87

87
KADE
The seer’s last words replayed in my head. I shoved my hand into my pocket and shifted my weight from one foot to another. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Lucian staring at the door angrily.
It was obvious that he was resisting the urge to bang on it or take it off its hinges so he could give her a piece of his mind. He had a look in his eyes that expressed how the entire session distressed him as much as it did me.
“You were right, Kade,” he mumbled and cursed. “This was a waste of time. Let’s go.” He started walking out of the building with his head bowed.
I followed behind quietly, terribly trying to find the guts to tell him the classic ‘I told you so’—but I couldn’t bring myself to. Yes, coming here seemed like a futile venture in the beginning, but now, given that I was getting time to mull over everything we had heard, an irritating wave of disbelief and anxiety enveloped me.
I felt like I was missing out on something important, but at the same time, it was still too ludicrous to wrap my head around.
“You seem awfully quiet,” Lucian’s voice interrupted my thoughts, and I looked up. We were standing on the curb outside the building, and the wind was starting to pick up as it blew a piece of paper past us.
“I… I don’t know what to think,” I stammered and reached for the car door. I was so lost in thought, I hadn’t noticed how quickly we had gotten here. He walked over to the driver’s seat, unlocked the car, and we got in.
“You don’t believe her, do you?” he said and started the ignition.
I let out a small chuckle and shrugged. “What would she be trying to achieve by lying?” I added after a short silence. He had gotten the car onto the road and was driving home slowly.
“Oh, for goodness’ sake, you can’t possibly believe her. I know we have a lot of problems, but none of them can be caused by some fairytale oath our ancestors took. And there’s nothing the omega has to offer us that would contribute to de-escalating our current issues.”
“While I don’t completely agree with what she said, it seems rather reductive to rule out the option. The council has always talked about the prophecy. All our lives we’ve heard about things that wouldn’t make sense to the ordinary mind. But our reality is different—we don’t live like others do—and it wouldn’t hurt to verify the facts we’ve been given today.”
“I don’t know what has sparked this sudden change in your opinion, but you sound just as crazy as the seer did.”
“She’s a seer, Lucian—sounding crazy comes with the job description. I keep thinking about her last words. What could she possibly mean when she said it was unfortunate that we aren’t the pack’s undoing?”
“I don’t know, and quite frankly, I couldn’t bring myself to care if I tried. Maybe she meant that we were going to be the ones who save the pack—but from what? And doesn’t that rhetoric feed into the constant panicking the council is known for? None of this makes sense.”
“That’s a thought. But it might also mean that beyond us, there’s something else that would affect the pack. And our reluctance to hear what she has to say about it might aid that misfortune. But you’re right—whatever she meant by that, it doesn’t change the fact that we can’t be with Ella Harper.”
“It’s unheard of for Alphas to be with Omegas. We won’t be the first to tow that line,” he responded and scoffed.
I nodded slowly and chose silence. We were in agreement about that part of the situation, but I was still a little bit curious about everything else. I decided I was going to ask my mom for any details she knew about this pact my family was said to have initiated with the Harpers.
Hopefully, she had some information that would make this comprehensible. But I wasn’t going to suggest this to Lucian. There was no point trying to—his mind was made up about the situation, and perhaps, for all our sakes, it was best to keep things that way.
“I’m going to join the scouts to patrol the woods. Wanna come?” Lucian asked a few minutes later.
“No, I think I’m going to head home. After the day we just had, I want to lie in bed and fall asleep. Any news about Langdon’s killers?”
“No. We only know what the cops have said about the incident, and that’s really annoying. We need to find out more information, but where are we supposed to look?” he replied in a frustrated tone and threw his hand up in the air.
I sighed as he held onto the wheel once more and took a left turn. “If only we could find out what pack did this.
But the odds that it was done by another werewolf seem rather slim. Why would they hang his body at the school gate?” I said.
“That’s the question I’ve been asking since this entire fiasco began. I can’t seem to come up with any answers, but hopefully, we can find some in the woods.”
“I hope so,” I answered. His tone had a hint of defeat in it, and I was doing everything to ensure that it didn’t rub off on me.
I don’t know who or what killed Langdon, but I knew that they weren’t going to stop there, and we had to get to them before they got to us. I also knew details that I couldn’t tell Lucian, because how was I supposed to explain that I had sent some rogue wolves there to toughen him up?
What would I tell him was the motive behind that? And for all I knew, the cops could get wind of that piece of information if it slipped into unwanted territory.
The police would start questioning us soon. None of the other people who knew about that night were going to be questioned—if they followed my orders and stayed as far away as possible.
We took one more turn and ended up on the street leading to our house. When we got there, Lucian stayed in the car while I alighted. He sent his regards to our mom and promised to be back soon.
I was happy to be home and looked forward to spending time alone before she came back or Lucian was done scouting. As I made my way to the front door, my thoughts shifted to Ella.
I thought about the last conversation we had and wondered if she knew about this pact with her people. Perhaps that was the real reason she left with Quincy—and not my initial conclusion of her being excited to have someone finally look her way.
I also thought that her fleeing was because she was scared to join whatever fight was coming—but maybe I was wrong. There was only one way to find out, but I wasn’t interested in embarking on an expedition right now.