The Omega's Three Mates

The white rose trembled in my grip, its petals edged with frost despite the August heat doing its best to choke the life out of everything else in Garden Valley. Above me, ravens circled the cemetery's ancient oaks, their wings cutting shadows that felt wrong somehow – too sharp, too purposeful, like everything else in my life lately. My combat boots, scored with marks from all our midnight "walks," sank slightly into earth that seemed eager to swallow things whole. Just like that night in Seattle when the ground had tried to drink my footprints and Mom had grabbed my hand, whispering "run faster" with fear in her eyes. The sleeve of my thrifted leather jacket – the one Mom hated until she didn't – caught on a rose thorn. Lately everything seemed to snag, to tear, to leave marks that healed too quickly. Like my body couldn't decide if it wanted to break or become unbreakable. Mom's fresh grave stretched before me, dark soil still loose and raw. The silver pendant at my throat burned cold, like it had every full moon since my seventeenth birthday when I'd woken up in the woods with dirt under my nails and no memory of how I got there. Funny how she'd insisted I never take it off, right up until the end, when she'd gripped my hand so tight and whispered "it's starting" like that explained anything about the past seventeen years. "Guess this is it." The words hung visible in air that shouldn't have been cold enough for breath to show, just like those midnight runs she'd called "emergency cardio" – the ones that always left me hungry for something I couldn't name, something that made my bones ache and my skin feel too tight. Behind me, footsteps faded across frost-tipped grass, carrying traces of an accent that made my skin prickle with recognition I shouldn't have. The last mourner's shadow stretched too long, too dark, before disappearing behind a mausoleum wrapped in unnaturally fast-growing ivy. The same type that had crawled up every house we'd ever lived in, no matter how many times Mom had torn it down. I shifted my weight, and something crunched under my boot – another chunk of quartz, probably. They kept appearing around me lately, like the ground was offering up gifts I didn't ask for. Mom would've known why. Mom always knew why, even if her explanations came wrapped in metaphors about lunar cycles and bloodlines and the importance of staying away from people during "certain times of the month." "Did you know, Mom?" My voice cracked. "How much I was gonna suck at this whole... being-alone thing?" The words tasted like copper and grief, familiar as the herbs she'd hung in our kitchen – the ones that made regular visitors sneeze but left me breathing easier, feeling stronger, more alert. More something. My phone buzzed in my pocket – probably another missed call from the school counselor wanting to "process my loss." Like she could possibly understand what it meant to lose the only person who knew why you couldn't have sleepovers during full moons, or why cats either loved you desperately or ran like hell. The silence stretched out, heavy as cemetery dirt, broken only by the soft click of my teeth grinding together – a habit that had gotten worse since that growth spurt last year, the one that had left me with sharper canines and a craving for rare steak that bordered on concerning. I tried to shrug off the grief clawing at my spine, but it just dug in deeper, wrapping around my bones like the ivy that always seemed to follow us from town to town. Three schools in four years, each move preceded by someone asking too many questions about my "unusual energy" or Mom's collection of silver daggers that she swore were "just decorative." Footsteps crunched behind me. Slow. Deliberate. Too close. The air shifted, carrying a scent that hit me like a forgotten lullaby – leather and woodsmoke and something wild that made my teeth ache. The same scent that sometimes woke me from dreams of running on four legs through moonlit forests. I spun around, adrenaline sparking through my veins as one of the thorns finally broke skin. The blood welled up black in the fading light, shimmering with something that definitely wasn't normal iron oxide. Like that time I'd cut myself helping Mom move her "special" mirrors, and she'd burned the bandages afterward. "Whoever you are, this is not the time." "Savannah." That voice. Seventeen years of silence shattered by a single word that made the ravens go still and my blood run hot despite the chill. My spine stiffened before I even turned, the rose stem splintering in my grip. "Richard." He stood there like some gothic novel cover model who'd raided a Tom Ford clearance sale – all broad shoulders and expensive dark coat and perfectly trimmed salt-and-pepper beard. But it was his eyes that caught me, storm-cloud grey and too familiar. The same eyes that stared back from my mirror whenever the moon was full and my reflection seemed to ripple like water. "You're not supposed to be here. This is family-only territory." The pendant pulsed once against my skin, like a warning I'd never learned to read. "And you're family." Power rippled beneath his words, old and hungry, making the quartz crystals at my feet vibrate in response. "Don't." I faced him fully, the grave a cold presence at my back. "You lost the right to that word when you walked out of Mom's life. Out of mine." My hands shook, and I told myself it was anger, not the way the air suddenly felt charged with static, making my skin buzz like it did before storms. His jaw worked, muscles cording beneath skin marked with scars that caught the light wrong. The shadows at his feet writhed like living things, reaching toward me with fingers of darkness that seemed almost familiar. "Why now? You show up here, today of all days, expecting what? A warm welcome? I'm fresh out of hugs for absentee fathers who never even bothered to call or send a f*****g letter." "Enough." His voice cracked like a whip, making nearby birds scatter. A streetlight flickered and died, like even electricity knew better than to witness this reunion. "I didn't come here for that." "Yeah, no kidding." The thorns bit deeper as I crossed my arms, blood trickling down my wrist in patterns that looked disturbingly like Mom's "meditation circle" drawings – the ones that had covered our basement walls in every house we'd ever rented. "So why are you here? To play mourner? To pretend you actually cared for the woman you dumped like a used tissue?" "Listen to me. There are things you need to know. Things your mother—" He stopped, head snapping to the side like a predator catching a scent. Every muscle in my body tensed in response, an instinct I'd never asked for recognizing a threat I couldn't name. The temperature dropped. The shadows between the graves began to move with purpose, carrying whispers in a language that shouldn't have made sense but did. In the distance, a wolf howled – which was weird, considering there weren't supposed to be wolves in these parts. And weirder still that something in my blood wanted to answer. My hand flew to the pendant as every new instinct I'd been ignoring screamed danger. The ravens took flight in perfect synchronization, and Richard's eyes flickered silver in the dying light. The ground beneath my feet thrummed with energy that felt like a warning, like a deadline, like time running out. "We need to go." His voice dropped low, urgent. "They're here." "They?" My pulse spiked as something moved between the headstones – something that made the ground frost beneath its steps and set my teeth on edge. "Who's they?" His answer was lost in a sudden wind that carried the scent of pine and predator and something else – something that made my canines throb and my blood sing with recognition. The kind of recognition that came with questions I wasn't sure I wanted answered. Well, happy early birthday to me. Looks like turning eighteen came with a side of supernatural drama after all. And somewhere in the back of my mind, in a voice that sounded too much like Mom's, I heard the whisper: "Run." My fingers tightened around the rose, thorns digging deeper. The pain felt real, grounding, unlike the surreal nightmare my life had become since finding Mom in the kitchen three days ago, surrounded by broken salt lines and scattered herbs. The official report said heart attack. Natural causes. But nothing about the shattered mirrors or the claw marks on the back door had felt natural. The temperature dropped another ten degrees. Frost patterns spiraled across Mom's headstone, forming shapes that looked like the "protection runes" she used to draw on my lunch bags. Basic mom stuff, right? Along with the self-defense lessons that focused weirdly heavily on how to escape silver chains. "I said we need to go." Richard's voice carried an edge of urgency that made my skin crawl. His hand reached toward me, covered in scars that caught the fading light like mercury. "They're getting closer." "Right, because I always run off with strange men who show up at funerals talking about mysterious 'theys.'" The snark felt hollow even to me, but it was better than admitting how the air had gotten thick enough to chew, how every shadow seemed to pulse with malevolent purpose. "Next you'll be offering me candy from your windowless van." "Savannah." My name came out like a growl, and something in my chest wanted to growl back. "Your mother spent seventeen years keeping you hidden from them. Don't waste her sacrifice because you're feeling rebellious." The mention of Mom hit like a physical blow. Behind him, something moved in the gathering dark – something that walked like a person but felt wrong, off, like a predator wearing human skin as a cheap costume. The scent of copper and wet earth filled my nose, along with something else, something that made every muscle in my body scream run.