Page 33 of The Wolf and the Chimera (The Witch and the Cowboy #3)

Ryder

Standing in the darkness, Freya’s hair billowed like plumes of fire. She crossed her arms and studied me with those bright, cunning eyes.

She sighed. “You left me.”

My chest tightened.

“Even in my delusions,” I muttered, “you’re not one to mince words.”

“You once said you loved me,” she continued, “but you left me with the High Witch. You left me with a monster.”

My breath caught. “I’m sorry, Frey. You know I’m sorry—”

“It’s why I love Walker and not you,” she said and stepped closer. She reached for my face, and I took a step back. Freya chuckled. “I couldn’t bring myself to love you, my friend since childhood, but I fell for a human in a matter of weeks.”

Not good enough, not good enough, not good enough…

The thought echoed in the darkness, and Freya laughed.

“Pathetic,” she spat. “You’re so godsdamned pathetic.”

“This isn’t real,” I whispered. “You wouldn’t be this cruel.”

She arched a brow. “Wouldn’t I?”

The ground shifted under my feet, and suddenly, I wasn’t in the darkness.

Instead, I stood near what had once been my favorite view of my home’s mountains.

Trees cast shadows across the green grass, and the blue sky faced me like the gods’ greatest work of art.

Snow-capped mountains peaked and crested, reaching for the lovely sky.

Freya stood in front of me, and I wanted to growl, but I couldn’t make a sound. I couldn’t run or yell or riot. All I could do was relive the day Freya broke my heart.

“I’m sorry,” Freya said, “but this has gone far enough. Witches do not believe in love.”

“What makes you think I love you?” I spat.

The words were as vile on my tongue as they had been the first time I had said them.

Freya frowned, and true hurt shined in her copper eyes. My anger swelled.

She was breaking up with me. She didn’t get to be sad.

“It’s all over your face.” Freya swallowed, and that cold mask I hated slipped over her features.

You’re my best friend, I thought. My best friend, and you still can’t let me in.

“This has to stop,” she continued.

Something cleaved in my chest.

“This?” I asked stupidly.

“We are still friends,” she said, “but we can’t be more. You’re going to be an Alpha, Ryder. I will be Coven Mother. This will never work.”

Though I had always loved Freya for her sharp mind and her cool logic, in this moment, I hated those things about her. What had once made her my twin blade now cleaved her from my side.

Not good enough, not good enough, not good enough…

Hollow and aching from the memory, I was whisked back into the darkness.

Though I now recognized Freya had been right to end our romantic relationship, and I in no way wanted her back, her rejection still stung.

The fact my best friend had chosen a human—someone who never should have even seen beyond her glamour—had battered my jaded heart .

“I deserve better than you,” Freya whispered and drew closer. “Just like Elle deserves better than a wolf who never wanted a mate—who had forsaken the thought of mates and spat on the greatest gift of his kind.”

Shame threatened to swallow me whole.

For most of my life, I had laughed at the thought of true mates. I had cursed the other half of my soul without ever meeting her and given my heart to a witch instead.

Freya was right. I didn’t deserve a mate.

I didn’t deserve Elle.

As Freya disappeared, I sank into the darkness and drowned in my despair.

???

Elle

By the time I came upon my parents, thirty minutes had passed, and the bleeding in my wing had finally stopped. My shoulders and back ached with every ravaged breath I took. Blisters stung my feet, and sweat dripped into my eyes. Forcing myself to focus, I studied my parents.

They stood on a raised platform made of the same roughly hewn stone that formed the maze.

Though their mouths opened and closed, no sound slipped from their lips.

Something shimmered around them. Cautiously, I approached the barely visible barrier and pressed my hand against it.

Thrumming with magic, it was as solid as stone beneath my touch.

It’s some king of forcefield.

Desperate to rescue my parents and get to my mate, my beast seized control and beat my hand against the barrier. It didn’t budge. Completely out of control, I punched the forcefield and winced.

Shaking their heads, my parents lurched closer to the barrier. I inspected my shaking hand and bloodied knuckles and cursed. My gaze, however, caught on something beneath me.

Before the platform, an imprint of two massive paws was embedded into slabs of gray rock. As fear seized my heart, the sweat on my skin became ice.

Anticipating the beast’s mental attack, I blocked my chimera from forcing a shift.

“Wait,” I told the beast. “Maybe it’s a trick or a trap—maybe we’re not supposed to shift at all.”

Inside, the beast growled. It didn’t need words to convey its message. I gathered clearly from its frustration that it thought I was full of horseshit.

On the countdown above me, the seconds ticked by. Each passing moment brought my parents and Ryder closer to danger.

How long would it take me to find Ryder?

I studied my parents’ worried faces and swallowed.

If I shift, I warned my inner beast, you can’t completely take over.

Jumping on the crack in my resolve, my inner beast snatched control. Terrified, I resisted the change. Between my tenseness and my tired muscles, the pain of the shift was blinding and so slow, every pop of bone and crack of flesh reverberated through my being.

Gods, I thought. Why does it have to hurt so badly?

My beast grumbled in frustration, as if to say, it doesn’t.

When the change was complete, I didn’t bellow triumphantly or lick my long, ferocious teeth. I sagged to the ground, drained of strength and will.

I didn’t rise.

???

Ryde r

“Ryder,” Mom cooed and placed a kiss atop my head. “Do you know why I named you that?”

We sat in my twin bed with a book on our laps. As Mom had read, I’d barely paid attention to the plot, though I hadn’t complained of boredom. I savored these moments when I captured her attention completely. In the confines of my cozy bedroom, she wasn’t an alpha female.

She was just my mom.

“Why?” I asked.

I remembered her reasoning, but I wanted to hear her say it. After struggling to control my shift all day, I wanted to know she still believed in me—that she always would.

“Because as soon as I saw you,” she said, “I knew you’d be fast enough to ride any wind and brave enough to ride out any storm.”

“Dad yelled at me,” I reminded her quietly. “He said I should be getting better at this by now—”

“He shouldn’t have,” she said and brushed my hair again, “but he’s under a lot of pressure, and no matter how badly we try to be perfect, we aren’t. That’s why we work as a team to take care of you. We always will.”

She smiled, and I snuggled deeper into her embrace.

As quickly as the memory had consumed me, it spat me back into the soul-sucking cold of the darkness. With disgust shining in her eyes, Freya waited for me.

“So pathetic,” she mused. “I sacrificed myself to save you and Walker and my coven, and you’re too scared to even practice wielding your dominance.”

“I know,” I murmured. “I know, Freya.”

“Do you wish to be human?” Freya crooned. “Like your pretty mate does?”

I tried to back away from her, but there was nowhere to go. The darkness rooted me in place with an icy grip.

“If she had her way,” Freya continued, “Elle would be human, and you know what that means? She never would’ve met you. That’s her dream, Ryder. A world without magic and mates and you.”

Freya prowled closer. Unlike the vitriol in her words, her pale, freckled skin and lavender scent was so familiar.

“You can’t even blame her,” she whispered, “not when you’ve hated humans all this time for their choices.”

“Stop,” I said. “Stop it, Freya.”

“Humans don’t have to be Alphas,” she said. “Humans aren’t assigned predestined mates. Humans don’t lose their mommies to fate.”

Freya clasped my face, and any lingering warmth leaked from my body.

“I know,” she continued in that soft, deadly voice. “I know how ungrateful and jealous and pathetic you are, just like I know that deep down, you were glad it was me who got left behind.”

I shook beneath Freya’s touch and the weight of her words.

“You’re glad you got to save your mate instead,” Freya whispered, “even though you didn’t even want her. Even though you’re still too scared to claim her.”

“No,” I countered. “I didn’t know, Frey. I didn’t know you didn’t come with us.”

“But you didn’t scent me on Arion’s back,” she said. Her voice grew stronger. “You didn’t spot the cracks in my astral projection.”

Freya drew even closer, until her breath fanned across my face.

“I know the truth,” she whispered. “You can lie to everyone else, but I know the truth because I know you.”

My stomach sank with dread, but I couldn’t stop the question from tumbling from my lips. “What?”

Freya’s eyes were so bright, and her freckles were so familiar. Heat emanated from her body. In the cold, empty darkness, she was the only thing tangible. She was real.

“You couldn’t forgive me,” she continued in that deadly, soft voice. “You couldn’t forgive me for hurting you, or for handing your mate away. You wanted me to be left behind. You thought I deserved it.”

Under her touch, I trembled. Her words echoed into the darkness, so loudly they hurt my ears.

“No,” I argued, “ no, Freya—”

“Why?” she asked and traced her fingers over the planes of my face. “Why couldn’t you forgive me?”

“I did,” I promised. “Frey, I forgive you—”

“I’m all alone,” she whispered, “just like you wanted me to be. I was so sorry, but you still ensured I was all alone.”

“No—” My voice cracked. “No, Frey—”

As Freya ripped her hands off me, her nails sliced across my cheeks. Flames surrounded her, and she cackled like a madwoman.

“Liar!” she declared. Rage twisted her smile into something foreign. “You’re just like him! You’re a liar.”

Freya charged me again and shoved me with her small but strong hands. I backed deeper into the abyss.

“You hurt the women you love,” she spat. “You have no forgiveness. You grew up loved, and it still wasn’t enough for you because you’re a cold, jaded liar!”

Her fists pounded against my chest, but I didn’t try to fight back. Hurt and fear and agony paralyzed me. Freya grabbed the collar of my shirt and pulled me closer. Though I was taller, she peered down her nose at me. Flames flickered in her eyes.

As Freya’s words hollowed me, something wet and hot spilled down my cheeks. She shook her head in disgust.

“You have no right to be Sovereign,” she declared. “You are no better than Lyall. You’re worse.”

Freya shoved me, and the floor bottomed out. Cold, bitter wind howled in my ears and ripped the screams from my throat. As I fell and fell and fell, Freya’s words echoed in the darkness.

You are no better than Lyall.

You’re worse.