Day bled towards late afternoon as the Excelsior wolves mourned the loss of their pack leader. Amber sat wordless in the mud, staring blankly at the roiling surface of the river, even as Henry kept his arms wrapped firmly around her. He was doing his best to murmur comforting words into her soft blond hair and even dared to press soft kisses to her forehead. In reality, though, he was surprised by her reaction: She was acting as though she had been the one to die, so empty and cold were her eyes. Losing a pack leader was difficult, certainly, but he had seen many rise and fall during his lifetime. What made Daesung different?

Not too far from where Amber sat, Taecyeon was openly crying into Chansung’s shoulder while the younger beta buried his face in his hands. Kyungsoo sat tucked up against his mate’s free side, a frown on his face as he listened to the mingled weeping of the betas. Looking up, the delta squinted – trying to see across the river. Unable to see anything, he turned to find Hakyeon standing silently on top of a nearby rock. “Have they left?” the redheaded delta croaked, his voice dropping into the silence like the heavy thud of a coin hitting still water.

Hakyeon blinked, as though coming to himself from a daydream, and looked over at Kyungsoo. “Who?” The delta nodded across the river. Breath catching at the reminder, Hakyeon shaded his eyes and looked over to the other shore. “They’re still there, but…” He narrowed his eyes. “It looks like they’re getting ready to move down river.”

“They’re going to find somewhere to cross, probably,” Yongguk murmured, his low voice settling into everyone’s bones. Jiyong shuddered and curled up into a tighter ball; he didn’t want to think about reality anymore. For all he cared, they could leave him there to die. “We need to get moving.”

“…Why should we bother?” Jiyong managed to breath through his clenched teeth. “What’s the point?”

Walking over to Jiyong, the NeverNoon alpha grabbed him by the arm and bodily hauled him to his feet. “Your mate didn’t hold those dogs off just so you could let them rip you up later.” Yongguk raised an eyebrow. “Now, let’s go. Amber, how far do we have left to go?”

Hearing her name, the alpha looked up. She glanced towards the trail and shrugged. “Til we’re on pack lands? I – I don’t know. Maybe a couple hours?”

“If we hurry, can we make it by dark?” Amber nodded and shrugged, “maybe” written in every line of the gesture. “Well, we’ll never make it there if we don’t get moving.”

Slowly, each of the NeverNoon wolves rose to their feet – some having to pull others to their feet – and moved to stand behind their alpha. Even Hakyeon, who still seemed to be lost in a dream, drifted over to stand at Yongguk’s side. Kyungsoo carefully took his mate’s hands away from his face. “Come on, Chansung. We’ve got to go.” Looking down at Chansung’s hands, the delta gasped. “Chansung! Your hands!” The palms were red and shiny, as though moist, with blisters bubbling up beneath the flesh. And then Kyungsoo remembered how the beta had grabbed the burning trunk, tossing it into the river. His poor hands, the delta thought, must have been burned by the contact. The damage was bad enough, but it also meant that Chansung would not be able to shift – would not be able to carry anyone on his back. How would they ever make it to the Excelsior lands? 

Chansung hiccupped and stared uncomprehendingly at Kyungsoo. Then, slowly, his gaze followed the downward trajectory of his mate’s gaze, and he winced at the condition of his hands. “Oh skies,” he growled, shuddering as he (foolishly) tried to flex them.

At his side, Taecyeon stopping crying in order to gasp in shock. “Sung, your hands!”

Kyungsoo shot the beta a flat look. Yes, Chansung’s hands were damaged. How had Taecyeon managed to miss that? Honestly. Rising, Kyungsoo put his hand on Chansung’s shoulder. “We need to get you to help,” he murmured. “Before they get infected.”

Numbly nodding, the beta let his mate help him to his feet. “I need…Junsu.” He shuffled over to where Taekwoon stood, his face set in its usual stony expression. “Taekwoon… Do you know anything that will help?”

The delta, whose Bao was one of the pack healers, carefully examined the wounds. He then nodded and pulled Chansung over to the shoreline. “Soak your hands,” he ordered gently. “I’ll find what I need.” His nearly feline eyes moved over to rest on Yongguk and the ragtag NeverNoon wolves. “Once I’ve taken care of Chansung’s hands, we’ll be ready to go.” Taekwoon only just managed to repress the tears that threatened to drown out his voice. But, he knew that Yongguk was right: Daesung did not die so they could give up. There would be time to cry and hate the world when they were safely at home. Until then, feelings were best bottled up and locked away.

“Of course.” Yongguk nodded. “Is there anything we can do to help?”

“No.” Taekwoon turned and began to search the shoreline for the herbs that would help ease Chansung’s pain, which was starting to filter past the barricade of shock that had filtered it before. When the brunette returned, he knelt at Chansung’s side and began to mash gathered yarrow leaves into a paste. “Do we have a blanket or cloth we can tear to wrap it with?” he called.

Hayi immediately moved, going to one of the bedrolls. She found one of the lighter blankets and carried it over to Taekwoon. He gave her a flat look and nodded to it. After a moment, the young Goddess Touched began to tear it into strips, wincing a little at the destruction of something that had been so vital to her survival for so long. Taekwoon took the strips from her and carefully washed them in the water. He then heated them a bit with his powers, causing steam to rise from them, before he turned to Chansung. “This will make it so it does not get infected. Bao will be able to help you better.” Though, looking at the state of the wolves, his Bao would have a great deal of work ahead of him, especially since little Tzuyu had been crying nonstop since before the loss of Daesung. She had been fussing so much he half suspected colic or hunger were the cause of her tears. Chansung simply nodded and allowed the delta to apply the yarrow paste to his wounds. The delta then carefully wrapped his hands, leaving the bandages loose enough they did not put any unwanted pressure on the blisters. “You won’t be able to run on these,” Taekwoon warned. Chansung simply nodded, resigned.

“I’ll carry him,” Kyungsoo said, his expression set in stern determination.

Taekwoon arched an eyebrow. “How?”

Kyungsoo straightened up a little, raising his chin. “I can do it.” He and the other delta stared one another down. “We won’t be going fast. I won’t get out of breath. I can do it.”

Tipping his head back, Chansung looked at his mate for several long moments. “Alright,” he mumbled. “I trust you.” He shrugged. “Worst comes to worst, we go on two legs instead of four.” 

---

Cutting the darkness came the one sound the wolves had come to dread: The rising notes of a hunting song greeting the moon. Jiyong felt his blood turn to mud within his veins, dragging sluggishly and unwillingly to the extremities of his body. He did not have enough feeling left in his franticly beating heart to be afraid; only a stern resignation echoed through his body, as though his very soul were rolling over to bear its vulnerable stomach to the hunters who would at last claim their lives. This, Jiyong thought, was not the life he had envisioned for himself when Daesung had asked him to be his mate. They were supposed to grow old together, have puppies, fall in love – everything that had been systematically torn away from them in a few short hours. Now Jiyong would not even be able to tell Daesung’s parents what had happened to their child nor weep with them over their shared loss. Instead, he would fall to fang and claw in the darkness, just another pile of bones and flesh for the maggots to churn to earth.

Yongguk did his best to rally the wolves – moving to nudge them forward as best he could – but their bodies had nothing left to give. The basin wolves were panting and dizzy, stumbling at best through the shadows, while the mountain wolves’ bodies trembled with exhaustion. Even Chansung, who had been walking the past few miles, looked ready to fall over, but he kept putting one foot in front of the other with resolute determination. Jiyong wondered why he bothered. Tipping his head back, the omega let out a howl born of the purest despair: heartbreak given a voice. At his side, Wooyoung shuddered but could not find it within him to protest.

Ahead of them, Jinyoung collapsed, every muscle in his body spasming in absolute exhaustion. Bomi whimpered, pressing her nose into the matted jet of his fur. He barely managed to twitch at her touch, and Yongguk was beside them in a moment. Shifting to his human form, the alpha lifted the young NeverNoon omega into his arms. The howls came thicker and louder in the darkness. Every muscle along his shoulders and back screamed in protest, threatening to rip flesh from bone, as he pulled Jinyoung from the mud. Rocking back on his heels, the alpha tried to steady the weight in his arms before hefting the omega – settling his weight more evenly in his grasp. Yongguk drew in a slow, shuddering breath. Lifting a foot, the pack leader took an unsteady step forward, pain jolting through his entire body at the motion. Soon one step became another as the alpha trudged forward, the dull throb of his head setting a ceaseless rhythm like the clinking of chains at a prisoner’s ankles as they walked towards the gallows. Yongguk had only felt so tired once before in his life: on a night washed with screaming agony and bitter iron of loss. His jaw clenched, grinding his teeth together. He had been running from Hong Man’s death order that night too. But, this time it seemed Death would at last press a fleeting, final kiss to the ragged, chapped surface of his lips. They were all going to die. Digging his fingers more firmly into Jinyoung’s fur, Yongguk ignored the piercing howls that were coming louder, more insistent, from all around them as his weary body kept its relentless forward motion: step, step, step, step. Death would almost be a relief. 

It came in the shape of silvery shadows between the jagged, mawing darkness of the forest – slips of life between the trunks. Wolves. Distant moonlight, filtering between the stretching branches of the giant trees, reflected off eyes in the night; thirty pairs at least. While the other fleeing wolves stumbled to a stop, clustering together, Yongguk continued walking – step, step, step – feet dragging through the mud. The alpha’s foot caught on a root, sending him crashing to the ground, Jinyoung’s eerily still body pinned beneath his. In the darkness, Taekwoon’s fingers crept over to curl around Hakyeon’s rounder digits in an attempt to comfort the alpha. Looking over at the stoic brunette at his side, Hakyeon’s full lips drew into a ragged smile. There was something right about this, dying together. He had only known the wolf a few days, but it was better to imagine facing their last days together than to spend lifetimes apart. Taekwoon was not Kyungsoo – he never would be – but he was perhaps something better. The alpha’s heart ached at the thought of a thousand tomorrows they would never see: days they could have perhaps come to be friends, maybe more, if they were only given the chance.

Growling shivered through the air, rattling the leaves and chilling the blood Hong Man’s pack began to close in on the broken wolves. It was only too easy for Jiyong to close his eyes, waiting for the pain in his chest to be ripped out with the soft, treacherous flesh of his heart.

Howls. Loud. Insistent. Piercing.

Jiyong could live a hundred years and never want to hear the sound again. It was as though someone had walked into his childhood home and made it a murder scene, so alienating was it to hear the comforting sound of wolfsong turned into a death knell. He shuddered, drawing into a tighter ball against the warm press of Wooyoung’s body. His cousin’s fingers tangled in his hair, holding him close as they waited for the end.

But, as the first of Hong Man’s dogs leapt forward – fangs flashing in the darkness – their attack did not go unmet. A large, bright figure sprung over Jiyong and Wooyoung, landing paws-first on the attacking wolf. Snarls fell into a hollow rattle as the basin wolf met its end, and Jiyong opened his eyes to view the scene – heart stuttering erratically in his chest at the sudden postponement of his death. The wolf before them was large - perhaps not as large as the other wolves, but still powerfully built - with fur that shone silver in the moonlight. Every line of the wolf's body bespoke of power and control even as he whirled to meet another attacker, slamming them into the ground. He fought with surprising grace and strength for his size; he was easily defeating wolves that towered over him. And he seemed to be protecting the basin wolves; it was almost impossible to believe. Jiyong tipped his head back to look at Wooyoung, and the cousins shared a look that seemed to ask a very important question: What was going on? Other figures melted out of the shadows, seeming to block out the distant stars with their size. Even the smallest of these new wolves seemed to dwarf the basin wolves; almost all of them were at least as large as Chansung, if not larger than Taecyeon. Slipping through the trees, the wolves weaved through the darkness until Hong Man’s task force was surrounded. The wolf who had protected Jiyong and Wooyoung sounded out a single bark, and death filled the darkness. Turning, Jiyong buried his face in Wooyoung’s neck; he had no more stomach for bloodshed. So long as he lived, he never wanted to see another wolf die.

When silence at last fell, Jiyong pulled his head from where it had been tucked against Wooyoung’s shoulder and looked cautiously around. He could see the shapes of bodies in the shadows, but the darkness blissfully hid the majority of the gore. The omega took a steadying breath before slowly peeling away from his cousin, and he even stumbled up to his feet. Turning, he sought the pale wolf who had defended them; the moonlit alpha had seemed to be the pack leader, if his command over the other wolves had been any indication of rank. In the darkness, though, the omega could not see very far – his eyesight as a human was a mere shadow of what it was as a wolf.

His thoughts were interrupted by the first, delicate splash of a raindrop hitting the gentle slope of his eyebrow. Tipping his head back, Jiyong looked up at the evening sky as purple-grey clouds split open and the rain began to pour. The omega drew in a deep breath, reveling in the way the rainwater purged the air of the acrid iron of blood and fear; soon only the fresh loamy scent of wet earth and pure water remained. A soft, sad smile turned Jiyong’s lips. There was something in the scent of rain that reminded him of his mate: an earthiness like the rich mountain soil and the freshness of pine. Daesung had smelled of his mountain home, though he did not realize it. A sigh slipped past the omega’s lips. Just thinking of Daesung was enough to bring to memory the ghost of his scent, which had been imprinted on Jiyong’s mind the moment they had met. Earthy soil, pine, musk; but, under those typical scents had crackled something distinctly Daesung, a soft of fragrant spice that made Jiyong think of burning stars and fiery flowers in the last rays of sunlight. His bottom lip trembled. It was cruel how well his memory was able to recreate Daesung’s scent; the memory was so strong it was as though his alpha were standing mere steps behind him.

“Jiyong.”

Every thought crashed out of his head at the warm, husky sound of his name. A tremor racked its way through Jiyong’s too thin body as he stumbled forward in an attempt to turn, his feet catching on one another in his hurry. His nostrils flared, drinking in the impossible scent once again, as at last his eyes fell to rest on a figure that seemed to have stepped out of the haunted dreams that had clouded Jiyong’s mind as exhaustion and pain had melted away reason. He choked out a laugh. This was a new low for him, he thought. The trauma of the day had created the greatest agony of all: imaging Daesung was there with him. Rubbing at his eyes, the omega cursed the burn of tears that threatened to track down his cheeks. He knew this had to be a vision and not his mate because Daesung was not that tall nor his hair streaked with so much gold. His Daesung, the real one, had been powerfully built, certainly, but he was not like the creature before him – a wolf in his prime and easily taller than the omega. How cruel, Jiyong thought, that his mind could not even bother to conjure a proper Daesung.

And then he felt the warm slide of calloused fingertips along the line of his jaw. He drew in a sharp, shuddering breath that caused him to drown in the smell of Daesung. But, the memory was imperfect. There, beneath all of the familiar scents, even beneath the unique scent of Daesung, lingered the smell of blood. The sharp iron – so unusual in the context of a hallucination – brought Jiyong to himself, his heart seeming to forget how to keep rhythm in his chest. “Daesung?” he breathed, the name barely slipping past his cracked lips to stain the night. “Am.. Did I die?” His brows furrowed. It was the only thing he could think of, that in dying he had been permitted to be reunited with his lover. How kind, Jiyong thought, that the Goddess let mateship continue beyond the boundaries of life. An eternity learning to love his mate would be no poor thing. But then Daesung laughed, husky and warm, sending chills of awareness prickling along Jiyong’s forearms – goosebumps.

“I sure hope you didn’t die, Ji,” the alpha murmured, taking a step closer. Jiyong could feel the solid warmth of Daesung’s body, even through the combined fabric of their clothing. “Since the Goddess sent me back from the grave for you.”

---

Did you really think I was going to kill him off?