"Tie them on the stake," Tessa ordered.
I couldn’t believe my eyes. Tessa was going to execute my friends ... people who’d given me warmth and joy, the kind I’d never felt before.
I wanted to beg for them, but I couldn’t. They’d ask me serious questions I wouldn’t be able to answer. I wished, somewhere deep in my heart, that Leah or Freya would tell the truth when they were questioned.
Tessa kept asking them, in the freezing air of the Winterwood field, "Who helped you escape?"
They didn’t answer. Tessa moved closer and started slapping them, whipping them with canes.
At one point, Leah spat on her. "You’re miserable," she said, "and you’ll be miserable forever."
Before long, the entire field filled with people who’d come to watch. Tessa disgusted me from that moment on.
Kael even walked away at one point. He said the most important thing to him was seeing his Alpha alive before pursuing justice. He tried to appeal to Tessa on behalf of the wolves at the stake ... people I already considered family. But Tessa’s mind was made up.
"Set the guns," she commanded.
One of the soldiers, clearly shaken, asked, "Are you sure, ma’am?"
She looked at him with disdain. "Do you want to join them up there?" He fell in line immediately, and so did the rest.
Seven soldiers raised their guns.
"Arrange yourselves. Get ready to fire," she told them, and they obeyed. She wanted to kill helpless wolves whose only crime was wanting freedom ... freedom to live, freedom to love and be loved. To me, this was the peak of wickedness.
"Any last words?" she asked them.
Freya looked at me first, then turned her eyes on Tessa. "You’ll never become Luna. You don’t know what it means. Power should never belong to bitches like you. Everything you’ve done will hunt you for eternity. Tell Lucian I’ll be waiting for both of you in hell."
Freya took Leah’s hand, and they closed their eyes together.
"Fire," Tessa said.
The soldiers opened fire, again and again, until Freya and Leah were gone.
The whole crowd gasped. I couldn’t hold myself together ... I cried. Tessa thought she’d delivered justice, but she had no idea she’d just woken sleeping lions. I was gutted. I ran inside and cried until it hurt.
When will I ever get to feel real happiness? I asked myself. Every chance I got, it was ripped away. First my mate. Now this. What could possibly fill the emptiness sitting in my chest?
I found some of the other she-wolves in the passage, and we held each other and wept. We’d lost two souls who meant everything to us ... but clearly meant nothing to the pack, since they’d been cut down like they were nobody.
The locksmith wolf came to me, tears in her eyes, the others watching.
"You’re our leader now," she said.
I shook my head, not agreeing.
They all gathered around me, hands on my back, trying to steady me.
"You can do this," the locksmith girl said. "We just lost two of our own. We have to be strong right now."
I was still too overwhelmed to think straight.
"This isn’t the time for this," I sobbed, and I pulled away from them to go check on Lucian.
Our Alpha was still critical, still unconscious. He had no idea what was happening in his own territory ... that his unmarked Luna had just executed two of his breeders. And now they wanted to make me the leader of the breeders. I didn’t even know the name of the girl who’d suggested it. I needed to find out.
After checking on Lucian, I went back to where Leah and Freya had been killed. Their bodies had already been taken down, prepared for burial. I couldn’t even look at them. They could have put me in the ground with them, but instead they chose to die for me.
Should I go and confess to Kael? Tell him everything?
It was too much to carry. I wanted to set the weight down, but it wouldn’t let me.
Where was Tessa? Probably laughing, twirling around like a child who’d gotten exactly what she wanted. I didn’t think justice would ever be served unless I turned myself in.
I almost went. But then I stopped myself. Leah and Freya wouldn’t have given their lives for me if they didn’t want something from me. They wouldn’t want me joining them in the land of the dead.
They’d want me to make them proud in the land of the living.
And that could only mean one thing: they’d want retribution for what was done to them.
I pulled myself up off the ground, out of my own tears.
I would take the offer to lead. I would build a plan to bring Tessa Crane down, piece by piece, until I’d taken every last bit of revenge.
That’s what I told myself.
When I got back, they welcomed me like they’d known all along I’d come around.
"We knew you’d change your mind. Welcome, leader," the locksmith said.
I forced a smile. "I still don’t know your name," I said.
"Oh ... I’m Valerie," she said, smiling back.
"Nice to meet you. I promise I won’t let you down again."
"You never let us down," Valerie said. "We trust the destination. We believe in the process. Welcome aboard, Selene."
That lit something in everyone. They broke into near-silent claps, careful not to be heard outside.
It was an honor. I was ready to give everything I had. And the biggest thing driving me was the burn in my chest, screaming one word over and over: revenge.