Page 7 of Wolf’s Providence (The Shadowridge Peak #3)

SIX

Willow

I sat in the chair beside the bed. The snow was so heavy outside that I no longer looked up at the small window. Soft electric light filled the room. I’d been surprised to find the lights were on a dimmer switch, but it was a happy surprise. My sketchbook was on my legs while I rubbed a hand across my abdomen.

The phantom aches still lingered, and I wondered how long it would be before my brain accepted the fact I was no longer injured. I’d been a lot more stable on my feet today. I’d had another shower, even washed my hair, and was now in fresh jammies. I kept glancing at the door, anticipating the arrival of my breakfast. Today was the first time I could say that I had an appetite.

A quiet knock at the door had me sitting up in the chair, my notebook being put on the bed in eager anticipation of being fed. Calling out an invitation to come in, I didn’t mask my surprise when the shaman entered.

“Oh!” I hesitated. “Hi.” I watched him as he crossed the room, his steps quiet as he approached me, his presence filling the room with an ancient energy. It wasn’t until he got closer that I realized I was in the only seat, and I jumped up and scrambled out of the way, flinching at the brief stab of pain at the sudden movement.

His lips twitched as if he could see me, but I knew the heavy thick layer of white across his eyes hindered his vision. Still, I wasn’t wholly sure he was blind. He was so small he looked frail, but there was absolutely nothing frail about this man. Wispy white hair covered his head, thinning but still there. His skin showed signs of age, but I recalled what I’d been told, that he was a lot older than he appeared. To me, he looked maybe mid-eighties, but I knew he had more years on his clock than it looked.

He sat wordlessly, his cloudy eyes fixed on me, but I knew I was being seen.

“Thank you,” he murmured as he settled into the chair.

I nodded, unable to shake the weight of his gaze as he got comfortable in the seat, and I forced myself to not fidget as silence filled the room.

“I hear you are feeling better,” he said with no preamble. His voice was low and steady, comforting.

“It seems so,” I admitted, my gaze flicking to the door, expecting Doc or someone to come through.

“We are alone, child. I am sure the alpha knows of my presence on his mountain, but we will not be disturbed.”

Was that a good thing? “Um…okay?”

“I have spoken to Caleb.”

He now had my full attention. The words sent a jolt of electricity through me, but I forced myself to stay still. I wanted to ask the thousand questions that sat on the tip of my tongue, but instead, I held back and waited for him to continue.

“He’s hiding,” the shaman continued, his words and tone soft but direct. “Running from what he thinks he’s done to you.”

I swallowed hard but said nothing. There was no need. The shaman seemed to know more than I did about pretty much everything, including how I felt even when I struggled with that myself.

The shaman studied me, one hand on the armrest of the chair, his fingers tapping gently off it. “The bond between you is as strong for him as it is for you.”

I nodded, then wondered if he could see that, so I answered hurriedly. “Is it annoying him as much as it annoys me?”

“I don’t believe so,” he said with a rueful smile on his face. “He didn’t mention it was bothering him, so I assume it was not.” He seemed to consider his next words carefully. “As we spoke about before, what you’re experiencing, what drew you to him from the start, is much deeper. I don’t think I need to tell you it’s the work of our Goddess?”

“I’ve been told that,” I confirmed, biting back my denial about another heavenly presence other than the one I’d been raised with. I was still very much a Christian, but it wasn’t my place to yuck on someone else’s faith.

The shaman hesitated. “Ah, you don’t believe?”

“I think even if I did, it wouldn’t make a difference,” I answered carefully. “She is a God to you. You are shifters, I am not.”

He looked thoughtful. “Interesting. She is still a deity that cares for all life, as much as your God does.”

The mention of God and Luna in the same sentence sent a chill down my spine. I was still very much of the opinion that theology was not for me to get involved with. I knew, for shifters, their belief was absolute. I didn’t think there was a Big Bang theorist amongst them. The shifters I had met had spoken of their Goddess with reverence, and for that reason, I had accepted their belief. I was human, I was not part of their world, and because of that, I had no right to voice my opinion of power and divine connections.

But was the shaman saying I was someone the Goddess had something to do with?

“I don’t think I understand, sir,” I said finally, finding my voice, even if it was barely more than a whisper. “Are you saying your Goddess cares about me?”

“I am,” he replied. “Her interest is Caleb. His bloodline.”

“His bloodline?” I knew I was frowning, my mind trying to wrap around the meaning of his words and how they connected to me.

The shaman nodded, his gaze on mine never wavering. I felt like he could see right into my soul. “Caleb is the last of his bloodline. A strong line, it carries an ancient power tied to the wild nature of the wolf. An alpha struggles most with control, as they fight their inner wolf, their beast. Caleb’s bloodline is one of the strongest, very similar to Cannon’s, the alpha of this pack where you recover. Being so inherently tied to their ancestral line, they are more prone to be untamed and, as such, run a higher risk of turning feral. Our Goddess knows this. She knows that, without balance, he will lose himself to it. To the calling of the wild.”

“This is the same for any alpha?” I asked curiously.

“It is. Most don’t even know it’s a struggle they face. Cannon, for example, was so focused on overthrowing his father’s reign, he never strayed from his calling.”

Wetting my lips, I watched the shaman. “But Caleb has no pack after what Jonah and the other pack did. When he exacted his revenge, he no longer had a purpose?” It was a guess, but I saw the shaman’s pleased smile.

“Exactly, by choosing to be alone and shun his brothers, he opened himself to the wildness.”

I felt like I would never swallow past the lump in my throat. “And how is this tied to me?”

“Without balance, he loses himself. You’ve seen it. Luna has seen it. She has chosen you, Willow, to be the balance in his life.”

I could only hear the sound of my heart racing, and I feared he was going to have to repeat himself. The idea was…preposterous. No, that wasn’t right. It was huge. It was absolutely incomprehensible and strange. So strange. Was this even real? I saw his finger twitch, and I knew he was patiently waiting for me to get over my meltdown. “Chose…me?” He nodded. “But, I’m just?—”

“Human,” he finished for me, with a gentle but firm tone. “Yes, you are human. I think that’s exactly why she chose you. You’re grounded in a way shifters are not. You seem to be able to ground Caleb in a way a pack could not. I believe the power you have to tether him, to keep him from falling completely to his wildness, is why he’s still with us. Luna’s Will is what created the bond between you two, and his blood bound you to him not only to save your life…but to save his.”

My mind was racing as the words hung in the air, heavy and profound with the power to blow my mind. “Why me?” I asked him eventually as I realized I was taking huge gulps of air. “Why did she choose me of all people?” I looked down at myself. “I’m no one. Absolutely no one.”

“You are Willow, not no one,” he corrected me gently. “And why you? I don’t know any more than you do. Our Goddess works in mysterious ways and does not always provide clear answers. Maybe she saw something in you, something that was strong enough to stand between Caleb and the darkness that’s so desperately trying to consume him.”

“She saw something in me?” I snorted, knowing I probably insulted him, too far gone in my “what the fuck” moment to care. “Was it the debilitating illness? The fact I’m an orphan? Or the complete and totally plain fact that I am not enough?” I felt a swell of anger rise. “Does she know I’m failing? I don’t know how to help him! This can’t be on me. I don’t know what I am doing!”

The shaman wasn’t the least bit bothered with my meltdown. He let me rant and then he waited until I was taking huge gulps of air again before he spoke. “You’ve already helped him, Willow. More than you realize. Your bond is not one-sided. He feels it too, even though he’s doing his best to deny it. This is why he ran. He’s so scared he’s going to hurt you again. He knows what he is capable of. The blood on his hands should never have been yours, and he knows that.” The shaman drilled me with a hard stare, a feat for someone who was almost blind. “He knows, without you, he will be lost.”

“And?” My snark was lost on the shaman.

“And he’s still here, still fighting. For you.”

This was madness. Shaking my head in disbelief, I fought the conflicting emotions rising inside me. “You make it sound like I am the one to save him, but that can’t be right. I have no powers. I don’t belong in your world. In fact, while no one has outright said it, I don’t think I’m even welcome in this world.”

“You belong more than you know,” the shaman said quietly. “Luna’s choices are never random. You have the strength inside you that Caleb needs. A strength that goes beyond the physical. You may not be a shifter, but you are tied to our world now, to Caleb. You are his balance, and you cannot escape that.”

Silence fell between us once more as I tried to process the weight of the words pressing down on me. I’d spent so much time thinking of myself as an outsider, someone who didn’t belong here, that I hadn’t accepted that the truth was so much more complicated than being a human in a shifter world. The bond between us wasn’t something random or born out of desperation or chance—it was something greater. Something beyond either of us.

And I had no idea if I wanted it. Could I be what he needed? After everything that had happened, did I even want to be?

“How do I help him?” I asked, my voice barely audible, the question surprising me as it wasn’t what I thought I would say.

The shaman’s look softened, and I batted away the thought that for the first time since coming into my room, he looked hopeful. “You don’t have to force it,” he spoke gently. “The bond will guide you both, but Caleb must be willing to face his demons. To do that, he needs to accept that the beast inside him is part of who he is and not something for him to fear. You, Willow, you will remind him of the balance he needs. Remind him that he is more than just his darkness. His actions ten years ago when he exacted his pack’s revenge, it haunts him. While he does not regret his actions, he feels the weight of their deaths. Carries it with him. He needs to learn to forgive.”

“They killed his entire family,” I spoke in his defense. “It will be hard to forgive that.”

“I meant he needs to forgive himself,” the shaman corrected me softly. “He needs to forgive himself for the death of his pack, of the pack he killed, and for the harm he has done to you.”

My mouth would never have moisture in it again, I was sure. “And if he doesn’t?”

The shaman’s expression darkened. “Then he will lose himself to the beast and the wild forever.”

“Beast? His wolf?”

The shaman shook his head. “No, our wolves are part of us—they want what we want. But the beasts? The darkness all shifters carry? That’s different. The more we feed it with hate and self-loathing, the stronger it grows.”

Clenching my hands together in my lap, I tried to keep my emotions in check. The thought of Caleb, the man I knew and cared for, turning into something wild and uncontrollable—it was too much. But the knowledge that I might be the only one who could stop it, was even more overwhelming.

“And if I decide to return to my life and never think of shifters or him again?”

The shaman cocked his head to the side, a small smile playing on his lips. “You can lie to yourself, child, but you can’t lie to me, or Luna.”

Well, what the hell did that mean?

“You love him.” He said it so simply, so matter-of-factly, that I blushed crimson. “Your heart will rule your head, child, and I thank you for it.”

“Um…” Yup, I had nothing.

“You won’t be alone,” the shaman added, his voice once more reassuring. “Luna chose you because she knows you are strong enough for this path. Trust in that, and you will be able to trust in yourself.”

That may be true, but the knot of uncertainty in my chest remained. The idea that this was my life, that I was part of something so much bigger than myself, felt impossible. But…I couldn’t deny the truth of the shaman’s words. I knew the bond was real, I could feel it, and it was growing stronger every day.

Did I love him? I wasn’t sure. I knew I could love him, and I knew I was so scared of his rejection that I was probably too scared to admit, even to myself, how deep my feelings ran.

“What happens now?” I asked him, breaking the silence.

“I told him to come to you.”

Alarm crossed my face, and even in his hindered sight, I knew the shaman saw it because he laughed. “He is stubborn, child. He will come when he is ready, but he will come.”

“So…I just wait?”

The shaman stood, giving me a kind smile. “Isn’t that what you have been doing?”

He patted my shoulder before he left me in my room, my mind overflowing with all the information he had shared since he started our talk.

Whether I was ready or not, I was bound to Caleb, and the path forward, for both of us it seemed, was one we would have to face together—if he ever came back.

The shaman may believe he was on his way, but I knew the mule-headed male better, and I wasn’t holding my breath.