Chapter 159

Sarah POV

I had left Zane alone for three days after his trip to the temple, and then, to my relief, his eyes were clearer the next morning, and after breakfast and kissing the girls goodbye for school, he didn’t disappear into his study or take the car out, so I made us a little extra coffee, and we sat in the sitting room together.

“Thank you for giving me space while I tried to work everything out,” he said, which was a great opening to a serious talk.

“You’re welcome,” I said and smiled.

“I’m a little worried about Grace,” he said, which wasn’t the topic I was prepared for, so I took a moment to switch mental gears.

“What about her? Is this about the attack?”

“No, no. I realize if she were a human child we would have sent her to therapy, but wolves, particularly alphas, understand instinctively that violence is part of life. In truth, she’s told me she barely remembers the attack, which is also pretty standard for an alpha, and I think she’s privately quite proud of being able to transform enough to heal herself. But you’re right that we should keep an eye on that situation.”

“Then what is it?”

“She’s worried because she hasn’t found something to love, the way that Chloe loves word working and the way she used to love painting.” He held up a hand. “Now, I realize she seems very young to be worrying about that.”

“No, I get it. I mean, I read about it. Alphas tend to find passions early.”

“I’m particularly concerned because we’ve got that parent-teacher conferences coming up next week, and I’m wondering if this might be on the agenda.”

I stifled a sigh. “As someone with a background in education, I think you should avoid thinking PT conferences come with agendas. They’re meant to be check-ins, not hearings.”

He sent me an, “Oh, really?” look.

“Was Grace passionate about her painting before Chloe and I showed up, or do you think it’s only by seeing Chloe be so passionate about working with wood that she’s felt she’s somehow lacking?” I asked.

“I don’t know. I don’t even know which of those two things would be better or worse.”

I shrugged. “Neither do I. Perhaps this is just one of those times being a parent means waiting to see what happens and being ready when something does.”

He nodded, and we sat for a little while.

“I went on a spirit walk,” he said at last.

“OK,” I said, looking at my half-empty cup. “Wasn’t expecting that.”

“I explained that I needed to know more about the threat to my family. The Oracle said she could see a ‘darkness’ around us, and specifically she talked about hatred, jealousy, and revenge.”

“Revenge? Just against you or all of us?”

He shook his head. “She didn’t say.

“Frustratingly vague.”

“Yes, so then she suggested the spirit walk.”

“Can you talk about it with me?”

“Well, I suppose I should keep the rituals to myself, but it was my dream, and I think I should be able to discuss it with whomever I choose.”

“Fair enough.”

“You were in it?”

I was rocked with surprise, having expected his daughters to feature in dreams about his family. I had to hide how good it felt to have him consider me that. Then I had a horrible thought.

“Was I the danger?” I asked.

“No, but you were in danger.”

“Just me?”

“The girls made a brief appearance, but they were fine, I think.”

“Perhaps start from the beginning?”

“You were standing in the forest in a black dress, and then you fell down dead.” He winced. “Sorry.”

“I doubt Freud is right and this was wish fulfillment. What happened next?”

He described seeing a status of me bleeding white fluid, the forest, and the moon. “I then you said, ‘I am what your enemies fear.’”

“Your enemies are scared of me?” I said. “Perhaps, humanity? They’re scared of humans’ becoming equal to wolves?”

“I don’t think so.” He scowled, and I could see what he had been wrestling with these last few days. Then he described standing in a graveyard, a grieving human family at a grave, and the girls running around laughing.

“Death?” I guessed. “I’m standing in for death?”

“No, you said it wasn’t death we really fear.”

“That doesn’t sound helpful. What, failure? Disgrace? Getting old?”

“The moon.”

I blinked at him. “What?”

“You told me the truth would come to me when I found the moon.”

I thought about it as deeply as I could, but I ended up just shaking my head. “I’m sorry, but I have no idea what that’s supposed to mean.”

“But you’ll think about it?” he asked.

“Constantly, I imagine. And that’s what I said, the truth is on the moon?”

“Not exactly.” He closed his eyes, obviously thinking back. “You said, ‘If you see the truth, stop seeking your enemies and find the moon.’”

“OK.”

“And I was looking up at the moon and said, ‘It’s right there.’ And then you said, ‘But you are not.’”

“Meaning you, in the dream, not me sitting here?”

“Yes.”

I tried to absorb all that and failed. “Spirit walk me likes being cryptic.”

He laughed softly.

I put my empty cup down. “Werewolves and their relationship with the moon is just about the most complicated subject I can think of,” I complained. “Your spiritual lives are dominated by it so much that when I first tried understanding the Goddess Luna I thought you guys actually worshipped, well, the chunk of rock up in space.

“What?”

“You all interchange ‘Luna’ and ‘goddess’ and ‘moon’ so much! It wasn’t until I read Plato’s conversations on the reflection of the spirit’s light by the moon that I started to get any sort of perspective on things. And then, well, the moon influences a woman’s biological cycle whether she’s human or wolf, and to complicate that relationship a woman’s first unforced transformation is almost under a full moon, whereas a man’s takes a while to synch up, which is why your Oracles are all female.

“But what does that really mean? Sure, you hunt by the moonlight, so it’s a god metaphor for your guiding light whether you’re male or female, but the stars are just as important when you’re on the trail, so you’ve got a wolf history of sects that have suggested the moon corresponds to females, whereas the stars, which are suns, are the true bearers of the light.”

Zane was looking at me oddly. “How do you know that?”

“Know what?”

“That the stars are just as important during a hunt as the moon?”

I shrugged. “I read it somewhere.”

“You didn’t sound like you were quoting someone else just now.”

I looked away, realizing I now needed the same space I had given him earlier in the conversation. It seemed only fair, though, that I respond to his talk of dreams with my own.

“Since coming to live here,” I said slowly, “I’ve frequently dreamed of being a werewolf, of running through the forest, of hunting. I don’t know why, but I’ve assumed it’s just my brain’s way of trying to work through all the werewolf information I’ve been taking in.”

He looked at me narrowly.

“What?” I asked, decidedly uncomfortable.

“After you have one of these dreams, do you sometimes come and join me in bed?”