THE ALPHA WHO COULDN'T HOWL

Chapter 11

_THE ALPHA WHO COULDN'T HOWL_

_Chapter 11: Hello, Son_

"Hello, son."

Same words. Different mouth this time.

Tyler's body had said it in the mud. Now she was saying it standing in the middle of the river, water running through her feet like she wasn't really there.

My mother.

I knew her face from one photo. Dad kept it taped to the back of his dresser drawer, like if he hid it well enough I wouldn't find it. Dark hair like mine. Brown eyes like mine used to be. Tired smile.

Only now her eyes were all black. No white. No brown. Just black river water.

"Liora?" I said. My voice sounded twelve again.

Hessa, standing next to her in the grey dress, rested a hand on my mother's shoulder like they were friends. "She's been waiting to say that for ten years, Kael. You should be grateful. Most boys who can't howl don't get to hear their mothers at all."

Elara's hand in mine was freezing. She was staring at her own mother too - the other transparent woman, Sarah White, in the white dress, barefoot, smiling at Elara like she hadn't left her for ten years.

"Mom?" Elara whispered. "Mom, is that you?"

Sarah White didn't answer. She just smiled wider. That smile was wrong. Too still.

"They're not them," Tyler said from behind us. His real voice, small and scared. He was pressed against the truck door, as far from the river as he could get. "Elara, that's not them. Don't look at them."

Hessa laughed. "Smart boy. Finally using that wolf brain I gave you."

She snapped her fingers and the river went flat. Glass flat. No current. And in it, I could see my mother's face clearer.

"Kael," she said, in her own voice this time, not Hessa's. Soft. That lullaby voice from the video. "You howled. You finally howled."

I couldn't breathe. My chest was too tight.

"Where have you been?" I choked out. It came out angry, not sad. "You left me. You left me with him. He told me you died because you were weak. He told me I was broken because of you."

"I didn't leave," she said. Tears of black water ran down her transparent cheeks. "Hessa took me the night you were born. White Alpha boys are not supposed to exist, Kael. Never. She needed me to make you. And then she needed to keep me to keep you quiet. Every time you tried to howl as a kid, I held your mouth shut from the veil. Because if you howled, she would find you and take you too."

The silver light in my hands came back without me calling it. Burning.

"Let her go," I said to Hessa. Low. My wolf voice.

"For a price," Hessa said, exactly like before. "Just like Sarah. Just like Liora. Mothers are so easy. They always pay."

Elara stepped forward before I could stop her. "What price? What do you want for them?"

Hessa looked at Elara like she was a present.

"You. Both of you. Whole."

She pointed at Elara's neck. The two silver marks I'd given her were glowing through her skin.

"You completed it halfway in the mud. Cute. Desperate. But not full. Not heat. The veil is still open. On the full moon - two days now, not three, I lied, sorry - your shadow will come back and try to wear you. The only thing that can stitch a split white wolf is a white Alpha's full claim. Heat, bite, knot. Old law."

Elara went bright red even in the cold. "You—"

"I know," Hessa cut her off, looking at me now. "And here's the fun part, little Alpha who couldn't howl. If you claim her while she is split, you don't get to choose which Elara you bind to. The veil chooses. You might bind to the human girl you love who serves you burnt eggs. Or you might bind to the girl in black who already called you mate. Forever. No take-backs. White bond is forever."

My blood went cold.

"What?" Elara whispered.

"She's lying," I said, but my voice wasn't sure. I looked at Hessa. "You're lying."

"Am I?" Hessa smiled and touched my mother's face again. My mother flinched. "Ask your mother. She knows. She was bound to Magnus while Hessa wore her. She knows what it feels like to be kissed by a man who thinks you're someone else."

Liora was crying harder now, black water tears.

"Kael, don't," she whispered. "Don't claim her yet. If you claim the wrong one, you'll—"

Hessa covered her mouth and Liora's voice cut off.

Sarah White, Elara's mother, finally moved. She took a step forward in the water, toward Elara.

"Elara, come here," she said, and her voice was honey. "Come into the river with me. I can protect you from the choice. I can teach you to merge on your own. Without him. Without a mate. Like I did."

Elara stared at her mother's hand reaching out over the water.

Tyler grabbed Elara's other arm hard. "Elara, no! That's not our mom! Our mom left! This thing told me in the river— it said Mom gave us away for wolf blood! It said—"

"Tyler is right," Hessa said, bored. "Sarah did give you away. Both of you. Tyler for wolf blood so he wouldn't die of his human sickness. Elara for white blood so I would have a new white wolf when Sarah got old. Fair trade."

"Stop it!" Elara screamed. She was shaking so hard her silver eyes flickered on and off. Brown to silver to brown. "Stop telling me my mom traded me!"

Sarah's smile didn't move. "I did it to save you."

"You left me in a diner!" Elara shouted back, tears finally breaking. "You left me serving coffee to assholes who said I was tolerated! Tyler and I lived in a trailer! Dad drank! We had nothing!"

"There is everything wrong with them," I whispered without thinking, pulling her into my chest. Her face hit my jacket and she sobbed into it.

Hessa watched us, amused.

"So sweet. So human. So doomed."

She lifted both hands and the river rose again, and both mothers sank down into it, gone, just faces under the water now, pressing up.

"You have two days until full moon, little white wolves," Hessa said, stepping back, her grey dress blending into the water. "Fix her split, or I get to keep both mothers and I get a new black Luna. And you, Kael you get to spend forever wondering if the girl in your bed is the girl you love."

She looked at Tyler last.

"And you, half-blood boy. You have wolf blood now. My blood. The river will call you again tonight. And next time, you will come in on your own feet."

The river dropped. Flat again. Normal current. Hessa was gone. So were the mothers. Just black water rushing.

Silence except for Elara crying into my chest.

Tyler slid down the truck door to the ground, holding his head.

"I don't want wolf blood," he whispered. "I don't want it."

I held Elara tighter, my silver eyes burning in the dark, looking at the spot where my mother had been.

Behind us, in the trees, that black circle of snow where black-dress Elara had disappeared started to spread.

And from town, the bonfire bell rang again.

But this time it wasn't a warning.

It was a death toll.