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9

Ander slowly started to rise, a loose coil of rope still dangling from his hand. It felt like he was caught in a terrible dream where everything came to pass at only half the speed, like he was stuck deep underwater and had to fight and push with every ounce of strength just to move a single inch, all so he could take in every excruciating detail as some kind of torture.

As his head rose above the cot where his unconscious mother had lain mere moments ago, half dead, her arms and legs hanging limply over the sides, the first things he saw were the rows of faces caught in the harsh glow of the firepit in the tent's centre, all of them Wolves, half of them on cots identical to the one taking up so much of Ander's vision, half of them lying on thick blankets spread on the floor. Half of them were propped up on their elbows, their gazes directed at the screaming horror playing out before them, their eyes widening with the same, terrible slowness as everything else. The other half were unconscious. Red spots of blood seeped through layers upon layers of bandages, wrapped around heads and arms and legs, Wolves who had come to kill, but had been saved instead. Wolves who did not yet even know of the great mercy that had been bestowed upon them.

Sarah and Bethany were just to his right. Sarah had both hands covering her mouth to stifle a scream, but her eyes alone were more than enough to convey her shock even in complete silence. Bethany had one hand placed over her heart and was reaching out with the other, as if to grab something that was no longer there, and Ander knew exactly what that 'something' had been.

His little brother, Hezzi, Fast Paws, had leapt over the cot at the last second, even before Ander had fully struck the ground, and inserted himself between Kiana and the raving lunatic his mother had become. Just like with most things, he did it without thinking. His body moved before his brain could tell him to slow down, that maybe this wasn't the best idea in the world. He had acted with his heart, and Ander knew, even before his eyes cleared the cot's wooden frame, that he had paid dearly for his selflessness.

Still feeling like he was pushing against a heavy flow of water, still feeling like he was drowning on dry land, Ander finally stood upright and saw exactly what had happened.

The pain tearing through his heart and mind was so intense he couldn't even find his voice to scream.

Mother was holding Hezzi close to her body, embracing him, gently rocking back and forth. They were both down on the ground, kneeling in a pool of blood. It had splashed everywhere: all down Hezzi's front and across Mother's arms.

There was a pair of scissors sticking out of Hezzi's neck, right where it joined with his shoulder, pinning his scarf to his body. It had gone in almost all the way up to the finger loops, coating the metal in a slick red sheen that caught the dancing flames within their depths, curving and elongating them into twisting, screaming faces of light and shadow.

His eyes were half-open, like he had stayed up all night and was on the verge of falling asleep.

"Hezzi!!" Mother screamed. "Hezziiii!! Oh Cora I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I'm so sorry!"

Kiana was down on the ground with Denko, the both of them staring up at the scene in disbelief. Denko scooted all the way back until he struck the next cot down the line, and he was trying to pull Kiana with him, but she was like a dead weight, completely frozen in place.

She slowly shook her head and a single tear ran down her face and across her trembling lip. She mouthed a single word, and that word was simply: No...

"Hezzi? Hezzi!" Mother gave him a brief shake, but Hezzi showed no response. She patted his body, searching, feeling, leaving bright red handprints all across his chest and shoulders, until she finally found the scissors.

"No, don't!" Bethany screamed and made to rush around the cot, but the moment she took that first step, any semblance of sanity Shekka might have had simply vanished.

"You stay away from us! Murderer!" she shrieked and ripped the scissors out in a fountain of blood. Metal screaked against bone and Hezzi's eyes flew open. He tried to scream, but all he could produce was a slow dribble of blood from the corner of his mouth. His scarf was absolutely saturated with it.

"Oh dear gods what have you done!?" So strong was Bethany's conviction, her drive to help those in pain, that she didn't even stop to contemplate the danger she was putting herself in. She simply grabbed the nearest handful of rags and rushed forward without a thought.

"Murderer!" Shekka swung the scissors through the air, and if Sarah hadn't been there to pull her back at the last second, the wicked tip would have lodged itself in Bethany's stomach.

They both stumbled back and nearly fell, staring in horror as Shekka brandished the scissors like a knife, swinging wildly at the faintest of sounds, screaming in a barely understandable mix of the Old and New Tongues. She retreated much like Denko had done, scooting backwards while dragging Hezzi along with her, until her back hit the side of the tent.

Ander didn't know what to do. A thousand different thoughts crashed together in his head, and none of them were of any help.

Hezzi seemed to be completely out of it, but for just a moment, those silver eyes locked onto his.

I'm scared, Ander.

Ander bit down on his tongue hard enough to draw blood and stepped around the cot, flipping it over onto its side to make more room.

"Ander, wait!" Bethany grabbed his elbow "She'll kill you!"

Ander shrugged her off without a word. Right now, all that he could see was a glistening trail of blood and the two Wolves at the end of it.

"Put down the scissors, Mother," he said. "Bethany is a healer. She can still save him, I know she can, but only if you let her."

Shekka didn't give any indication that she had heard him. She simply kept on rocking her youngest back and forth, like she was living in her own little world.

"I'm sorry, Hezzi," she whispered into her son's ear and kissed him on the cheek. "I'm so sorry. Baiya yamre, please? Baiya yamre. I'm so, so sorry, Hezzi..."

"Damnit, Mother, he's not dead, but if you keep pushing us away then he will be, and you'll be the one who killed him!" Ander shouted, taking even himself by surprise.

Shekka looked at him. He knew she couldn't actually see him, at least not in the way of reality, but she was looking at him regardless. But that begged the question: if she could not see with her rancid eyes, then what was she looking at? If she was as blind as he knew her to be, then what did her dead gaze see when she looked him in the eye?

What did she see?

"I'm the one who kills him, you say?" She did not scream, she did not shriek, but neither did she speak calmly. She spoke like one caught in a trance, stuck between waking and dreaming.

Ander didn't like it. He didn't like it at all. Every muscle in his body went tense and he shifted his feet farther apart. He kept his eye on the glint of the scissors, swaying back and forth at the end of her arm, and lowered his head, waiting for the perfect moment to strike. If he could just grab them or knock them out of her hand, then maybe Hezzi could still make it out of this alive. Ander didn't care that she had gone insane. He didn't care that those scissors might end up lodged inside his throat. All he cared about was the look in his little brother's half-lidded eyes, the look that said so plainly: please, please help me.

But then something happened he could not foresee, something so unthinkable he couldn't believe it even as he saw it happening.

Shekka took the scissors and pressed the tip right up against Hezzi's throat. "Maybe you're right, Ander," she said, speaking in that same far-off, dreamy voice. "Maybe I should."

All the blood in Ander's veins turned to ice. "What are you doing, Mother?"

"Don't call me that." Shekka pressed the scissors even harder against her son's throat, making the tip vanish between the red, sticky spikes of his fur.

Ander instinctively held up his hands, even though he knew the gesture was wasted on the blind. "All right, all right, I'll just call you Shekka, is that okay?"

She pulled Hezzi a little bit closer, so they were cheek to cheek, and said something that didn't seem to have any bearing on Ander's question. "It wouldn't be the first time. He's gone because of me. He didn't leave me, I pushed him away. I did it."

Bethany stepped forward and mouthed Hezzi's name, waving until she caught his fleeting attention. She took her hand, mimed placing it over her shoulder, and whispered: "Hard. Understand?"

Hezzi closed his eyes, opened them again, and watched as Bethany repeated the gesture. For a while it looked like he didn't get it, but then, with great effort, he managed to cover his wound and squeeze down hard, gritting his teeth against the pain. The blood slowed down, but there was still a good trickle flowing between his fingers, staining his scarf a crimson so deep it bordered on black, and Ander wasn't sure how much time (if any) that had bought them.

"What do you think, Hezzi?" Shekka asked. "We can walk the Path together, just you and me. We can go see your father. Would you like that?"

Hezzi swallowed, and when he opened his mouth to speak, Ander saw that the inside was a bright red. "I don't want to go down the Path yet," he said. His voice was small and weak.

"I missed you so much, Hezzi." Shekka ran the scissors up and down his throat, making the bloody fur bend and spring back against the steel. "It'll only hurt for a moment, and then we can be together forever. Mother and son. Maybe Banno is there, too. Waiting for us. We'll be a family again."

Hezzi swallowed, and Ander actually saw the shining blades undulate against his neck. "I'll... miss... Renna..." he struggled to get the words out through all the blood coating his mouth. "And Ander... and everyone..."

"They don't matter, Hezzi. None of them matter. It's just you and me. You can apologise in the next world for leaving me, and I can apologise for pushing your father away. You'll get down on your knees, and I'll get down on mine. I will forgive you, and he will forgive me. Everything will be right again. There will be no sin or pain. Neither of us will ever need to feel alone, I promise you."

"But... I'm not alone..."

"Shhh, Hezzi..."

"I have Ander. He's my brother. I have Renna. She... I really like her, Mother. I like her a lot. And she likes me back. I have Nilia, and Dan, and Taberah and Sorrin. I have Kiana and Layla and Bethany-Kai and Salem-Sai and Sarah-Kai. They're my friends. They helped me so much. I don't want to die, Mother. I don't want to leave..."

"Ander is not your brother, Hezzi. He is not family. He is an imposter. His whole life is a lie. He is nothing more than the spawn of sin. Renna does not like you. She is simply using you. She was sharp enough to see which way the wind was blowing, and she latched onto you like a tick because she knew you were strong. Nilia and her ilk are no different. They're not really your friends. They're not even friends to each other. They merely banded together because they would have died otherwise. And the rest... they are nothing but filthy, cowardly Foxes. They sneak around behind your back and steal what is most precious to you. They are not your friends. They are thieves and whores."

"Ander is my brother!" Hezzi insisted. "He is family! He always keeps his promises! He always helps me out! He's always there for me when I need him, and that means he's my brother, no matter what you say!"

"Hezzi."

"You think Renna uses me? That she relies on me? She saved my life twice! If anything, I'm the one who relies on her!"

A large gout of blood suddenly spilled from Hezzi's mouth and even more came pouring from his nostrils. He choked and coughed, and Ander was barely able to restrain himself from charging in. If he acted rashly, or if Shekka so much as heard an unexpected sound, there was no way to predict how she might react.

Hezzi swallowed. "The others... You don't understand because you don't have any, but they are my friends, and I love them."

Shekka grabbed a handful of his hair and gave his head a sharp jerk backwards, exposing his neck. "They don't love you the way I do! Their poison can never come close to what a mother can feel for her son!" Her lips brushed against his ear with every word. "Everything I've done, I've done it for you, Hezzi. All the sacrifices I've made, all the pain I've endured, I did it all for you. Even now, when you treat me so coldly..." She pressed the scissors right beneath his jawline, where the flesh was soft and weak. "...I do it out of love."

That was the moment Ander would have acted, that was the moment he would have made a grab for those scissors, and that was the moment he almost surely would have caused his little brother's death, had Sarah not elbowed him out of the way.

"Sarah, what -"

Sarah squared her stance, placed her hands on her hips, took a deep breath and thundered: "That is the biggest CROCK I've ever heard!"

The silence following her words was almost eerie. The wind still howled outside and made the walls of the tent flutter and flap. The firepit still crackled. Wolves still held their breath and shifted uncomfortably beneath the blankets they had been given. But all of that seemed to come from far away, like they weren't even a part of this world anymore.

Ander was frozen in place, his eyes locked onto the spot where the cruel tip of those scissors pressed against his little brother's neck. There was a small drop of fresh blood flowing down the bottom blade, but Sarah's outburst seemed to have stopped Shekka's hand. At least for now.

Those dead, white eyes shifted ever so slightly, and Ander knew it was no trick of the light. She was looking directly at Sarah, and her mouth slowly widened into a bitter smile.

"I was wondering when you would open your filthy mouth," she said. "Seducer of Wolves. Breaker of families. I know who you are. I know what you are. You will never -"

"Shut up!" Sarah screamed. "You dare speak of love while you hold a blade to your own son's neck? You have no idea what love is!"

"Love is pain!" Shekka screamed back. "That's what love is, you clueless bitch! Love is giving your heart away, piece by piece, until you have nothing left! But you don't even mind. You're happy to give those pieces away. You give them to your mate, the one you lie with every night, the one who holds you in the dark, the one who comforts you when you're sad. You give those pieces to your sons, the ones who come running up to you, crying their heads off because they fell and scraped their knees! The ones who keep bickering and fighting until you pull them apart! The ones who sometimes hug you for no reason other than because they wanted to! You give it all, because they're your family and you love them! You give away your heart, piece by bleeding piece, and what do you get in exchange? You get to watch them take those pieces and throw them to the ground. You get to watch them step on the beating fragments and grind them to a pulp beneath their heels. And then you get to watch them spit on whatever's left! That's what love is, Sarah of the Foxes! It slowly kills you from the inside out, devouring you, making you hollow, making you Empty!"

Sarah listened to it all without a word, waiting patiently, and when she was sure that Shekka was finished, she slowly shook her head. "Love can hurt," she admitted, "but that is no excuse to hurt the ones we love."

Shekka giggled. It was a high-pitched sound, dripping with insanity. "I know all about that. I know all about hurting the ones I love. Tell me, Sarah..." Those eyes, those putrid, white eyes, wide open, unblinking. "Did you love Kadai? Did you love him with all your heart?"

Sarah frowned. "Back when I was a stupid young girl, yes. I did love him."

"Not as much as me, I can guarantee you that. Do you want to know just how much I loved him? Hmm? Do you?"

Ander's fingers opened and closed, opened and closed. His claws dug into his palms and beads of sweat stood out on his forehead, despite the cold temperature. Right now, they were all stuck in an uneasy equilibrium where none of them could act or move forward. While Shekka was still talking, Hezzi was safe, but the longer this dragged on, the weaker he would become.

Something had to be done, but what? He didn't want to risk making a mad grab for those scissors, but neither did he want to stand around doing nothing while his little brother slowly bled to death before his very eyes.

Ander scanned the tent, taking in every scrap of information, looking for anything that might be of use, trying desperately to come up with some kind of plan.

Maybe if he could get outside, he could grab a length of firewood or something and knock her out through the canvass. That was risky, though. She might hear him try to sneak out and decide to end things early. And even if he did make it outside, he wouldn't be able to see what was going on inside. His attack might fail to knock her out (or miss completely) and that would be the end right there. It was all just too uncertain.

What if I use an axe instead?

The thought hung in Ander's mind like a spider from a thread, fat and bulbous and dripping with venom.

An axe...

He swept it away, absolutely horrified at himself. Why did it always come down to this? To kill or let die? There had to be some other way! He was the one who dug her out of the snow! Did he really save her life only to put Hezzi's in danger? Was all of this his fault yet again? Was killing her the only way out?

Going from life to death to life to death, carrying the choice in one hand and the aftermath in the other. It was enough to drive anyone insane.

So Ander stood there, powerless, trying to think of a plan that could save them both, praying that no one would come inside this tent. Hell, praying that no one would sneeze.

But still, the thought remained, hanging from its silken thread...

Sarah's hand slowly crept up to the neckline of her dress, but, realising that she was reverting to her old habit, she forced it back down again. "How much did you love him?" she asked, trying to keep her voice calm and even, but it was obvious that this was a difficult subject for her, and Shekka picked up on it immediately.

Her smile widened against Hezzi's neck, making it look like she was about to forgo the scissors and tear out his throat with her bare teeth instead, like a wild animal. "I loved him so much that, when I learned of his betrayal, I gathered some very special mushrooms. Holy mushrooms. The Cora's mushrooms. I ground them up. Added just a tiny splash of water. Made them into a fine paste. It had a soft aroma, like the forest floor after a quick shower in the springtime. It smelled a bit like you, Hezzi." She buried her nose right up against the spot where the scissors had pierced his flesh and breathed deeply. When she drew back, there was a dab of blood on her lips. She clearly wasn't in her right mind, but Ander couldn't help but shudder when her tongue snaked out and licked it off.

Focus, Ander! Think! Maybe you can distract her, get her attention, or maybe just talk to her, convince her to stop this madness!

Ander's thoughts were still racing through his head when Shekka said something that stopped him dead in his tracks.

"I took that paste and rubbed it into some venison, then I chopped the venison into cubes and soaked them some more. I made them bathe in it. I made them suck it all up."

Cubed venison. That was Father's favourite food.

Mushrooms that smelt of earth and rain, the same scent that sometimes drifted through the doctoring tent, a subtle undertone to all the blood and vomit and noxious medicines.

"I put them on a plate..."

The bottom dropped out of Ander's stomach. His legs went weak and a wave of nausea washed through his body. If he had eaten anything prior to this terrible night, he would have retched it up right then and there. "No... please, no..." he begged, unable to believe this could possibly be going where his tired mind insisted it must be going, but Shekka simply continued with her story, speaking from deep inside her blackened dream of the past.

"I took them to Kadai. He was no longer my mate, my love, my one. In my eyes, he was now only the betrayer you had turned him into, Sarah of the Foxes."

Sarah looked to Ander. It was only a glimpse, but in that glimpse he could see her confusion turn to fear, perhaps because of the look on his own face.

"I watched him eat," Shekka said. "I watched him take every bite. When he was done, he said it was delicious, and I was happy he enjoyed it."

Hezzi blinked his bleary, half-seeing eyes and turned his head. Every movement seemed so slow and painful. "Mother?" he whispered.

"Do you know what happened then, Sarah of the Foxes? Did my little boy tell you all about it? The pain and suffering your sin brought upon our family?"

Hezzi tried again, but it was getting very difficult for him to speak now. His words came out in a barely audible whisper. "What are...?"

"That's enough, Shekka!" Ander said. "We get it! You don't have to say any more than that!"

Shekka ignored him. "Blood came out of his mouth and nose... from his ears... even from his eyes. I know how that feels, to weep blood. It's not like tears. It's thicker. It sticks your eyelids shut. Your whole world turns a reddish brown, if you can still see anything at all. It's because the Cora Himself resides within those mushrooms. He punishes the wicked and rewards the faithful. He makes you see your sin and vomit it back out. It's both the final blessing and the final payment before you get to walk the Path."

"M... Mother...?" Hezzi coughed a bright splatter of blood across her face, but Shekka didn't even notice. "Did... did you...?"

Twin lines of tears spilled from her dead eyes and flowed down her cheeks, cutting through her son's blood like a blade. "Yes, Hezzi. I told your father I loved him. Then I poisoned him. And then I watched him die a slow and painful death."

Ander had to grab hold of the overturned cot to keep himself steady. Sarah was frozen in place.

Hezzi slowly shook his head. "No..." he said. "No..." The same word, over and over again, an irrevocable denial, an outright rejection.

"Yes. I killed him. I murdered him." As if to seal her confession, Shekka pressed her lips against his cheek. Hezzi tried to pull away, but he had nowhere to go. Forced to endure a kiss from the she-wolf who had ended his father's life, he closed his eyes and wept bitterly.

"Hezzi..." Ander wanted nothing more than to pull him away from that demented woman and hold him close, give him a real hug instead of that snare Shekka had bound him in, but she still had those scissors pressed against his neck, pushing so hard that the tip occasionally dented the skin beneath his fur.

Shekka's eyes flew open and came to a stop on Sarah's once again. "But I wasn't alone. You were right there with me every step of the way, Sarah of the Foxes. For a normal Wolf trying to forget, they might see the source of their pain every time they blink, every time they close their eyes, every time they lay down their head to dream, but for me it was very different. I could see you every second of every day, dancing naked in the dark. I could see you looking back at me with contempt. I could see you and Kadai coming together, becoming one in the way of the flesh, right in front of me, and I could do nothing but watch as he kissed you and told you how much he loved you more than me! More than me!! The one who gave her life for him! And you... you would lie there and you would look at me and you would smile... oh, how you would smile... You would reach up and pull him in close and you would kiss him but you would still be looking at me, looking at me and smiling, like you were deriving more pleasure from my pain than from my mate's flesh!"

Sarah was speechless. Her hand had gone back up to her neckline, and this time she didn't even try to stop it. It squeezed compulsively, bunching up the fabric, all while her lip trembled and tears shone in her eyes.

"You were there when I ground up the mushrooms. You were there when I infused his food. You were there when I gave it to him. You were there when I watched him eat. You were there when he began to bleed. You were there when I took my last son and led him to his father's deathbed. You were there when I watched him breathe his last. Only this time... I was the one smiling."

Sarah had bunched up her dress so tightly that it was beginning to dig into her neck. "Why?" she asked. "That was over twenty years ago! Why... Why would you do such a thing? Just why!?"

Shekka tilted her head and her cheek made a soft rubbing noise against Hezzi's. It was a sound that ordinarily would have been touching, but was now made disgusting by the wet, caked on mess of drying blood and tears. "It was so I could bring a weakling into power, a weakling who thirsted for blood just as much as I did, even if not for the same reasons. I killed by the power of my own hands, and doomed many others to fall by the hands of their enemies, all for this, all for the opportunity to face the one who ruined my life, to show her what her sinful love has done to me! Well, here I am, Sarah of the Foxes. Take a good look at what your sinful flesh has wrought. Look at me. Look at me!"

Sarah took a frightened step back. "No..."

"Everything that happened here tonight, all the pain and misery and death, all of it grew out of love! It was love that drove my Kadai to sin, and it was love that drove me to set things right! It was love that struck me blind and love that broke my heart! It was love that brought my first son back and it was love that carried us through the mountain! It was love that killed so many of my people and it was love that made me not care! It was love that brought me here to this moment, holding my youngest in my arms, and it will be love that sends us on our way, because that is what love truly is, Sarah of the Foxes! We come into this world by love and by love we are taken out, because love is pain and pain is love! There is no difference in the end!"

Sarah slowly opened her fist and the fabric of her dress bloomed outwards like a wilted flower, full of wrinkles and creases. "That's not what love is..." she said, shaking so badly she could barely get the words out. "That's not what love is at all! Love isn't pain, and neither does it make pain! Love is what takes the pain away! When I almost gave up all hope, it was love that saved me from myself! When I was on the verge of death, it was love that gave me the strength to keep going! It was love that pushed me through the wind and the rain! It was love that forced me to put one foot in front of the other, even though I was bleeding, even though I was certain I would die inside the mountain where my baby was given to me, and it was love that made me give my baby back! When my days grew dark and I felt that I was all alone, it was love that made those days liveable again! It was love that gave me the strength and the courage to go on living despite the pain! That's what true love is, Shekka! Love is strength! You said that everything you've done, you've done out of love, and that your love is no different from pain, but if that's true, then that also means that everything you've done, you've done out of pain! It was pain that drove Kadai into my arms, and it was pain that drove you to revenge! It was pain that struck you blind and pain that broke your heart! It was pain that brought your son back and it was pain that carried you through the mountain! It was pain that killed so many of your people and it was pain that made you numb! It was pain that brought you here to this moment, holding Hezzi in your arms, but I will be damned if I let your pain touch even a hair on that boy's head, Shekka of the Wolves! Because that is not what love is! Everything you've done and everything you've said, none of it is love. It is despicable selfishness! Nothing more!"

They waited, all of them too scared to say a word, but Shekka remained deathly silent. The loudest thing in the entire tent was the laboured sound of Hezzi's breathing.

Was she thinking about what she was doing? What she was truly doing? Ander couldn't know for sure, but what he did know was that both of these women, both of them his mothers in their own way, had given him a lot to think about.

In their own way, were not both of them telling the truth? To Sarah, Shekka's words were evil and twisted, and they were, of that there was no doubt, but were Sarah's words not just as twisted to Shekka's ears? The product of naivety and fanciful thinking? They were as different from each other as fish were from birds. To a fish, the river meant life, the river meant happiness. It was a place of cool waters and smooth stones. But the sky... To a fish, the sky was only a painful death. It meant drying out on a sandy riverbed, suffocating under the scorching sun, slowly being devoured by the ants crawling all over her eyes. But to a bird, the sky was freedom, the sky was joy. It was white clouds and fragrant winds. To a bird, it was the river that meant death. To a bird, the river was a maelstrom where her wings could not save her, a black abyss that pulled her down to the bottom, where she would gasp for air but find none, and slowly drown while staring at the shining fragments of the broken sun high above the surface of the water, forever out of reach.

Was the bird right and the fish wrong? Or was it the fish that was right and the bird that was wrong? Were they both wrong?

No. They had different ways of seeing the world because to each of them the world was a very different place.

But if there was no 'right' or 'wrong' way to see the world, no 'true' or 'false', only different versions of the same thing seen through different eyes, then...

What did 'love' mean to him?

Did it mean pain or strength?

Or something different?

"I did not know what would happen to me when I woke up on the wrong side of the mountain," Ander said. He had no idea why he was saying this or what he hoped to accomplish with it, but the words came regardless, pouring out of him with surprising force. "It was my first time away from home, and I was scared. Even more than that, I was ashamed. I had killed my own brother, and a part of me believed that I did not deserve to open my eyes when he could not. But within the first day... no, within the first minute, I found a love I never knew existed. It was everywhere I looked, even though it was too early for me to understand. It was in Layla's eyes and the way she gasped and ran off to find her father the moment I started moving. It was in the bandages around my hand and even in the blanket that slid off my body when I sat up. It was in the way Salem questioned me, making sure I wouldn't be a threat to his family. It was in the way Bethany could look after me and scold me at the same time. And most of all..."

Ander looked to Kiana. The hem of her dress was torn and frayed, a testament to the bandage around his head, and the love he felt for her was so intense it bordered on a physical ache. "It was in the way Kiana pushed me. Always, she pushed me and pushed me. I think she was the one who understood me the best, who could see better than anyone else how much I was struggling, how much I hated myself for what I had done. I wanted to stay inside and hide from the world, I wanted to withdraw into myself, but she wouldn't let me. She pushed me outside, and for that, I will always be grateful. It was because I kept feeling her hand at my back that I met so many new friends, friends who didn't care that I was bigger and taller and had sharp fangs and claws, friends who didn't care that I liked to carve statues and draw sketches in my spare time and tinker with cogs and gears and build things simply because they didn't exist, friends who accepted me for who I was, who actually liked me for who I was, who welcomed me with open arms. They made me feel like I belonged, and to me, that was a kind of love I'd never felt before."

He placed his hand on Sarah's shoulder, and she reached up in turn to place her hand over his, smiling warmly. Her fingers brushed against the folds of the handkerchief she had tied there so long ago.

"This is the vixen you called a 'whore' and a 'harlot' and all kinds of names, but to me, she only has one name now, and that name is 'Mother'."

A single fang briefly shone beneath Shekka's twitching lip. Ander didn't know if that was a good sign or not, but it had to be better than that dreamy, semi-catatonic stare.

"She is the one who taught me what an immensely powerful force love could be. The lengths she went to just to ensure that I would stay alive long enough to see the sun for the first time is something I can still hardly believe, even though the fact that I'm standing here, alive and breathing, is proof in itself. It was a lesson I took back with me, back to the place where I grew up, the place I once considered 'home'. I went back because..."

Here Ander faltered. There were many different reasons for why he did what he did, but in the end, it only came down to two. "I wanted to protect my new friends and family, my new home, and the love I had found there. That thought alone was enough to give me strength. It was just as Sarah said. Love _is_strength. The love I felt was stronger than my fear, and it allowed me to face my past and find out who I really was, where I came from, and why I am here now. But that wasn't the only reason. I also went back because I had hoped I could make a difference. I had hoped I could make others see the world as I did, as a place that wasn't just about hunger, blood and death. I had hoped I could convince my people to live in peace with each other as well as the strangers on the other side of the mountain. But..." He sighed. "Things didn't quite work out that way."

It wasn't just Shekka and Hezzi and the small group of Foxes and Wolves gathered around them anymore, but everyone. They all listened with perked ears, they all stared with wide eyes. Dozens of Wolves, so badly injured, some of them teetering right on the very brink of death, Wolves who previously would not listen to anything save for their own rumbling stomachs now held on to his every word.

"On that night, it was just as Shekka said. Love is pain. Love can hurt. Love can kill. It almost killed me. They cut me, they bit me, they stabbed me, they broke my bones, but I endured it because I had so much love for the new home I was protecting, and love is pain. Love is pain..."

Sarah squeezed his hand and a bright spot of pain bloomed between his knuckles, right where she had so carefully picked out the jagged shards of glass only days ago.

"But all of that was just surface pain. It didn't compare to what happened after the sun came up. I had to say goodbye to everything and everyone I had ever known. To all my friends, to the ones I owed my life. To my father, who held my fate in his hands and gave me one last chance to fight to keep everything I had sacrificed so much for. Even to you, Shekka. Back then, you were still my mother, and because I loved you, it hurt to say goodbye. It hurt to see you hate me so much."

Shekka hugged Hezzi even closer. His breathing was quick and shallow and blood was still flowing between his fingers and down his scarf, staining his chest a darkening crimson, but his eyes were still open. He was still there.

"But what hurt me the most, was when I had to say goodbye to you, Hezzi. I didn't want to leave you behind, because a part of me believed that, if I turned my back on you, I would never see you again."

A small sound came out of Hezzi's bloody mouth, a cry brought forth with what little energy he had left. He strained against Shekka's grip, but the she-wolf pulled him back in, pressing the tip of the scissors beneath his jaw, right where the big vein was. If Ander looked at that spot long enough, he could almost see it pulsing in time with his heartbeat.

"It hurt because love really is pain. You felt it, too, didn't you?"

Hezzi gave an almost imperceptible nod, just a tip of the chin.

"But that's not all love is!" Ander said. "Love is strength, and love is pain, but it's so much more! I could have fallen against that wall and died right there. I could have sat down and watched the mist come in and just waited for death to take me. But I didn't. I walked into those woods even though it hurt. It wasn't strength that drove me or pain that pushed me. It was hope. That was all I could think about. Every time I fell against a tree or tripped over a root, every time it got so dark that I could barely see, I would think about where I was going, and that would get me moving again, because where I was going was home. I hoped I would see Bethany again. I hoped she would be cross and plant her hands on her hips and yell at me for being such a stupid idiot. I hoped I would see Salem again and wrinkle my nose at that pipe he's always blowing on. I hoped I would see Layla, because she's always reading those big books and she promised she'd teach me. I hoped I would see Sarah again, and one day muster up the courage to call her Mother. I hoped..." Here his eye fell on Kiana, the one who pushed him, encouraged him, inspired him, bettered him. The one who held him in the dark and kept the nightmares at bay. The one who kissed him and made his pain go away. Among all the candles beckoning him home, hers was the brightest by far. "I hoped I would see Kiana again... I hoped I could hug her and hold her close. I hoped I could kiss her. I hoped to tell her I love her. I hoped to hear her say that she loved me back..."

Kiana was trying to be as quiet as possible, he could tell. She didn't want to make any sudden noises and startle the blind she-wolf holding a pair of scissors to Hezzi's neck, but her lip trembled, nonetheless. Tears fell from her eyes and landed on the tattered edges of her dress, turning the fibres a darker shade of green. "Ander..."

He swallowed the lump in his throat. It was getting harder and harder to talk, and yet he couldn't stop. This had to get out. He had to make Shekka understand. He had to make the Empty One understand the very thing that made her feel Empty in the first place, the inability to see love as anything other than a source of pain. He had to make her see the beauty of this world with those blind, stricken eyes. He had to make her understand what love meant to him, how it was inseparably infused with feelings of hope, and how strong those feelings could truly be. Hezzi's life depended on it.

"Hope... can be a fragile thing," he said. "Sometimes the mist is so thick it seems to drown you. It weighs you down, pulls you to the ground. I saw a word coming out of that mist. Just one... empty word, carved into the bark of a beech tree. It was a common word. We hear it every day back home. 'Enka'. 'First Daughter'."

Shekka drew in breath. It wasn't a gasp, and it wasn't a hitch in her throat. She was still holding the scissors against Hezzi's neck and her milky, bloodshot eyes were still filled with an incomprehensible madness, but she was listening now, and listening intently.

"I tried to finish it," Ander went on, fighting back the tears. "I tried to finish it, just like Father wanted. I tried to give a name to his First Daughter, the baby girl who didn't live long enough to earn a name of her own."

Shekka slowly shook her head. "No..."

"But I couldn't do it by myself. I was too weak. The rock in my hands was too heavy. I fell, Mother. Just like you wanted me to. I fell, and I couldn't get back up. I lay underneath that beech tree, and it was as if I could feel all my hope slowly draining away, just like the blood was draining out of my body. And that moment, the moment I began to lose hope, was also the moment I began to die. I could feel it happening. All the pain, all the torture, all the things you associate with love, came flooding in. I kept thinking about how that name was the last thing, the very last thing I absolutely had to do in this life, and how I couldn't even do that. I kept thinking about how I had let Father down. I kept thinking about how I had let my sister down. The only reason I was allowed to live was because she had died, and I couldn't even give her a proper thank you. She had nothing, and I... I couldn't even give her a name... The pain was too much. The mist was too thick. Even the sun was just a silver circle in the sky, and gave no warmth at all." Hezzi and Shekka were beginning to blur together into prisms of grey and red, misery and blood, and Ander had to wipe the unspilled tears from his eye to get them back into focus. Shekka hadn't moved at all since that small intake of breath, but he did not know if that was good or bad. Either way, all he could do was keep going. All he could do was speak from the heart, and hope that his words would somehow touch hers.

"Because I had no hope left, I began to feel that maybe this was right. Maybe this was fair, that I should die in that spot, where one life ended to make room for another. Maybe it was right that I should share the grave of the little sister I never knew I had. I... closed my eyes and I... I began to die..."

Kiana almost stood up just then. Denko had to grab her just to keep her still. Ander could see the yearning in her eyes, he could feel how badly she wanted to go to him, hold him, just be with him. It was like he really was back underneath that massive beech tree, slowly dying in the mist. The whole world was just a blurry mess of grey and white, where the grass vanished into nothingness and the trees were no more than shadowy lines on an invisible horizon.

But Kiana was there. She was there.

"But then... then I heard a voice, whispering my name. It was so familiar to me. It felt like I could almost remember, if only it wasn't so dark, if only the mist wasn't so thick. If only I wasn't so alone..."

Was Shekka breathing a little heavier? He couldn't tell for sure, but the fire reflected in the blades of the scissors seemed to be jittering slightly faster than before, brushing against the fur of Hezzi's throat. The kid was still hanging in there, but for how much longer?

Ander wiped the back of his hand across his running nose, feeling that time was running short.

"Someone was touching me. Hugging me. Holding me close. It hurt, but it also felt good. Warm. Gentle. I felt a pair of hands against the back of my neck, pulling me close, and then something soft against my face. I felt tears spilling onto my cheeks, and a soft whisper washing over my lips, reminding me of a promise someone once made to me, a promise in the rain. She promised she would never let me go. She asked me to stay with her. She begged me not to make her break that promise. She reminded me over and over again, that she had promised to keep holding me, to keep loving me, to never let go, no matter what."

Ander was looking at Kiana as he said that, looking at the tears filling her eyes and spilling without a sound. Because truly, how could he ever try to speak of hope without speaking of her?

"And that's when things began to change. The pain was still there, the darkness was still there, the mist was still all around me, I was still dying, but now... now they weren't everything anymore. There was something else there, something those bad feelings couldn't touch, something I had almost lost. It was a desire to reach out to this warmth that was enfolding me so gently, a desire to answer these whispers that spoke of promises made. It was a desire to make her happy, like she had made me happy. I had never wanted anything more in my whole life, but I didn't know how. If I couldn't even finish my sister's name, then how could I possibly do something as difficult as making someone truly happy? But then she asked me something so simple, just one little thing. She asked me to open my eyes. She begged me. She pleaded, again and again, just to open my eyes. And I wondered if it was really that easy, if all I had to do to make her happy was to... open my eyes..."

Shekka's eyes were still the colour of rancid milk, laced with blood, but was there a shine to them now? Or was it just a trick of the light, a glowing crescent formed by the fire and nothing else?

Ander didn't know.

"I would have given up, but she gave me something to fight for." He was speaking faster now, feeling the seconds bleeding away. "I would have died, but she gave me a reason to keep living. My eyes would have stayed closed forever, but because of her, I was able to open them again. I opened them and I saw her. I saw how much pain she was in. I saw every tear flowing down her face and I knew each and every one of them was for me. I heard her whispering my name, begging me not to leave her, begging me not to make her break her promise. She held me, and somehow I found the strength to hold her back. It was something I couldn't do. It was something I was physically incapable of doing. It was something I had tried to do by myself and failed, because it was impossible. But for her, with her, I could do it. I didn't care how much it hurt, I didn't care how much pain I had to endure, just as long as I could take her sadness away. She raised her head and she looked at me. She looked at me, Shekka, and all the hope I thought I had lost came flooding back. It was something I couldn't have done by myself, and that's what I'm trying so hard to explain to you. For me, love is a force that can push you into doing something impossible. I looked at her and she looked back at me and even though I was in so much pain, I was happy. The love I felt for her and the love I knew she felt for me was enough to obliterate everything else, all my doubts and all my despair. She was the one I had fought for, she was the one I had hoped to see again, she was the one I had hoped to hold again, the one I had hoped to kiss again, the one I had hoped to love again, and it was her hope, together with mine, that brought us together underneath that tree. It was our hope, together, that allowed me to do what I couldn't do by myself."

"No..." Shekka's face contorted into something that was impossible to read, something trapped between misery and anger. Her hands shook. The scissor blades dimpled Hezzi's neck. She shook her head, the corners of her mouth turned down. There was a definite shine in her empty eyes, threatening to spill. "No... you didn't. You can't!"

"Kiana gave me the strength to guide her hand, and together we finished the name that my father began all those years ago."

"No!" Shekka screamed, spittle flying from her mouth. "You had no right to do that! Especially not together with some Fox! Some stranger!"

"Shekka -"

"No! Your father stole her from me! He spirited her away and dumped her in some hole for the worms! Even though she was dead before she was born... even though there was nothing anyone could have done... I was still... I was still her mother! She was still my baby girl, but I never got a chance to see her! I never got a chance to hold her or kiss her or tell her how sorry I was! I never got a chance to cry for her! It wasn't fair, Ander! It wasn't fair!!"

"No," Ander agreed. "That night wasn't fair to anyone."

Shekka pulled Hezzi even closer and pressed her face against his cheek, clutching him to her body as if she would drown without him. Tears spilled from her dead and useless eyes and dripped down onto his sodden scarf. After a while, she raised her head, and with tears still streaming down her bloodstained face, she asked: "What... What did you name her?"

"Lenka."

"Daughter of... Life?" Shekka sniffed and swallowed back the worst of her tears. "Do you not think it cruel, to name her 'Lenka' when she didn't get even a single moment of Len in this world?"

"She didn't, but I did. It was thanks to her I didn't end up buried beneath that tree. It was thanks to her I could have this life. 'Lenka' was my way of thanking her, of giving back the Life she gave me, even if only in name. Leaving her all alone beneath that tree, nameless, with the empty word of 'enka' scratched into the bark... that would have been true cruelty. Don't you think so, too, Shekka?"

She looked at him for long while, crescents of firelight trapped within her blank eyes, before finally dropping her gaze. "Yes... that would have been cruel," she said, speaking softly, barely moving her lips at all, "'Lenka'... it is a good name..."

Was he doing it? Was he actually getting through to her? Ander licked his dry lips, knowing that anything, anything could shatter this fragile spell at any moment. If someone came storming into this tent with another injured Wolf, if someone said something out of turn, if someone just made an unexpected noise, it could all lead to disaster. "Kiana. Layla. Sarah. Bethany. Salem. A hundred others. They all came to save me. They came to save me because they loved me. All the faces I had hoped so badly to see again, the faces that had given me the resolve to keep going through the mist, and the strength to get back up every time I fell. It was their hope that gave them the courage to brave the pass, and it was my hope that allowed me to keep holding on long enough for them to find me. Hope is something that grows stronger and stronger the more hearts it touches. It's like a fire that needs no fuel to burn, only itself. The hope of one heart touches the hope of another, and so it grows stronger. That's what love means to me, Shekka. It is the force that brought me back home. It is the force that gave me a new life. It is a force I can send out into the world, where it can touch the ones I love so much. Because to me, love is hope."

He could have ended his words there, he supposed, but it wouldn't have been right. One look at the expression on Hezzi's face was enough to tell him that. He looked so tired, so used up. There was pain in those eyes, and terrible fear. All of it mixed together. Was it not hope that had landed Hezzi in such danger? Was it not hope that had caused so much blood and death to fill the pass? Speaking of one side while ignoring the other... it was wrong. It was so, so wrong. When love was so many different things to so many different people, it was impossible to see every side at once. For Shekka, it was pain. For Sarah, it was strength. For Ander, it was hope. Somehow he had to bring it all together. He had to do the impossible.

So he kept talking, knowing it would all end soon, one way or another. This was the last part he had to tell, the last part Shekka needed to hear. And then...

Then a decision would have to be made.

Ander closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "But sometimes, life can take our hopes and set them upon a sacrificial pyre. I was so happy when my little brother came back. It was as if all my hope had been made real. But the news he brought with him... it tore me in two different directions."

Ander curled his free hand into a fist. The tips of his claws dug into the calluses that had hardened there over the years, and the bitter sting of pain was all too familiar.

Sarah placed a hand on his shoulder, gently encouraging him to keep going, to try his best, and that made it a little easier.

"It was love that made me build the wall, and it was love that made me set the trap. It was love that forced me to hammer every nail, and it was love that forced me to wear that horn around my neck. It was love that told me I had to blow it, and it was love that told me I couldn't. I was confused, trying to understand how the same thing could tell me two different things, but now, thanks to you, the two women I have both called 'Mother', I think I can understand. Love can be many different things at once. It was love that gave me the strength to do what I had to do, but it was also love that caused me so much pain when I did. The strength to protect, and the pain of killing. All of it was born out of love. Seeing the snow fall down from the mountain like a white river, watching it engulf the Wolves I had grown up with, it was like I was down there with them. It felt like I was getting buried, too, but in pain instead of snow. It hurt so badly I thought I was going to die, and the reason it hurt, the reason I could barely breathe, the reason I could barely stand under the weight of it all was because, even after everything that had happened to me, after everything that had been done to me, I still... I still loved them. I still loved you, Shekka."

Ander studied the blind she-wolf's face, but she was so difficult to read. Her tears had formed two dark lines across her cheeks, and fresh ones were continuously forming in her milky eyes, shining in the gloom. They rolled down her face and around the curve of her muzzle, falling past a mouth that was still stained with the blood of her drisa. Looking into those blank, sightless eyes, Ander saw so many feelings warring against each other; anger, remorse, hatred, fusions of love and pain, inseparable, indistinguishable.

"I could have stayed exactly where I was. That would have been the smart thing to do. That would have been the safe thing to do. If I had let you die, if I had let you suffocate and freeze, then you wouldn't be here now, holding a pair of scissors to my brother's neck. But if I did that, if I just stood there and did nothing, if I waited for five minutes, ten minutes, twenty minutes, until I was certain that everyone beneath all that snow was dead and gone, then I would never have been able to look my brother in the eye again, because he asked me... he asked me not to kill you. He asked me that because he loves you, because you are his mother and he is your son. I went into the pass and I dropped down to my knees and I dug through the snow with my bare hands because I hoped I could save you. I hoped you could cast off all the anger and hatred you insisted on carrying with you everywhere you went. I hoped I could hug you and tell you how sorry I am, and I hoped you could hug me back and say the same. And you know what? My new family, the ones you considered your enemies, the ones you came to destroy, they saw me dig through the snow and they hoped, too! They came to help, they came to save the ones who tried to kill them, because they hoped that things could change! They hoped that things could be different!" Ander's fist was shaking badly. He could feel the warm, slick texture of blood against his fingertips. "Love can be different things to different people. For some it can be pain. For some it can be strength. But for me, love is hope. That's why..." He took a very small, very slow step forward, making a deliberate noise with his heel to let her know what he was doing. "Shekka. Mother. Please... let Hezzi go. I hope we can all get out of this. I hope we can all still be a family. I hope we can all find happiness together. I hope we can find a way to make all your pain go away. So please... please... let Hezzi go."

Everything was very still, not just in terms of sound, but in terms of everything. The wind did not blow. The walls of the tent did not ripple. Every breath came slowly. The fire didn't even crackle. There was no movement at all, except for the faint glimmer of blood slowly seeping through Hezzi's fingers.

Shekka kissed his bloody cheek and, without pulling her lips away, she asked him: "What do you think... my stupid little Hezzi? What does love mean to you?"

Hezzi could barely breathe, let alone talk, but somehow... somehow Ander knew he'd do his very best. He licked his lips with a tongue as red as the blood flowing from his wound, and blinked twice, very slowly and deliberately, perhaps trying to clear the fog clouding his vision. He took several, deep breaths and began.

"I'm not very good at complicated things..." he said in barely more than a whisper. "I don't know much about being strong, or being in any real pain. I know what it's like to feel bored, and I know how to run fast, and that's about it..." He smiled. "But I think I'm really lucky. Because, to me, love isn't a complicated thing at all. It's the most simple thing in the whole world." He drew a line across his stomach with his finger, right where Garten's spear had nearly ended his life. "I have a scar here," he said, swallowing back the blood. "Sometimes it hurts when I run too far, but I'm glad it's there, and I'm glad it still hurts. Every time it stings, it reminds me that I'm alive because you saved me, Mother. And you saved me because you love me, right? That's what love is, isn't it? That feeling I get right after I feel that sting, that feeling that makes me happy to still be alive."

Shekka rested her head against his shoulder and closed her eyes, but did not say anything, only listened.

"Deeper in the valley, up on a hill," Hezzi continued, "I have a tent almost exactly like the one back home. The Foxes made it for me. Right next to my bed, I keep a carving Ander made for me. It's just like the one I broke, but better. Every time I pick it up, and hold it, and look at it, it reminds me of how close I came to not being myself anymore. When Ander made that carving, it wasn't just a piece of wood he fixed. He fixed me, just like you did. He made a promise, and holding that carving in my hands is like holding the promise itself. And that's love, too, isn't it? That feeling I get that makes me happy to still be me."

Shekka still did not say anything, but the scissors were starting to tremble. Ander could see the reflection of the firepit jitter up and down.

"And... and..." Hezzi looked down and to the side and, amazingly, he actually appeared to be a bit embarrassed. "Renna used to be sad a lot, but now she smiles almost every day. And when I see her smile like that it makes me want to smile, too, because seeing her happy makes me happy. And I think... I think it works the other way, too. Maybe the reason she's smiling more often is because she knows it makes me happy, and that makes her happy, and that makes her want to smile even more. And sometimes, when it's still really early and I'm wrapped up inside my blankets and I don't want to go outside because it's all snow and cold and windy and horrible out there, I hear Renna's voice and suddenly I want to go outside real bad just so maybe I can see her smile again. And maybe, if I'm really lucky, I'll get to hear her laugh. That feeling I get when I throw off my blankets and rush outside... that's love, isn't it? That feeling that makes me want to smile when I see her smile... that's love, isn't it?"

The fire shone inside the tears rolling down Shekka's face; drops of molten embers stained a cloudy red.

Hezzi struggled for every breath of air. Blood dripped from his nose and lips. "The reason I feel that way... is because I know there are so many people who care about me. They care so much it's almost scary. Sometimes I wonder what I did to deserve it all, to have so many friends and family who would go so far for me. I'm not... I'm not good at complicated things. I'm not good at figuring out what people are feeling or why they do the things they do. But maybe I don't need to. All I need to know is that they do care about me, and I care about them. That's what makes me feel happy... and that's what love is to me."

One last tear ran down Shekka's cheek, mixed with blood and fireshine. "Is that your answer?" she asked. "Happiness?"

Hezzi nodded and Shekka smiled, an exhausted mother with a child in her arms, ready to fall asleep together. "Do you really think you can find happiness in a world as dark as this one? Maybe the next will be better. Maybe we can both be happy."

Hezzi shook his head, making the scissors whisper across his neck. "I love you, Mother. But I don't want to go. I am happy."

"Because you have so many people who care about you."

Hezzi nodded.

"That's... That's good." Shekka raised her head and gave him what would be her very last kiss. "I'm so sorry I hurt you, baby."

She opened her blind eyes and immediately fixed them on the son she had rejected, but her gaze seemed different, somehow. "Ander... I'm sorry I hurt you, too. You really are my dosa."

It was like a heavy ball of molten lead suddenly settled in the pit of Ander's stomach. Those words should have made him feel happy, hopeful, but instead all he felt was an indescribable dread. There was something very, very wrong here. "Mother?"

"If you find Banno... tell him I'm sorry, too."

"Mother, wait!"

Shekka looked at him, and Ander was convinced it wasn't merely an unintentional stare or a trick of the light. She was seeing him, if not with her eyes, then with her heart. "There is one last person I need to ask for forgiveness."

"Mother!" Ander rushed forward, reaching out, but it was already too late.

There was nothing anyone could have done.

Shekka pulled the scissors away from Hezzi's neck, turned the blades upon herself, and plunged them deep inside her own throat.

Ander felt like he was stuck inside that terrible waking dream once again, where everything moved at a fraction of its true speed. In the time it took him to take even a single running step, he saw the tip of the scissors disappear inside her flesh, forcing the wound wider and wider. He saw the blood burst out of her throat, not as a trickle or a stream, but a torrent.

Hezzi's eyes went wide and he opened his mouth to scream, but no sound came out. It was as if Ander had gone deaf. There was no sound at all in this world anymore, just a dull throbbing in his temples. Blood gushed out of Shekka's neck in pulsating spurts, engulfing the scissors as well as her hands and splashing all over her youngest son's screaming face.

Motheeeer!! Ander saw his little brother's mouth make the proper shapes, but no sound reached his ears.

Hezzi reached for the scissors, but the moment his hands left his shoulder a fresh rivulet of blood splurted out and ran down his arm at a frightening pace, dripping from his elbow in an almost solid stream. He was barely conscious just a moment ago, fighting with all his strength just to speak. If he lost any more blood...

Kiana seized him and pulled him back, her own eyes just as wide and terrified as Hezzi's, locked on to the dying horror that his mother had become.

Motheeeerr!! The soundless scream, the reaching hand closing over empty air.

Kiana took his head and pressed it against her chest, embracing him and restraining him at the same time.

Don't look...

Ander skidded to a halt and dropped down to his knees in a single movement, nearly skidding right into her through the pool of blood spreading across the ground.

A moment later Bethany was right there, pressing a folded blanket down against the side of Hezzi's neck with both hands, screaming orders at everyone nearby in a voice that simply didn't exist to Ander's ears.

In all the confusion, he was certain that he was the only one who actually saw what happened next, and it would stay with him for the rest of his life.

Ander reached for the scissors, wondering if this might actually be the absolute worst thing to do, and that's when it happened, something he thought to be completely impossible.

A small smile briefly touched the corner of Shekka's mouth, allowing a thick stream of blood to flow down her chin, and then she slowly dragged the scissors through her neck, from left to right, but because the blades didn't have an outside edge, she didn't actually cut her throat as much as she pushed it open, tearing her flesh apart.

On some level Ander knew that he had been drenched in her blood. It was scorching hot and reeked of iron, but it barely even registered in his mind.

Her lips were still moving. Somehow, even with her throat ripped wide open, she was still trying to speak. No sound came out, but Ander could read the shape of her lips.

My boys...

She closed her empty eyes.

I love you...