Page 28 of Wolf Trial

You’re not a hunk of meat, that breathless, awed voice blurted. You’re an angel, fallen from the skies.

Fallen from that hill over there, the sharp one quipped and—

I can hear you, I blurted, and yet… I couldn’t hear my voice. Not in sound. And yet…

Breathe, alianaza, the calm one said, and it hit me so fast that I scrambled backwards, trying to throw up my hands to ward them off.

The wolves. I could hear the wolves in my head.

CHAPTER 17

SADIE

Told you she’d hyperventilate, the sharp one remarked as I backed up, trembling. My fur stood on end. My fur stood on end.1

I growled deep in my throat, the sound more instinct than anything. Loud. Powerful. And not at all human.

The next sound to leave me was a whimper.

The biggest of the wolves prowled closer as I tripped over my feet again. His fur was an ashen colour, and light seemed to glow through eyes the colour of dark chocolate. Rich and so deep I could fall into them if he wasn’t about to attack me.

I’m not going to attack you, he said calmly. Neither are these two idiots. You can hear our voices because we’re all pack. There’s a bond that connects us.

Two bonds, the breathless wolf said—the smallest, his fur a pale silver, eyes a dark colour I couldn’t place even with my enhanced sight.

Why can I… why can I hear you? I whispered, all my fight fleeing at once. I can hear you, and I can’t walk right, and I don’t sound right.

I didn’t want to put them together, but my mind was racing, knocking one thought into the next.

And the terror that coursed through me made it impossible to breathe. Because there was no way, right? There was absolutely no way that my paranoid thoughts were true. Because if they were, and I went back to Lunova, they would kill me on sight.

It was the sharp one who spoke, and a wolf came forward, with the blue eyes so pale they were almost white. The voice belonged to the wolf who moved towards me. Maybe if I said it a few more times it would feel more real, and not just the product of a well-earned mental break.

You can hear us, he said with brutal truth, because you are a wolf now. We found your broken body at the bottom of that hill and you died. And for some godforsaken, stupid reason my alpha thought it was a good idea to save you. If it was up to me, I would’ve left you to die there in the cold, where you belong.

Pain, as bad as anything I’d felt before, ripped a hole in my chest, and I staggered back. A whine filled the air, and even though it completely matched the aching, ripping feeling inside me, it couldn’t have belonged to me. Because that was the sound of an animal, and I was human. I was human.

What they said made no sense. Things like this didn’t happen in real life; they happened in movies and books. I didn’t care that I could hear voices in my head, or that I couldn’t stand up straight, or everything in my body felt alien and new, and all signs pointed to him speaking the truth. I refused to believe what he said.

You’re insane, I hissed, my voice weak, and completely inside my head. There was no noise that left me, nothing except that whine. But judging by the way the wolf with the sharp, pale eyes reacted, my voice was inside his head, too.

Pack bond, the other wolf said. As if that meant anything, as if that was any explanation. I was shaking, I realised, as I stood there facing the three wolves, not daring to look down. Because if I looked down, would I see two human feet, or would I see paws? The thought made me shake harder, until my teeth knocked together, and even that felt strange and unfamiliar. As if they weren’t my teeth. As if they were new.

I didn’t die, I said with as much sharpness as the pale-eyed wolf.

Starlight, the softest voice murmured, and the green-eyed wolf came forward, closer than the other others.

That’s close enough, the sharp one bit out. She’s a slayer. We don’t know what she’s capable of or how many she’s killed.

I flinched as visions flashed through my head. Ash drifting from the ground, meeting a night sky that never lightened. Hair wrapped around my fist in a braid. Threatened words from a scared woman. And then a crack, final and fatal. Suri’s empty eyes staring up at me.

He was right. I was a killer. But I wasn’t a wolf. There was no fucking way I was a wolf. I shook my head in denial, but the motion felt wrong, new in the same way my teeth felt new, and my legs felt new as I tried to operate them and turn away.

Breathe, came the calm, steady voice of the one they called alpha. The most dangerous and dominant of them all. The biggest threat, the one that was probably about to kill me. I backed up a few steps, getting the hang of sliding through the dirt, even if I couldn’t walk properly.

I can’t fucking breathe, I snapped, an awful wheezing noise leaving my chest.

Give her space, he ordered the others. Look at me, he said, meeting my eyes, nothing but patience and concern in those dark chocolate irises. It was strange to be looking at a wolf, to be looking into his eyes and not into its mouth as its teeth gnashed down, severing my life.