“He wouldn’t have wanted to hurt you, of course,” Sonny continued. “But he either would’ve walked away before the mate bond, or he would’ve died after bonding, only to leave you to go crazy in a mate-less state of anguish.”
Air abandoned my lungs. My stomach recoiled as if sucker punched in the gut. Or we could’ve lived a long and happy life together.
“I know his death hurts. I know this truth hurts as well. But it’s nothing compared to what you would’ve gone through.”
Had he lived.
My knuckles popped, and I clenched my teeth. The kettle whistled behind me. Sonny walked around my stiff body and turned it off. He poured the steaming water into the two mugs and plunked the tea bags in. The smell of spices floated through the air.
We stood side by side in silence—Sonny faced the counter, our drinks, and the window to the outside, while I faced the interior of the cabin. I tried to collect my thoughts. They scattered like cockroaches from the light.
“So you’re saying I should let my anger for Christine go because she did me a fucking favourfavor?”
A pause. “No. Absolutely not. Let go of your anger because it only hurts you right now. Christine’s actions will come back on her.”
I grumbled. Sometimes karma took too long.
“She gave Tristan the noble way out he wanted.”
My scurrying thoughts vanished, leaving my mind full of anger. “A way out of his relationship with me. Like I fucking trapped him.”
“A way out that wouldn’t hurt you as much as the alternatives. He obviously loved you very much. He loved you enough to try to ignore the mate call and leave you. I don’t envy his dilemma.”
I took a deep breath and swallowed my words. Breathe. Just breathe. Tristan’s loving face flashed through my mind, his gaze tender when he watched me, when he told me he loved me. His feelings for me weren’t a lie, but it hurt that he never shared his struggles or the war raging inside him. He never fully confided in me. The red haze in my vision cleared. Sonny spoke from a very neutral point of view. He’d never met Tristan. His comments cut deep, but that wasn’t his fault.
Sonny watched me for a moment before picking up one of the mugs from the counter. He handed it to me.
“Thanks.”
He nodded and picked up the second mug.
“What about the Pharaoh?”
Sonny smiled into the fragrant steam lifting off the hot tea before leaning back into the counter. “He’s thousands of years old. If his diabolical plans for world domination haven’t worked yet, we have little to fear. Besides, the Pharaoh is not your problem, not your responsibility.”
“But—”
“And even if this all rested on you, even if the Pharaoh’s plans might actually succeed, we have time. The Pharaoh is ancient. From what I’ve heard, he’s no different than any other Vampire and operates on a longer time scale than the rest of us.”
For the sake of all British Columbians, I hoped he was right.
Chapter Twenty
The totem
“I am more than a forest, I am a lifeline. Within my canopy is a pharmacy for sustaining life.”
~Plaque, Golden Spruce Trail, Haida Gwaii
The cool wind caressed my face like a lover, as I tramped through the lush temperate rainforest of the North Coast. After travelling south in a power boat all day, Sonny and I rowed to a barren beach on what amounted to little more than a raft. Without a word, he’d handed me a backpack. Weighed down with supplies, I’d hefted the bag and turned my puzzlement on my brother. He’d been cryptic all day. It had been three months since I’d arrived on his doorstep, and although he didn’t fill the silence with idle chitchat, Sonny was usually more adept at conversation than this.
He wouldn’t even tell me where we were going, only that it was time. Bloody soul-seers and their cryptic, mysterious ways.
Sonny pointed to the tree line.
I replied with a blank look.
He shrugged and said, “You must go that way.”
“For what?”
“To find yourself.”
So very cryptic.
Shifter girl is wasting daylight, Tank crooned in my head.
Maybe they just planned to leave me here and head back. Maybe Sonny had a lady friend coming over, and he wanted some privacy in his small cabin. Whatever his reasons, I now walked alone in a pristine forest with only the sounds of nature to keep me company. I had no idea of my location, although if my directional intelligence pinged right, I was near the southern tip of the Haida Gwaii.
A bald eagle screeched overhead.
Sonny? Tank?
The eagle remained mute.
I watched the powerful bird soar above. Even if it was Sonny or Tank, this journey was meant as a solo trip. Great.
The air was rich with a bouquet of fertile soil, evergreens, and wet bark. The ocean, growing distant, but never far, sprinkled salt and moisture to cling on the leaves and my skin. Long sage-coloured lichen hung from old snarled branches.
I hiked through the forest, thick with dense moss and long ferns, and damp with dew. The flora encroached on the old, worn trail.
Well, may as well see where this leads.
The quiet curses directed at my soul-seer brother faded away to silent appreciation for my surroundings. As I continued to walk, the trail took a more distinct shape. Now, white clamshells bordered the path. Among the forest, half-fallen totem poles stared back at me. The trees parted to a clearing on a remote beach. Facing south on a long isthmus, gentle waves broke against large boulders and rocks jutting out of the sea. With each gust of wind, the ocean spray brushed against my face like a cool caress.
Haida watchmen had protected these shores for over fourteen-thousand years. Defending this place, full of life and culture. Beside me, amid the looming spruce and overgrown grass, stood more totem poles, all facing the ocean as if guarding the land from unseen invaders. Aged by time, and the harsh elements, some had collapsed to lie on the ground where they toppled for nature to reabsorb them. Regrowth had taken over. A green blanket of moss engulfed the decaying remains of an abandoned village.
I walked to the nearest totem pole. With my hand centimeters from the broad wooden face of a bear, I hesitated. Would it be disrespectful to touch the old relic?
Reading one of Sonny’s many books on the subject, I’d learned the Haida raised totem poles as a symbol for their family or clan, in honour of the dead, or to record supernatural encounters. Other reasons existed, too, but totem poles were never worshipped or used as talismans. Regardless, they cut a noble, if not eerie, image in this place.
My chest warmed. The eagle circling overhead screeched with encouragement. At least, I thought it did.
Maybe for once, I should turn off my brain and follow my heart instead. I took a deep breath, closed my eyes, and focused inward. My body leaned forward. As my arms opened and slid around to hug the old wood, cool to the touch, my head rested against the totem’s rough surface.
Something powerful and ancient tugged at my essence.
I gasped.
I tried to pull back, but invisible arms wrapped around me, cocooning me in warmth. The totem pole sucked the essence from my body. I spiraled out of control until odd heat spread through me and I became one with someone else, something other, looking out at a vision.
Or a memory?
The soft patter of bare feet beats on the red path like a drum—thump, thump. The sound stirs my heart and the old songs fill my soul. Before, I whispered them, but now, I’m awake. I sing to her, this child, as she skips toward me, fluttering like an errant leaf in a light breeze.
The diminished forest is alive with her presence. The sun breaks through the canopy and warms her chilled bones, soothes her prickled skin. Each step feeds the rhythm. The wind whistles through the leaves and sings a sweet harmony. The birds join in, an eagle watches.
When she reaches me, she wraps her tiny arms around my ancient skin. I sing louder, hoping she wi
ll hear, but she is young. She does not know the way yet. Her father calls out and she returns to him giggling, unaware of the life she has breathed into this forgotten place.
The forest diminishes in its strength, in its beauty. Children die from disease while others desecrate the land. My brothers and sisters fall to iron warriors, their voices cut from the old songs too soon. They crash to the ground—thump, thump. I sing louder, but the lost will not heed my voice. I want to shut my eyes to these horrors, but they’re forever open, forever watching, and time slides by like a jumbled mess.
The land around me changes. The wind, no longer a friend, rips by me, cutting and cracking my once smooth skin. The birds use me for shelter and peck away at my heart, and the sun, once a welcome sight, hardens the land around me and fades my once brilliant colours.
The woman’s visits lift my laden heart. She sits with me, an eagle on her shoulder, and I soak up her salty tears as they fall to the soft soil. No longer standing proud, I lean to one side. Everything is now on an angle, slanted and skewed, yet she looks into my eyes without fear. She starts to hum, catching the beat of the old songs without knowing what she does. She is hope. My heart beats for her—thump, thump.
She comes to me with her guide one last time. She is older now, wiser, her face cracked and wrinkled, like my own, bent with age, yet proud, like me. She knows the way now, like I do. She has passed on the story. She walks on the worn path and sings in her heart of hearts the songs of our people, the old songs. She will join me, soon, to look upon the future.
And we will sing together.
As quickly as it happened, the totem spat out my essence, flinging me back into my body.
I staggered. Taking a step away, I tried to slow each quickened breath.
What the hell was that?
My head spun. The woman had been a Shifter. Had this been her village? The memory felt old. Older than possible. Totem poles only lasted a hundred years or so. This one couldn’t date back earlier than the 1800s. Sonny’s book had said the oldest standing totem pole on record was from 1835.
Yet… Yet the memory sung of the long passage of time. As if this totem pole carried the memories of the family from a time before its own creation.
I turned to the ocean and closed my eyes against the refreshing ocean spray. The woman’s face seemed familiar. Her kind expression pulled at my mind, tickled my neurons.
Her eyes. Her dark knowing gaze… Grandmother?
Thump, thump.
My eyes popped open. My heart beat so hard it rattled my bones. I spun around. Sweat broke across my brow. No one was there, except the sightless, all-seeing eyes of the totem poles.
Thump, thump.
I ran.
Chapter Twenty-One
Rebirth
“Rose Spit: The distant sandy shores of Rose Spit are where the Haida people originated. The Raven, one of the most powerful creatures in Haida mythology, was lonely. As he wandered down the beach, he heard noises coming from a clamshell. As he looked into the clamshell, he saw many tiny creatures hiding within. The Raven convinced the people to emerge from under the shell and join the new world, and they became the first Haida people.”
~Plaque, Haida Gwaii
Pumping my arms and legs as fast as possible, I ran through the forest. Twigs and branches snapped as I sped by them. My arms burned. A branch sliced my cheek.
Thump, thump.
I put my chin down and ran faster.
In a mossy bed, a lone totem pole stood majestically as sunlight filtered through the surrounding forest. I staggered to a stop. The air sparkled with mist and refracted light. Moist loam, and pine, with spruce flooded my senses. The cold, damp air clung to my skin as I walked toward the centre along a worn, red path, almost completely reclaimed by nature.
I approached this totem pole slowly. It appeared different than the rest, the style slightly off, the animals not as commonly depicted. At the bottom, an intricately carved wolf held up a woman. She looked supported and trapped at the same time, wedged between the wolf below and a mountain lion above. The feline’s face sat beneath a bird of some sort.
I stepped closer, breath caught in my throat.
The bird perched on the mountain lion’s head with its wings spread as if to take off in flight. Not the thunderbird—a more common totem—something else, something smaller. A falcon.
I swallowed the lump of air, the meaning of the three animals not lost on me. My first three feras. My heart. My soul.
I was the trapped woman. My fingers itched to touch her carved face, but froze an inch away.
Not prey, my mountain lion would’ve hissed. Predators didn’t run away. Why was I scared of dead wood?
A screech sounded from above.
That didn’t sound like Sonny.
I looked up. And gasped. Hundreds of birds flocked in the air, circling the clearing. Eagles, falcons, ravens, seagulls, owls, sparrows—too many types to name and identify. They continued to loop around, lower and lower, as if forming a vortex of flapping feathers around the totem pole.
The ground trembled. My pulse rate increased. The trees swayed. Brambles danced. Sweat trickled down my forehead. I took a step back and looked over my shoulder.
The trees surrounding the clearing, including behind me, continued to sway.
Crap. No escape. I was trapped.
I returned to the center of the clearing and crouched low. Whatever came, I’d be ready. Where the heck was Sonny? Was he one of the squawking pigeons above? As sweat coated my skin, I waited. And waited. No attack came.
Animals by the dozens—no, more than that—gathered at the edges of the clearing. Bears, wolves, coyotes, foxes, deer… Now an entire wildlife foundation commercial circled and enclosed the clearing, fencing me in with the strange, lone totem pole.
Thump, thump.
An eerie silence fell over the moss covered rainforest as my heart beat along with the thump, thump of the land. My breathing slowed. These animals weren’t here to hunt or hurt me. Their presence offered something else. Support.
Warmth, like the one I experienced with the other totem pole, spread through my chest. As if my soul expanded with nuclear energy, my body vibrated to the very tips of my fingers and toes.
I walked forward, extended my finger, and touched the totem pole.
Nothing happened.
I sucked in a deep breath and tried again.
Nope. Still nothing.
Now, repeatedly jabbing the totem pole on the wolf’s nose, like a non-responding vending machine button, my stomach sank.
What the hell?
I turned and sank down to sit with my back resting against the regal totem pole.
What now?
Why were all these animals here? Their idea of entertainment? Watch the Carus make an ass of herself?
The birds had stopped circling and now perched on surrounding branches along with some of the smaller non-flying animals. Hundreds of beady eyes watched as I looked around.
The wind whispered, too faint. I leaned forward and strained to hear. Again, the wind carried a whisper of words, quiet at first. It grew louder. And louder. Until finally, I could make out the high-pitched wailing of ancestors blended with the sounds of the wind, ocean and land, and the constant beat of a thumping drum. As if my brain already spoke the language, the words translated within my mind.
I am you. You are me. We are one.
My breath caught. I gulped. The mantra my feras always recited to me before bonding, echoed in my head. Like parrots, it was their only reply when I asked them direct questions, like what they were, where they came from, why I had more than one of them, or why they were in my head unlike other feras. The beady eyes in the forest continued to blink and observe.
With a deep breath, I closed my eyes and reached out with my mind. Can you hear me?
I am you. You are me. We are one, the response immediate. So many voices joined the mantra. I winced and covered my ears. Like that would help.
> My head thumped back against the old totem pole. So all these animals were new feras? Their energies pulled, expecting me to suck them in like I had the others.
Okay, I said to them. Bring it!
An eagle swooped from a nearby tree and dove straight at my chest. Her essence slammed into me. I sucked in a breath.
This wasn’t right. I had to touch them for the bonding.
A saw-whet owl barreled into me next. Her presence filled and expanded into my bones on contact.
I always had to reach out and actively touch them with my hand. Before—
Another animal crashed into me.
Then another.
And another.
My blood raced. My breathing grew shallow and fast. My head pounded. Too many. My vision faded to black as pain lanced through each vein and rattled my bones. I drew inside myself, letting darkness spread through my body as if the tissue sucked it in like a sponge.
Donny’s faraway words from a distant memory flittered through the void to reach me. “Remember, Carus. When darkness descends on your soul, you’re not alone.”
Images of those I cared for flashed through my mind. Donny, Ben, Stan, Mel, Wick…Tristan. With each face, with each remembered smile or cherished moment, the darkness withdrew, fading to the sunlight beating down on the clearing from above.
The beast pressed against the artificial barrier. One of her growls squeezed through. Accept them.
Instead of fighting the animals as they flowed into me, I did as she said. Embracing each of the feras as one, they continued to stream into me as if I was a drain in a sink, or a portal to another realm.
A roar like the winds of a prairie storm, the spiraling of a cyclone, the destructive force of a tornado, picked up with the swirling wind. The feras kept coming. I dropped my head back, flung my arms wide and took them all as they thudded against my breast bone.
As each animal poured into my essence, my mind opened to a place I’d briefly glimpsed once before. A forest. Within the trees, my lost feras huddled together among the new ones as they arrived. My wolf’s soulful gaze met mine. She howled.
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