Page 12 of Never Tamed (Bad Wolves #3)

Ren

I stiffen at the voice, too close to my ear for comfort. A stiff breeze tickles the hair on the nape of my neck and goosebumps prickle along my skin. I definitely shouldn’t be surprised by it.

I’m not alone here and I think I knew it from the start.

But I force myself to turn around and stare at the woman slowly growing clearer against the darkness. Her body, an indistinct shape, sharpens and her features go hollow. Firm. Clear.

She is carved from the stone itself and ancient. She is old and young and timeless.

I’ve seen her before. I know her form even though I've never spoken to her face to face like this. She’s inside of me and all around me, the one who gave me life. The one who gave me until my twenty-fifth birthday before death claimed me again.

“Moon Goddess.”

Should I bow or something? We’ve met already, in a dream, but seeing her in front of her statue is next level strange for me. I nibble on my lip as unease skips my heartbeats. Not because of her. There’s reverence but not fear.

The unease comes from me and the reality that every step I took led to this moment, this encounter.

“Renee Wexler.”

My name is lyrical and fantastic in her long-dead language. Instead of strange or assaulting, the unfamiliar syllables are a song. This is like the dream but more, a richer experience, and although I don’t speak the same language she does, I understand everything.

She wants me to.

The edge of panic fades. “The statue looks like you,” I say. “You don’t like it?”

She stares at me for a long moment before a small, halting laugh pries her lips open. She shakes her head. “The carvers were struck by a vision of me. They got some of the features right but my chin is too prominent and my nose narrow. The eyes are smaller. I simply don’t care for it.”

She clucks her tongue like I’ve somehow managed to insult her in so few words. Her dark brows arch high.

I’m more prepared for her appearance this time around. Perhaps I’ve been through enough to make me more of a skeptic, or more open to things that should be fucking impossible.

My stomach is no longer shrinking, and neither am I. The icy tendrils of fear trickle away under the strength of the sweet and out of place breeze.

“You’re not here to talk about artist licensing, though,” the goddess adds. “I heard you. I brought you here, and I’ve come to you. As to what we do now—”

The wind increases and forces me back a step until my knees hit one of the toppled stones. I drop. This is not the fairy godmother goddess, no.

There is no wave of a magic wand and my happy ending suddenly presents itself on a platter. This is an ancient deity who shouldn’t exist and she wants to have a chat.

“I’ve worried you.” The goddess stalks toward me. “Maybe it’s this face you have difficulty addressing. I’m not as approachable this way.” A slither of shadow obscures her features. “Is this better?”

Her dark brows melt into gold and her hair grows longer, softer, falling around her heart shaped face. Her features round out and her eyes are much kinder when the goddess blinks them open this time.

Alarm splinters through me and a headache immediately deepens, because I’m not staring at the Moon Goddess anymore.

I’m looking at Anna.

The same Anna who pulled over to the side of the road in a random ass van to give me a ride when I needed it. The same Anna who sought me out at Rudy’s with a large tip I didn’t deserve and a cryptic message.

“I’ve tried visiting you multiple times,” Anna says with a tired smile. “This is the only figure you seem to respond to.”

Oh, god. I’m going to throw up. A low moan builds inside of me until it tears its way out of my throat and my stomach twists. It’s impossible. The woman in the brown van…

The random puffs of chocolate cereal scattered around the van—

I thought she might be working with Andras because of her cryptic note—

She’s been the Moon Goddess this entire time.

Anna closes the distance between us and drops down beside me on the stone with a slight huff, decidedly less graceful than her previous form. She’s more human this way.

I’m not sure I like it any better.

“I know.” She pats my knee. “It’s a lot to take in.”

“It’s insane.” My words sound strangled.

“I assure you, it’s not. It’s me. And you want to know why it’s you, Ren? Why are you the one I chose?” Anna pauses.

Do I really? I thought I did, until it’s right here ready to smack me in the face. Now I want a warm bed and my mates.

“Because there is no one else,” Anna continues. “It’s not because you’re particularly special to me, although anyone can be special under the right circumstances.”

“Oh, thanks.”

She laughs at my dry tone. “It’s true.”

It’s much easier to speak to her this way, actually. The maternal set of her features, the rounded cheekbones and the small smile, all combine into a much easier facade than the stone-cold figure from mythology.

She’s even dressed like some Mom ready to pick her kids up from soccer practice.

We’re both out of place in the wintery ruins.

Anna taps her fingers on her knees. “Your parents came to me with a bargain and I knew the time was right. You were the perfect outlet for my cause. You were bright with future and promise, because you wouldn’t have had a future if I hadn’t stepped in.

Your fate was to die before you took your first breath. It made you the right vessel for me.”

“So everything I am…is because you needed a body?”

Ugh, that sounds awful. Yet my wolf presses closer to the surface to absorb every word.

“I needed a weapon,” she clarifies. “You are my sword and my shield. You are the one to use the moonstone.”

“What about the sword?”

I think I’d know if I had a sword anywhere.

Anna looks put out, which is strange, considering what I know now. “You have cotton in your ears, girl. Didn’t you just hear me say that you are the sword ?”

The wolves seemed to believe the sword of the goddess was an actual weapon. I stop, chewing on my lower lip, my knee bobbing.

Her features scrunch like she hears my thoughts. “Think of the sword as a metaphor.”

“So there isn’t a literal blade out there for us to hunt down,” I clarify.

“No, Ren. You are the one who can stop Andras from destroying the balance.”

Me. I sniff, shaking my head. “I’m not sure what I can do. I barely know how to control my wolf. I only just learned about the shift. I have a new mate bond and a pack who are falling apart.”

“But look at what you’ve accomplished so far?

The Steel Claws and the Grey Valley are two of the most prominent and powerful packs in the area.

At least, they used to be before someone grew too large for his own ego.

You have managed to unite them in a matter of months.

Something none have been able to accomplish before.

You have created an entirely new pack; one that is much stronger because of it. They have put aside their differences.”

I snort. “Yeah, sometimes.”

“Aren’t they? They are living together. Working together toward a common goal. They are providing protection for you.”

“Because they have no other choice. There’s a mate bond in place.”

The edges of her lips lift. “Do you think the mate bonds are accidental?”

I stop short, barely breathing. “What?”

“My chosen has to have her protectors. Her big bad wolves. Isn’t that what you’ve called them before?” Anna’s eyes spark with mischief and she bumps her shoulder to mine. “Why would her protectors not be spectacular men as well? Strong, capable. Ruthless. Vicious.”

Their faces flash in my mind, from Noble’s smile to Dax’s crazed laugh as he guts his enemies. From Torin ripping off his tie to Mathis crushing the fake wedding ring I used to wear to keep the creeps from hitting on me.

Then another horrible thought takes up space inside of me.

“Do any of them really love me, then?”

I choke, tears clogging my eyes immediately.

I thought the men saw me for me, for who I am and my capabilities, beyond just me absorbing the moonstone. They took me up the mountain to the temple when I was dying, didn’t they? Slowed their pace even though they’d have made the trip in hours versus the days it took me.

I’ve never seen Anna angry before. The Moon Goddess, yeah, sure. Even the cut of her stone face is stern in her statue. But seeing the furious glower on Anna’s face kicks things up another level.

“You doubt their feelings when you feel them inside of you? When they’ve proven themselves to you countless times? You’ve proven yourself to them, too.” She sniffs and adjusts one leg over the other, no longer touching me. “I don’t make mistakes.”

I’m not sure I can trust her, though.

How can I?

She’s not the only one angry.

“I’ve been manipulated every step of the way to get here. Manipulated into being alive when I shouldn’t be, into being your sword and shield.” Those two words together taste acrid and burnt. “Is there no part of me that’s still actually me? Even the men I love are nothing but a lie.”

“Who are you, then, Renee? What pieces of you are there that you don’t want to exist?” Anna fires back in challenge.

The strange part is that I actually kinda like who I am now. Sure, my life hasn’t been easy. The years are marked with tragedy and shit and some dark moments where it was hard to peel myself off the floor and stop the tears. And changing into a wolf…

It isn’t easy. It’s not like you see in the movies where the change is effortless and costs nothing. There’s pain with the pleasure.

Even my love for my alphas, my betas, isn’t easy. It’s trying to work with our different personalities and get on the same page where none of us have ever had to bend before.

Compromise is tough.

But it’s made me the same. I like my jagged edges and my hard parts.

“Everything you've been through and the people you have at your side…” Anna trails off. “Everything happens for a reason. So you are able to stop Andras from destroying the balance.”

The balance. It’s the second time she’s mentioned it and a chill drops into my gut. “That bad?”

“Bad is an understatement. The world exists on a tenuous scale. If things skew to one side, if greed and pride and ego are allowed to take over, then something must change in order to shift the energy back to stasis. Otherwise it’s chaos. Madness. Death.”

“I thought death was a natural part of life, too.” It didn’t stop me from wanting to avoid it, though.

“I’m not that kind of goddess. But if it helps you to picture it this way, what Andras is attempting to do is to stop the ties. And if the tides are blocked from the shore for too long…”

She trails off, leaving me to fill in the blank.

I hold up a hand to stop her. “I get it. So I guess you’re not working with Andras.”

Anna’s laugh sends a nearby owl skittering off its stony perch and into the night. “Working with him. Is that what you thought?”

“You were pretty weird when you talked to me at Rudy’s bar. I suspected you.” I draw my knees up to my chest and wrap my arms around my legs.

I have no control over the tears that slip out. I’m not even sure why they decided to make a break for it. I only know the tear trails dry on my cheeks almost as soon as they wind past my nose and I have to sniff to keep them from going any further.

“I know this isn’t easy,” Anna says. “Which is why I wanted to talk to you. To tell you to come find me.”

“I found you, all right,” I grumble.

And a whole lot more than I ever bargained for.

“Humans are full of such emotions.”

“But you don’t have any?”

“It’s not in my nature. This facade is designed to put you at ease and it’s easier to mimic them. I only know that I need you to be strong. I need you to do what you were saved to do, Ren, even when it feels hopeless.”

“I have no clue what to do to stop Andras,” I admit.

“Yes, you do. You’ve already started the process.”

Ugh. “A book of instructions might be nice.” My side clenches as I remember the awful feeling of Catarina’s claws biting deep. “Because I’m not sure I’ll be able to hold my own against him.”

“His weakness is right out there in the open if you look for it. He makes no effort to hide it.”

“I barely got away from that bitch he’s got working for him. He’s sure to have more wolves around to protect him.” I point to my side like it will prove something.

Stronger wolves and much more practice than I have at my disposal. Not to mention my men. I don’t want anything happening to them.

We hardly made it out of the church and who knows what might have happened if Dax hadn’t thought to steal a car.

“Trust yourself,” Anna says quietly. “Trust the gifts I’ve given you and trust the men at your side. You won’t let me down. And they won’t fail you.”

They might not, but they’d fight to the death in order to win, and I’m not willing to take the chance.

I’m not sure I trust myself.

“I didn’t expect you to feel sorry for yourself,” Anna adds. She tilts her head to the side to study me.

My stomach twists and I hold up my hands. “I’m allowed a little bit of wallowing.”

She stands, her gaze fastened on something in the distance. The glow around her, the one I’d thought came from the moon, only grows brighter. It’s coming from inside of her. “No, you’re not. Not anymore. Stand tall and do your job. Be my sword. Protect the people you love.”

Her form wavers and dissolves into moonlight. Alone on the side of the mountain, surrounded by the devastation of her temple, I’m left with nothing but worries, the silent face of the stone effigy—

And an impossible task.

Anna is the Moon Goddess. She’s been with me the entire time, watching me, guiding me, and confusing me.

Now, she expects me to take on Andras, something no one else has been able to do. The man is slippery and brutal, ruthless in the worst possible way.

I steel myself and my shoulders hunch against the night breeze. My legs protest the second I step away from the ruins of the temple and back toward our camp.

It might be impossible, but I’ve got to do it. There’s no other choice. And if my three mates are on the line, if Flora and the rest of the kidnapped omegas are still alive, then I have to do it for them. Not for myself.

I don’t believe in myself enough to do it for me.

But for the people I care about? I’ll burn the world down and laugh with the match in my hand.