Blood_Between_Us

Blood Between Us Chapter 2

The silence stretches so long it becomes painful. Liam's jaw clenches, his gold eyes locked on his father's, refusing to give an inch. The wolves around them shift restlessly, waiting for someone to break first.

Then….movement at the tree line.

"Liam!"

Everyone turns. Rose bursts through the trees, her dark hair wild, eyes desperate. And clutching her hand, stumbling to keep up, is Karl.

Eight years old. Too young to be here. Too small to understand what he's about to witness.

"Liam, stop this!" Rose's voice cracks as she runs toward her mate, her whole focus narrowed to that one point. Nothing else exists. Not the blood-soaked ground, not the grieving wolves, not even…

She lets go of Karl's hand.

The boy trips over an exposed root, arms pinwheeling. He's going down, face-first into blood-stained earth.

A hand catches him.

Karl looks up into warm brown eyes set in a young face. The woman is heavily pregnant, one hand cradling her swollen belly even as she steadies him with the other.

"Careful, little one." Her voice is soft despite the chaos around them. Then her eyes sharpen, taking in his age, his confusion. "A child shouldn't be here."

Karl stares at her belly. Something about it draws him…maybe the roundness, maybe the way she protects it instinctively. Without thinking, he reaches out and places his small palm against it.

"You shouldn't be here either," he says, with the blunt honesty only children possess.

For a moment, nothing happens. Then.

A kick. Strong and insistent, right against Karl's hand.

His eyes go wide. "It moved!"

Despite everything, Amelia almost smiles. "She does that." Her hand covers his, both of them feeling the flutter of life beneath. Her daughter. Active and healthy and completely unaware of the nightmare unfolding around them.

Then Amelia's smile fades as she really looks at the clearing. At the bodies. At the blood. At the raw grief that hangs in the air like smoke. Her hand instinctively tightens over her belly.

"You're right," she says quietly. "We shouldn't be here. Either of us." She looks down at Karl, this child who somehow made more sense than any of the adults around them. "Come on. Let's go."

Karl takes her offered hand and holds on tight. His mother has already forgotten him, she's with his father now, trying to pull Liam away from Joshua, her voice pleading. Karl watches for a moment, something twisting in his chest, then turns away.

Amelia leads him away from the clearing, following a narrow path between the trees. With each step, the sounds of grief fade behind them. But the smell of blood follows.

"I need to check on someone," Amelia says, more to herself than Karl. Her free hand stays on her belly, rubbing small circles. "My husband's cousin. She..." Her voice catches. "She lost her mate today."

Karl doesn't fully understand, but he nods anyway. He's seen death before, old wolves who passed in their sleep, their bodies laid out with flowers and gentle tears. But this feels different. Heavier.

They walk in silence through Silvermoon territory. The houses they pass are dark, empty. Everyone must be at the clearing. Or hiding. The only sound is their footsteps and Amelia's slightly labored breathing.

Finally, they reach a small house at the edge of pack lands. Modest. Quiet. The door is cracked open.

"Jamia?" Amelia calls out. "Jamia, it's Amelia. I came to check on you."

No answer.

Something cold slides down Karl's spine. He doesn't know why, but his hand tightens on Amelia's.

"Stay close," she murmurs, and pushes the door wider.

The inside of the house is dark. Too dark. The curtains are drawn, blocking out the moonlight. It smells... wrong. Stale. Like nobody's opened a window in days.

Amelia fumbles for a light switch. Finds it.

The world stops.

Jamia hangs from the ceiling beam, rope tight around her neck. Her body sways slightly…just slightly…in the breeze from the now-open door. Her eyes are half-open, unseeing. Her face is peaceful in a way that makes it worse somehow. Like she'd finally found relief.

"No." The word barely makes it past Amelia's lips. "No, no, no!!!"

She drops Karl's hand and rushes forward, her pregnant belly making her movements awkward. She reaches up, trying to lift Jamia's body, trying to support her weight. The chair that Jamia kicked away lies on its side nearby.

"Close your eyes, Karl!" Amelia's voice is sharp, desperate. "Don't look!"

But Karl can't look away. He stands frozen in the doorway, his eight-year-old brain trying to make sense of what he's seeing. The angle of Jamia's neck isn't right. Her skin has a grayish tint. Her hands hang limp at her sides.

He's never seen a person look so... empty.

Amelia manages to get the rope loose, lowering Jamia's body to the floor. "Breathe," she begs, pressing her hands to Jamia's chest. "Please, please breathe." Her voice shakes with each word.

She pumps once. Twice. Three times. Her own breathing comes in gasps now, tears streaming down her face. Inside her womb, Her daughter kicks wildly. Frantic movements that Amelia barely registers.

"Come on, Jamia. Come on!"

Karl's feet finally move. He walks toward them on shaking legs, each step feeling too loud in the awful silence. His small hand finds Amelia's shoulder.

"She's not breathing." His voice comes out flat. Matter-of-fact. He's just stating what's true, the way children do when they don't understand how to soften terrible things. "She's not breathing anymore."

Amelia's hands still. She stares down at Jamia, her sister-in-law, her friend and something breaks inside her. A sound tears from her throat, raw and animal. She pulls Karl down into her arms, pressing his face against her shoulder, holding him as much for her own comfort as his.

Karl's small arms wrap around her neck. He can feel her crying, feel the way her whole body shakes. Inside her belly, right against his chest, he can feel the babyl, kicking and kicking like she's trying to fight her way out.

"I'm sorry," Amelia whispers into his hair. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry."

She doesn't know who she's apologizing to. Jamia? Karl? Her unborn daughter? Maybe all of them.

They stay like that for a long time. Long enough for Amelia's sobs to quiet into shaking breaths. Long enough for Karl's legs to go numb from kneeling on the hard floor. Long enough for Her daughter's frantic movements to slow into occasional, tired kicks.

Finally, Amelia pulls back. Her eyes are red and swollen. She touches Karl's face gently, like she's checking to make sure he's real.

"We have to go back," she says quietly. "Alpha Joshua needs to know."

Karl glances back at Jamia's body one more time. Her eyes are still open. Staring at nothing.

He takes Amelia's hand again as they leave. Neither of them looks back.

___________

The walk back to the clearing feels longer. Slower. Like they're moving through water. Amelia's hand trembles in Karl's, and he squeezes it tighter, trying to offer comfort he doesn't know how to give.

When they emerge from the tree line, the fighting has stopped. Wolves stand in tense clusters, Silvermoon on one side, Redblood on the other. But the violence has paused, like everyone's too exhausted to continue.

Amelia's appearance breaks the uneasy silence. She's pale, her face streaked with tears, one hand still protective over her belly. Every eye turns to her. Her mate Miles notice her distress immediately.

Joshua steps forward. Something in her expression makes his blood run cold. "Amelia? What.."

"It's Jamia." Her voice barely carries, but in the sudden quiet, everyone hears. "She's... Alpha Joshua, she's gone."

The words hang in the air for a heartbeat. Two.

"What do you mean, gone?" Joshua's voice is carefully controlled. Too controlled.

"I found her at her house. She..." Amelia's voice breaks. "She hung herself. I tried….I tried to save her but.."

The world tilts.

Joshua's face goes white. Around him, wolves gasp, cry out. Someone, a woman, lets out a wail that sounds like it's being torn from her soul. John, Jamia's brother, makes a sound like a wounded animal, his knees buckling. Miles catches him, holding him up even as his own face crumbles.

But it's Liam's reaction that makes everyone freeze.

"No." His voice cracks like breaking glass. The cold mask he's been wearing shatters. "No, that's…that's not…"

He staggers backward, his eyes wild. The composure he's maintained since they found him, the ice in his stare, the cruel indifference, all of it crumbles in an instant.

"She wasn't supposed to" His hands shake as they come up to his head, fingers digging into his hair. "I freed her. That bastard is gone. She was supposed to come back to me. She was supposed to.."

The clearing goes deathly silent. Even the crying stops. Every single wolf stares at Liam as the weight of his words sinks in.

Joshua's voice, when it comes, is barely above a whisper. "What did you say?"

"She was MINE!" The words explode out of Liam like they've been clawing to escape. "Before him, before that…that mate bond…she was mine first! We were…" He stops, breathing hard, his eyes unfocused. "I loved her. I loved her and she…she just…"

He doesn't get to finish.

John's fist connects with his jaw with a sickening crack. Liam goes down hard, blood spattering from his split lip.

"You killed him for HER?!" John's voice shakes with rage and disbelief. He lunges for Liam again, but Miles grabs him, hauling him back even as John thrashes against him.

"Let me go! Let me…he killed Peter because of an AFFAIR?!"

"She wasn't just some affair!" Liam shouts from the ground, blood running down his chin. His eyes are red now, wild with grief and rage and something that looks almost like madness. "She loved me! Before any of this, before the mate bonds and the duty and all the bullshit. She loved ME!"

"She found her MATE!" Joshua roars. His whole body trembles, grief transforming into fury so potent it's suffocating. "The bond chose Peter! Not you!"

"The bond was WRONG!" Liam screams back. "It took her from me! It made her forget!"

"You killed them both." Joshua's voice cuts through Liam's breakdown like a blade. The rage drains from his face, replaced by something infinitely worse. Hollow, bottomless grief.

He drops to his knees. The mighty Alpha, who has led his pack for decades, crumples like his strings have been cut.

"My daughter," he whispers. "My little girl. You didn't just kill Peter. You killed them both. And their child. You killed all of them."

The words echo in the terrible silence.

Zack stares at his son like he's looking at a stranger. "You started a war..." His voice is hoarse. "You murdered an innocent man... over a woman who wasn't your mate?"

Sarah covers her mouth with both hands, tears streaming down her face. Her baby boy. What has he become?

Grey stands rigid, his expression carved from stone. But his hands are clenched so tight his knuckles have gone white.

And Rose.

Rose stands apart from everyone, as she always does. Her face is blank. Carefully, perfectly blank. The mask she's worn for eight years, ever since the mating bond snapped into place with a man who didn't want her.

But her claws have pierced her palms. Blood drips steadily onto the grass, pooling at her feet.

Nobody notices. They never do.

Except Karl.

He stands with Amelia, her hand still in his, but his eyes are locked on his mother. On the blood dripping from her hands. On the way she doesn't even flinch at the pain.

He's seen that blank expression before. Every time his father said another woman's name in his sleep. Every time he pulled away from Rose's touch. Every time he looked through her like she didn't exist.

Rose's eyes finally lift, and for just a moment…just a heartbeat…they meet Karl's across the blood-soaked clearing.

Her mask slips.

Karl sees everything. The pain. The rage. The years of being unwanted, unloved, invisible. The years of knowing her mate's heart belonged to someone else. The years of pretending it didn't destroy her.

Then she looks away, and the mask slides back into place.

Karl's hand tightens around Amelia's. She's warm and solid and real, and right now she feels like the only stable thing in a world that's tilting sideways.

Eight years old, and Karl understands something terrible:

His father never loved them. Not really. Not him, not his mother.

Liam's heart had always belonged to the dead woman in the house behind them.

And everyone knows it now.