He was right, in a way. Where the women always described her as pure white with green eyes, he was black and had red ones. They never said anything about him being an actual living breathing animal, either. It was hard to make out his form, the smoky wisps of his fur were even more pronounced than ours, so he almost looked like he’d waft away and become one with the darkness. He didn’t though. His head jerked right when another group was tossed down into his pit. Women, if the screams were anything to go by. He took a step forward, and the thud of his paw was felt throughout the cave. There was a lot more of them, and they weren’t chained, which was perhaps part of the problem. Some looked up at the huge animal and screamed. I would’ve probably done the same, if I’d thought it’d do any good. They screamed, and they ran.
His muzzle moved so fast, it appeared as a blur as he snatched up a tiny woman. We were only just able to see her limbs flailing before he tossed back his head and swallowed her down. I imagined his red eyes glowed brighter for a second before he lunged again.
“What the fuck... What the actual fuck...” Blake babbled as we watched.
“Blake...”
“No, no, it’s been bad enough, this fucking place, but this?” When he turned to me, I saw the tears on his face before he angrily dashed them away. “We’re not going down like this, Morgan, we’re fucking not!”
“I know, mate,” Cam said, and placed a hand on his shoulder. “I dunno if you’ve got much anymore, but we’ve gotta try.”
“What?”
I shuffled in closer, placing a hand on each of them and sending what I hoped was reassurance down our bond. We couldn’t do this terrified, and by fucking god, we needed to. This was our last hope.
“C’mon, boys,” I said, affecting the tone we used when we melded with our mate. Fuck, Eileen. I hoped she was too far away to feel any of this. “We need to mesh together. The line stays unbroken, remember?”
“Got it.”
We huddled together as we watched the big bastard pick off every single woman, downing them like a fox might with field mice. Each life, just snuffed out like candles. Cam’s arm went around my shoulder, Blake’s hand grabbed mine.
“Take a deep breath,” I said. “Feel the oxygen in your lungs, feel the movement of your chest.” The wolf took another ponderous step. “Don’t worry about that cunt, stay with us.”
I felt it stutter down the line of our bond, that feeling of connection. It was small and fragile, something that needed to be nurtured and protected, not used to face down some kind of fucking monster wolf. But we lost that choice once the matriarchs chose to exile us.
“I’m sorry, so fucking sorry...” Cam said.
“None of that, mate.” I shook my head, but my eyes stayed trained on the big bastard. “We’re greater than the sum of our parts, remember?”
When the link was made, it felt as easy as it always did. Before we bonded with Eileen, we were close, growing up together and basically living in each other’s houses. Our mums always thought we’d form a pack. We didn’t tell them we had well and truly done so before Eileen came on the scene. For a moment, all I could feel was my mates thrumming through me. Part of me wanted to stop there for a second, just to savour the feel of them with me. We’d clung to the bond desperately at the start of our time here, but learned pretty quickly that melding just brought pain and anguish. But we had no time for that now.
All that we were hummed as we got to our feet, the clank of the chains, the burn of the bloody wolf’s eyes all dropping away.
“Draw the power up,” I said, taking hold of each of their hands.
“It’s not gonna be enough,” Blake said, but there was a peace to his words rather than hysteria.
“Maybe not,” I said. “But if this is the way we have to go out, there’s no two blokes I’d rather do it with.”
“And Eileen will finally be free,” Cam said.
The wolf’s jaws were black when they opened. Not the colour, but the complete absence of light. We stared into the abyss, and the abyss stared back, growing larger and larger, while we were the most feeble point of light in all this nothing. We sent fireballs of energy into the wolf’s mouth, tiny little pinpricks of light that were instantly smothered. I felt the shudder of my brothers’ bodies under my hands as we struggled to strike back, as they watched it all come to nothing.
We were not enough, had not been enough since we got here. Nothing about growing up in Sanctuary had prepared us for this place. All the crap that had seemed so important back home crumbled to nothing in the face of this darkness. For a second, I saw Eileen’s face, clear as a bell, my eyes hungry for every detail.
“It’s not working,” Cam said.
We each looked at the other, and then Blake nodded.
“See ya in the next life, brothers,” he said, and then the wolf’s jaws snapped shut.
Jules
I sat straight up in bed, drenched in sweat, my cry dying on my lips.
“You dreamt it too,” Jack said.
“We all did, I think,” Slade said. “What the fucking hell?”