Chương 7: Chapter 7: The Journey Home

Selene follows Sparrow through the village. There are more people living here than she had thought. A few onlookers stop and stare as they pass, but for the most part, the city bustles with its everyday activity. As they reach the end of town, a group of children runs up to Selene, filling the space between her and Sparrow.

“Are you the silver wolf?” a little boy asks.

Selene recognizes him from the night before. He had been the one clinging to his mother’s skirt while she carried the Alpha home.

“Yes,” Selene replies.

He turns to his friends who are gathered behind him. “I told you so!”

A shy little girl steps toward Selene and hands her a wildflower. “You’re really pretty,” she says while looking at the ground.

“Thank you,” Selene replies, taking the flower.

“Are you the Alpha’s mate?” another boy asks.

His friends nudge him from behind. “What?” he wines. “Everyone’s talking about it, I just want to know if it’s true.”

Selene doesn’t know what to say. She looks at the group of children as they eagerly await her answer. Her mouth feels dry and her stomach does a flip. What do they mean by his mate? Selene doesn’t understand what these kids want from her. Before she has the chance to say anything, Sparrow interjects.

“You all have somewhere else you need to be,” she growls.

The children look back at her and squeal as they scatter and run away laughing. Selene can’t help but smile as she watches them. It would appear they are not so much afraid of Sparrow as they are entertained by her.

Sparrow shakes her head. “Let’s go, witch.”

Selene follows her in silence as they walk back to the passageway she had used the day before. Selene would like to know what Sparrow’s thinking, but she doesn’t want to ask. There is an overwhelming feeling of hate radiating from the she-wolf.

Sparrow halts her march and turns on her heels to face Selene. “This would go a lot faster if we were in wolf form. Not that I don’t enjoy spending time with you,” she adds sarcastically. “I really just want to get this over with as soon as possible.”

Selene looks at Sparrow. She doesn’t want to admit to the she-wolf that she doesn’t know how to in and out of her wolf form yet. She doesn’t have to say anything, her silence says it all.

“You don’t know how?” Sparrow scoffs. “Goddess, why am I stuck with such a waste of skin?”

“I only shifted for the first time last night!” Selene snaps while stomping past Sparrow.

The she-wolf follows closely behind, trying to pass Selene on the narrow path they are on. “Shifting isn’t that complicated,” Sparrow huffs. “What did you do last night that made you shift?”

“I don’t know! There was a lot going on at that moment and I wasn’t paying attention. It’s not like I planned on shifting.”

Selene tries to remember what was happening when she shifted. Was it because she felt the need to protect herself? Probably not. If that were the case, she would have shifted when Tobin was ready to rip her apart in the Alpha’s chambers. Maybe it was the magic of the full moon. Something made her shift, but what was it?

Selene wants more than anything to be comfortable around Sparrow. The she-wolf appears to hate her guts, and Selene isn’t sure why. Shouldn’t Selene have known she was able to shift? Shifting isn’t something she’s ever heard of just happening out of the blue to people. She’s overwhelmed and scared by the notion she knows nothing about shifters, yet she is one.

“This is going to take all day,” Sparrow wines under her breath.

Selene feels anger bubbling up inside her. If anyone should be annoyed with the situation it should be her. How dare Sparrow huff about her petty annoyances. Selene’s life is a shit-show and she has no control over any of it.

“I didn’t ask you to come!” she snaps at the she-wolf.

“No, but the Beta ordered me to,” Sparrow replies while pushing her way passed Selene.

“The what?”

“Tobin, the pack's Beta. The second in command who takes over for the Alpha when he isn’t around?” Sparrow scolds.

Selene is silent again as she hurries to keep up with Sparrow’s pace.

The she-wolf is clearly frustrated with her as she continues her rant. “How is it you don’t even know the basic pack hierarchy? If you really are a shifter, this should have been taught to you as a pup.”

“I was never a pup,” Selene replies. “I was, am, a human.”

Sparrow stops again, causing Selene to stumble to keep from running into her.

“Your ignorance knows no bounds, I see,” the she-wolf hisses while turning around. “The children you were talking to in the village are pups. We are every bit as much human as you are, witch.”

Selene looks down at her feet, suddenly overcome by her own lack of shifter knowledge. It’s not like she ever had lessons on other creatures and their family and social protocols. Her Gram had taught her everything she could about witches and magic. Maybe, if she hadn’t passed away, Gram would have sent her to learn about shifters from another witch.

The plan had been to take her to a rogue witch who lived in the Northern lands. Her Gram had told her the witch's name, but Selene can’t recall it right now. Not that it matters anymore. Now that she is a shifter, she will have to figure out things the hard way.

The two move at a good pace. The squabbling back and forth is put on hold as they march along. A few hours pass slowly, but they soon find themselves at the river’s edge.

“Looks like you better figure out how to call forth your wolf, witch.”

Selene doesn’t even bother looking over at her.

“Unless you think we have time to build a raft?” Sparrow mocks.

Stepping up to the shore, Selene places her hand on the ground by her feet. She channels her magic into the soil around her, just as Gram had taught her. A shelf of dirt forms into a solid platform and hovers just above the water’s surface. Selene hops up to the transport.

“Try to keep up, or you’ll end up wet,” she says to Sparrow while reaching down to help her up.

Sparrow refuses her hand and leaps up to the platform directly behind Selene. As they walk forward, the soil moves beneath their feet. Sparrow almost falls of the back a few times, but they finally reach the other side and jump down. The soil returns to the earth.

Selene looks at the she-wolf triumphantly. She can tell Sparrow’s impressed, but there’s no way she will admit it to the likes of her. After a quick thirty-minute walk, Selene can see her house on the horizon. She tries to slow her pace a little, holding herself back from running toward the familiar abode.

“We should go in through the back,” Sparrow mumbles.

“I agree, they’re probably watching the front.”

The two walk around to the rear of the hut and Selene leads Sparrow up to an open window. There are no guards in sight, but they stay silent as they move inside. Selene climbs through the window first and drops down onto the trunk under the sill. Sparrow is right behind her.

“Hurry up,” Sparrow whispers before leaving the room to check out the rest of the house.

Selene looks around the small storage room she’s standing in and hurries over to the closet. She pulls out a satchel her Gram had enchanted. You can put anything and everything into the bag without altering its weight. It doesn’t matter how big something is, it will fit in the bag without filling it up. After opening the case, she grabs the emergency magic kit from the closet and puts it inside.

She slowly creeps out into the living room. The pictures on the hearth go into the bag first followed by a stack of books. The potion cupboard is next, and she cleans it out along with the spell drawer. Selene slowly climbs the steps up to her room and walks inside to find Sparrow snooping through her stuff.

“Really?” she harshly whispers.

Sparrow throws up her hands in a shrug. “What?” she whispers back.

Selene rolls her eyes at the she-wolf and starts throwing stuff into the satchel. She packs up everything she can think of possibly needing before stepping out into the hall with Sparrow.

“Are you done yet?” the she-wolf asks in a hushed voice. “I’m starting to feel really uneasy about being here for so long.”

“I need to get the stones out of my grandma’s room.”

“Well, let’s go,” Sparrow replies.

The two go back down to the first floor. Sparrow stands by the front door as Selene hurries back to her Gram’s old room. She takes a deep breath as she walks inside. The room smells musty and Selene makes a mental note to open a window and air it out. She starts in the closet, digging through everything she can in hopes of finding the velvet bag the stones are kept in.

Her Gram has been gone for a couple of years now, but she still feels like she’s intruding in on her privacy. She keeps telling herself to not get caught up on looking through her grandma’s old things. When this is all over with, she will make an appoint to start cleaning out the room properly.

Selene brushes some tears out of her eyes. “Stupid dust,” she mummers to herself. The comment is a cover, she knows the tears are being caused by the feelings of loss and not the dust.

“If I were Gram, where would I put them?”

She looks around the room and notices the corner of a floorboard sticking up beside her grandmother’s bed. Selene rushes over and slowly lifts the piece of wood. As the dust clears, she can see the velvet bag she’s looking for. She grabs it along with a few other things that were hidden in the hole. Everything goes into the satchel and Selene jumps to her feet.

She’s about to exit the room when she hears Sparrow holler. Peeking her head around the door frame, she can make out a coven member standing just inside the front door. Sparrow is on the floor, bound there by the member’s spell.

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