Chapter 133 It's Time
ADRIANA
Getting through to Elijah had taken longer than it should have, mostly because I had needed to sit with my own stubbornness for a while before I was ready to let it go.
The anger had been real and I didn’t want to dismiss it by moving past it too quickly. He had kept something significant from me and I had every right to feel what I felt about that. But somewhere in the middle of the second night, lying in the dark and listening to the quiet of this unfamiliar pack, I had reached the bottom of the anger and found that what was underneath it was simpler and harder to argue with.
I missed him.
I had used my powers to reach through the mind link even though he hadn’t marked me yet. That was something I was still getting used to, the way my abilities filled in gaps that shouldn’t have been there. When his voice arrived it had been so immediate and familiar that something in my chest unknotted before he’d even finished saying my name.
He was coming. He needed to bury Jane first, and I understood that. I would wait.
In the meantime there was work to do.
Hazel had arrived before him, which I was grateful for. Having her here meant the men could begin preparing properly without waiting for Elijah, and every hour we moved faster was an hour in our favor. Yara had been clear about the timeline.
We had a week, maybe slightly less, before things moved into a phase where preparation became less useful than reaction, and I did not want to be reacting.
I watched Hazel sharpen her dagger at the table and thought about how quietly extraordinary she was. She had just traveled a significant distance, arrived in an unfamiliar pack, and within an hour was already working, already oriented, already three steps into organizing the men without making a production of it.
“You don’t seem surprised,” I said.
She paused and looked at me. “About what exactly?”
“About any of it. Everything that’s happened. Everything I’ve done. You’ve never asked me how I find things out. You didn’t ask how I reached Elijah through the link without a mark. You didn’t ask how I knew it was time.” I paused. “Why not?”
She set the dagger down and gave me a look that was straightforward and a little amused.
“Because it’s not my job to ask. It’s my job to respond to what I’m given. If my Alpha tells me something is happening and I need to prepare, I prepare. All the rest of it is above my pay grade and honestly, I don’t need it.” She tilted her head slightly. “Does it bother you that I’m not asking?”
“No,” I said honestly. “It’s a relief, actually.”
“Good.” She picked the dagger back up. “Then let’s talk about where we actually are.”
“How far along are the men?”
“Further than I expected, which is a good sign. They should be ready within a few days. The question is what exactly we’re preparing them for, because right now I’ve been working from general readiness and that only takes you so far.”
I went quiet for a moment, reaching for Yara.
“A week,” she said. “At most.”
“We have a week,” I told Hazel.
She nodded, processing that without visible alarm.
“That’s workable. It’s tight but it’s workable.” She looked at me. “You need to address the pack, Adriana. Whatever is coming, they need to hear from you directly. They’re watching you right now and they’re deciding whether you’re real or whether you’re temporary. You need to give them an answer.”
I knew she was right. I had been turning this over since I arrived. The knowledge that standing up in front of these people and telling them something was coming would generate chaos and questions I couldn’t fully answer.
They would want to know why. They would want details I couldn’t give them without exposing things I needed to keep protected.
But the alternative was standing in front of them having never spoken and expecting them to follow me into something difficult.
“I know,” I said. “I’ll do it.”
Hazel gave me a small nod that communicated both approval and the expectation that I meant it.
She left shortly after to check on the men’s progress, and I sat alone with Yara in the quiet.
I thought about what it would mean to shift freely again. I hadn’t done it since that first time. I hadn’t let myself, because part of me was still finding my footing with Yara and with the scope of what we apparently were together. But Yara had been making noises about it. Said I needed experience, real muscle memory, if I was going to be able to do it under pressure.
She was right about that too.
Then Elijah’s voice arrived in my head, quieter than usual.
“Are you busy right now?”
“No. What’s happening?”
I heard him breathe out. Not a sigh exactly, more like a man who had been holding something for several hours and was deciding whether to put it down.
“It’s the burial today. Leo won’t come out of his room. I’ve tried everything I can think of and none of it is working and I don’t know what else to do.”
“Where is his toy train? Does he have it with him?”
“I think so, yes.”
“And the photograph — the one he kept under his pillow. Do you have it?”
A pause.
“He ripped it. When he was in the hospital the last time, I brought it to him and he ripped it. I think it was the grief coming out somehow. I didn’t push it.” Another pause. “You think he’d want something like that now?”
I thought about my mother’s burial. About the way I had held her locket in my closed fist the entire time, held it until the metal left marks in my palm, because having something of hers in my hand made it feel like some part of her was still close enough to touch.
“Find something of Jane’s. Something small that she left behind. Give it to him and don’t make a big thing of it. Just put it in his hand. He doesn’t need words right now — he needs something to hold on to.”
He was quiet for a long moment.
“Thank you. I mean it.” His voice was softer now. “I’ll be with you as soon as I can. We’ll talk properly when I get there.”
I held the connection for a moment after he’d gone, not quite ready to release it.
Then Yara spoke.
“We need to talk about your training. The men need Hazel. What you need is something else entirely.” She paused. “It’s time to call the sisters, Adriana.”
The sisters had told me to call if I ever reached the point where I genuinely needed them. They had said it simply and without condition, and I had tucked it away in the back of my mind like something I hoped I’d never have to use.
I looked around the quiet room and thought about the week we had, and the Cult, and the people moving toward us from directions I couldn’t fully see yet.
“Alright,” I said.
“Alright?”
“Yes, it’s time.”