhere to grip, too young to shift, so no claws, but she scaled the trunk and climbed to the utmost branches.”
I huffed out a laugh. “It doesn’t surprise me.”
“Couldn’t get down, of course,” the druid continued, a fond smile on their face. “Took three of her father’s men to reach her, and her mother sent her to bed that night without supper.” They set aside some of the feathers. I noticed they were the least damaged and knew without asking that they would soon be pinned to their robes. “I asked her the next day why she would be so disrespectful as to climb the Heartwood like it was any other tree. Do you know what she said to me?”
“It’s just a tree.”
“Exactly.” They nodded. “She said, ‘It’s just a tree, Druid. The Goddess isn’t inside it, she’s all around it.’”
“You believe that?”
