“And you can’t protect us without being the leader?” I tilted my head in confusion.
“The Lycan are mine by right—”
“We don’t belong to anyone! We’re not property,” I corrected. “Get that through your thick skull before you start your reign or else you won’t last.”
“I’ll last longer than you,” he smirked.
I snorted. “Well, yeah, but only because you don’t have a god threatening your life. So go ahead … kill me. If you think it’ll help you save the Lycan, do it.”
“Mackenzie!” Alexander shouted from behind me. I glanced over my shoulder to see Raven standing in his way while the other Lycan stood around confused, unsure what to do.
“You think I won’t do it?” Fenrir asked. “Because I will.”
I shrugged. “Go ahead, then. I’m not afraid to die. I’ve faced much worse than you,” I lied. Possibly.
Fenrir reached for my neck and squeezed, cutting off my air supply. Alexander let out a ferocious chorus of shouts and growls, but Raven must have been holding him back because he didn’t approach. With Fenrir’s punishing grip on my neck, I couldn’t turn and look in his direction.
“Mackenzie!” I heard Bash’s shout from down the shoreline, followed by the galloping hooves of his horse.
The panic in his voice was palpable, but I couldn’t think about it now. I was taking a calculated gamble that I hoped payed off.
According to Ophelia’s vision, everything depended on me, and in the course of my journey I would face death multiple times. I had to believe this was one of those times, but one I’d survive.
I know, crazy, right? But sometimes we had to make nutso decisions in the heat of the moment.
“Mackenzie!” Bash was still too far away. Blackness seeped into the corners of my vision. I didn’t think I would make it long enough to say goodbye.
“Release that child,” someone commanded behind me.
I recognized the voice, but in all my near-death experiences, I’d discovered one weird thing that happened: when one of your senses started to go away, the rest of them faded away with it. My vision faded and my hearing was muffled, like I was partially submerged underwater.
“I said, release that child!” A cane came down and smacked Fenrir on the arm with a meaty thwack. He loosened his grip on me and I sucked in a deep, ragged breath, then he dropped me to the ground like a sack of potatoes.
“What is it, old woman?” Fenrir snapped, annoyed.
“Ye cannae kill her.”
I glanced up from my place on the ground and stroked my neck, partially unsurprised to see Ophelia standing behind me. She wielded a wooden cane with both hands and a hoard of oracles stood behind her in silent solidarity.
“She is one of us,” Ophelia claimed, “and ye swore an oath to nae harm us if we lent ye our lands.”
My eyes widened at the fact that she’d made a deal with Fenrir and didn’t tell me. Then again, she also didn’t agree to help him, either. Maybe this was why.
“She’s not one of you!” Fenrir yelled. “She is a Lycan!”
Ophelia shook her head. “She’s a hybrid—the first of her kind.” As her declaration rang out, I closed my eyes slowly, shocked that she’d just announced one of my biggest secrets to everyone. “She is half Lycan, half oracle; the only one in existence. If ye kill her now, we will be forced to retaliate,” she threatened.
Fenrir choked out a surprised laugh. I opened my eyes and glared at him. “So that’s how you know? You’ve been spying on me?”
I didn’t admit or deny his accusation. Instead, I climbed to my feet and dusted myself off, standing beside the old woman who’d just saved my ass.
“You still haven’t answered me, old woman. Are you going to help us or not?”
I wondered what they were talking about. I peered over at Ophelia.
She pursed her lips a moment before answering. “If I agree, it will nae be me ye’ll be dealing with.”
Fenrir’s eyes narrowed and then widened in realization as they traveled in my direction. “What? No way! The little wolf?”
Ophelia nodded resolutely. “Ye need an oracle? Ye have one.”
“The fuck?” I shouted as I stepped away from her. “I’m not helping him! He’s tried to kill me multiple times! Including just five minutes ago!”
I glanced at Alexander, Bash standing by his side. They wore matching dubious expressions. Like me, they didn’t like the direction this conversation was heading. What the hell was Ophelia’s end game?
“I’m not working with half an oracle,” Fenrir grunted derisively.
I glared at him. “Well, this half oracle found your hiding spot, so I wouldn’t be so high and mighty if I were you,” I sneered.
Raven limped forward, dragging her torn wing along the rocky shoreline. “If this puts an end to the fighting, just work together,” she said wearily.
“I don’t trust you,” I growled, reaching up to cradle my broken nose.
Working with Fenrir would be a gamble. Instead of leading his people, he wanted the Lycan to worship him like a new religion. There was no way that would ever happen. He couldn’t just show up after a millennia of absence and demand to rule over a species. It didn’t work that way.
“You don’t know what you’re up against, little wolf. You won’t be able to handle it—”
“It is she who the demon wants,” Ophelia interrupted.
I snapped my head in her direction and jerked back in surprise. “Excuse me, did you just say demon?”
“Ophelia, what is going on?” Alexander demanded, coming to stand by my side. “No more secrets.”
“Mackenzie has something the demon wants,” Ophelia revealed, her sightless eyes locked onto my wide, disbelieving ones as she ignored Alexander completely.
“What is it? What do you have?” Fenrir scowled at me like I was supposed to know.
I shrugged. “How the hell do I know? I’m still stuck on the fact that demons are real.”
“It escaped the underworld last year, but it’s been roaming quietly until recently,” Fenrir explained, his eyes narrowing. “Now what could you possibly have
