Riannon gathered up her hair at the back of her head and dressed quickly into a pair of blue jeans, comfortable leather boots and an oversized blouse, part of which she tucked into her belt. All the while she called Ash and Maya in turns. To her disappointment and horror, neither of them was replying.
She tried to steady her breathing as panic almost overwhelmed her.
She couldn’t lose Maya. Not again. She almost lost her once, and it almost broke her.
It did break her. This was the point from which everything went downhill.
She remembered every detail even now. Roxy was launching attack after attack on her. Maya helped protect her best friend and helped Riannon avoid traps more than once. She was very snarky towards Roxy and quickly got under her radar.
That fateful day, she was accused of treason. There was no evidence against her. Just a confession of a warrior from one of their enemy packs from the East, who hoped to become the next Beta after Ash was accidentally killed and insisted she was trading secrets with them. At the time, Ash wasn’t convinced, but Maya’s loyalty was compromised. Brayden came up with a” good solution” as he called it, which was to send Maya to the border to serve as one of the guards up there. Only several days into her relocation and her post, out of all others, was under attack. Moreover, she was one of the very few dead.
Closing her eyes, Riannon felt a tear roll down her cheek as she remembered driving with Ash all the way to the border as soon as she received the news. Brayden couldn’t look her in the eye, although she did not want to see him anyway.
The Beta brought her to one of the small cottages of a bordering village, and there on a table lay her best friend, covered with a white sheet. They had cleaned her body after they heard that their Luna was coming. Still, they couldn’t do anything about the claw marks, which didn’t knit back together after she shifted back to her human form at her death. Those ugly, uneven scars ripped through her face and neck, extending down to her chest. Just by looking at them, Riannon could tell that fatal injuries such as those inflicted on Maya were the result of the savage attack of several beasts.
Maya was so cold. So lifeless. An empty shell of the person Ria once knew. It was hard to recognise in the vacant face of the person on the table who Maya was.
The,strong girl, who was a fighter at heart and could barely spend a minute without cracking a joke, didn’t exist anymore.
Riannon remembered how she wept over her friend’s body. How painful that experience was. How Ash tore her off Maya, and how she cried into his chest for hours in that cottage.
All of which occurred much later in the timeline of her previous life. What was happening? If only someone answered the phone!
She took her bag and hastened down the stairs, hoping to not encounter anyone and to easily find a car.
If anything, she was sure she could ask Savvy for some assistance. The princess seemed like someone who could understand her situation.
However, the first person Riannon ran into was Reid. He was reading something on his Ipad in the living room when she passed by. He jumped to his feet as soon as he noticed her and followed her.
“Where are you going?” he asked, slightly shocked at her apparent readiness to leave.
“I need to get back to my pack,” the Luna stated plainly as she kept walking toward the exit.
“Absolutely not!” Reid blocked her way.
“I don’t think I asked for your permission,” Ria countered, arching her brow, “I’m simply informing you that I am leaving.”
“Luna,” the Beta began, trying to reason with her, “
I am sorry. I just can’t allow it. Gideon will kill me when he comes back and discovers you are gone.”
“Let’s drop the formalities, Reid.” She looked at him with a challenge. “If l don’t go back to my pack now, my best friend in the whole world could die! l just can’t let that happen.”
“But į-“
“I will hate Gideon forever if you stop me now because of him,” she lied. She could never hate the Lycan King. It was simply impossible. However, she knew that for this to work, this was the right button to push on the Beta. Nevertheless, she decided to sweeten it a bit,” Reid, I can’t lose her. I almost lost her once, and it was the worst thing ever for me. She is my Beta.”
Something changed in his eyes at her words.
Something clicked. Because after that, he opened the door for her himself, saying, “l will drive.”
She decided not to argue with that. A lycan by her side could prove useful.
The drive to the Silver River pack seemed terribly long, and they barely spoke to each other the whole time.
“This friend of yours,” Reid asked, deciding to break the silence, “Is she at least hot?”
“Hotter than fire,” Riannon scoffed, “But way out of your league.”
“Excuse me?” the Beta interjected, pretending to be offended although his eyes gleamed as if he had accepted the challenge, “Any girl will be happy to land a lycan Beta like me!”
“Not Maya though,” Ria chuckled. “She is different.
She doesn’t care about titles. She also is not your typical she-wolf.”
“Tell me more!” Reid insisted, and she did. She recited story, after story, after story about Maya and her shenanigans over the course of their time together, relieving years of their friendship.
The guards let them into the pack territory with ease, greeting their Luna.
“Wait for me here,” Ria told the Lycan when he parked in front of her house. Hastily, she jumped out of the car.
The door of the mansion opened at once, and a very troubled Ash walked out of it. He looked her up and down as if he was checking for something and then took her hand, pulling her behind him.
“Where is she?” Riannon asked him without attempting to struggle out of his firm grip.
“In the barn,” he replied dryly, “Everyone is there! I have to tell you, it doesn’t look good, Riannon.”
“Ash, stop for a second! Explain what is going on!
What happened to Maya?” she begged him.
He stopped, inhaling deeply, and turned to face her.
“Goddess knows what is happening, Riannon,” he said, “It started yesterday and escalated rather quickly into something else completely!”
“Details, Ash. I need details!” she urged him.
“Yesterday, out of the blue, Roxanne announced at the pack dinner that she saw Maya stealing from your jewellery box while you were gone,” he started explaining.
“What nonsense!” Ria rolled her eyes, “Maya would never! And anyway, she can take whatever she likes from my jewellery box if she needs it.”
“That’s what we all thought,” the Beta nodded, “
Only the issue did not end there. Without warning, Brayden got very angry and ordered guards to search Maya’s room.
“Of course he did,” the Luna gritted her teeth.
“Except that was when they found Maya had hidden a secret phone in her room,” Ash continued on, “The Alpha ordered her to unlock it. This was when the sh!t hit the fan. Because on that phone, she was texting foxes and werebears. And even lycans from the Eastern kingdom. I mean texting them about upcoming attacks on our pack. She was giving them information on when would be the best days to attack us.”
“That’s impossible!” Riannon splashed her hands, Maya would never”
“Again,” he interrupted her, “Everyone said so. But right now, this has escalated even more.. That’s why you need to go to the barn with me. You need to see this.
She could only hope that it wasn’t what she thought it was. History couldn’t be repeating itself!
Yet, when the doors of the barn were opened before her, she met Brayden’s gaze. And Roxanne’s too. Maya was right next to them.
Riannon was already also staring into a pair of smoky grey eyes. She could never have forgotten those.