90. Give In Part II

“So you would just let Calla go?” he snapped, finally meeting her gaze with the fire ignited in his. “You want her back as much as I want Zinnia.”
She snapped back with a flare of rage at his accusation, “You stubborn ass! It took me decades to get over my mate’s death that you caused. No, I didn’t just let her go. But, after a while, I thought I did. Then Seff appeared and I felt hope. I realized…if there was just one chance I could get her back…then I would try.”
Kiran’s chest was heaving, but Selene knew he felt suddenly as torn as she did. “When did you give up?”
For almost two months they tried to get Seff to remember without telling her the real truth. Selene knew they didn’t try hard enough or even the “right” way to find their mates within her subconscious. All they did was confuse an underage Omega and toss her back and forth because of their selfish whims.
*“You say the truth will push me away. Well, not telling me pushed me away better.”*
They were lovestruck idiots, to say the very least. Even after making love to Seff, after trying potential trigger words, after giving her Calla’s own necklace—which Selene feared was now lost forever somewhere between Castle Night and the Keep—nothing seemed to work. Taking her to the place of her death was Selene’s last resort, but when these records appeared…it was a hopefully kinder alternative.
And yet…she had come to the conclusion to her own thought: *Was all of this really worth it? Just to cling to that last wisp of memory?* Or could she—could Kiran and Seff—just move on?
Her voice couldn’t even decide what tone to take. “I didn’t give up, you bastard, I just…” Her superior mind struggled to find the right words. “I just *gave in*, Kiran.”
“What’s the fucking difference?”
Selene had already forgotten the box. Though he winced as if he thought she would take it, she simply rested her hand on his cheek, stroking her thumb over the scruff. It prickled her rough skin. “We talk to Seff,” she said softly, searching the face she knew longer than anyone else’s, the one she hated and the one she— “We ask what *she* wants to do with them. Then we let *her* decide.”
They were frozen on purpose for a moment longer than either would admit. Then Kiran snorted and pulled away. “Where does the violence come in?”
She sighed. So much for that. But now that he mentioned it, she wouldn’t mind a certain kind of bloodshed. She looked at Hyacinth with a smile that bared all of her teeth. “Once we address *his* involvement.”
She sensed him fake a savage grin as well. “We can’t forget the thief, can we?”
Hyacinth was trembling like a pup in winter. It was a fresh kind of horror when he saw Selene’s delight vanish. “Yes,” she said slowly. “The…thief.”
She made sure to fix her mask of indifference into place before turning back to Kiran, but just as her skill to do the same, his intuition did not allow him to miss the change in tone. He hid that knowledge by noticing how the belt of her robe had loosened and exposed most of her body. His eyes brazenly drank her in.
She flashed her breasts fully before tying the robe closed tightly. Kiran’s male excitement was dashed; he grunted and continued walking.
In the middle of the night, there was only the sound of crackling torchlight. Lesser Alpha guards slunk along the edges of the walls and didn’t attack Selene on the order of Kiran’s glare.
When they reached the courtyard Selene gladly admitted to stealing the blueprints of decades ago when they were both building their harems, Kiran halted Sienna and Hyacinth behind one of the pillars cloaked in darkness. “Stay here,” he threatened in a low tone. “And stay hidden.”
Hyacinth nodded hastily, but Selene noted Sienna’s compliance was paired with her jaw tightening, as if frustrated.
Kiran padded into the open space without waiting for her, and when she did follow, Selene was only half surprised by the appearance of Seff, Wisteria Ren, and that Magnolia male Seff mentioned, Hawthorn Henbane.
They stood in a valiant line, shoulder to shoulder, with Seff in the center. Their white hair was paired with the white silks and Selene thought they glowed brighter than any moon. With the real one above them, its light flooding onto the grass, Selene couldn’t stop the memories of the sleepless nights she and Calla spent counting stars on knolls and in wildflower fields. Selene had thought it was ridiculous, and that was why Calla insisted they do it. The only good that came of the childish pastime was lovemaking.
But the she-wolf with Calla’s face was not Calla, and Selene had come to terms with that. At least she hoped she did. Seff looked far too vengeful to be her dead mate. But when her green eyes fell onto the box in Kiran’s hands, the mask of bravery started to slip. The first movement in the courtyard was the male Magnolia’s hand clasping hers.
*“His name is Hawthorn Henbane. He’s the one who…announced that he loved me at the Choosing.”*
*“And do you?”*
*“Yes.”*
Selene smiled to herself at the lack of jealousy in her chest. She glanced at Kiran to see if he was aware of the relationship, but his mask was still in place.
It was a tossup of which scorned wolf would speak first. The pretty but surly-looking middle-aged Magnolia Omega who started the mad search for key and box, perhaps?
No.
It was Seff, and her voice was raw. “Did you two always know about this?”
She held up a key and Selene’s heart jumped, unbidden. It was an ugly little metal thing. Her eyes flicked to the box in Kiran’s arms. Neither looked like they belonged together. Looking back at Seff, the timid and confused Omega she had been when she was Chosen was no longer so: she was running on pure anger.
The development was honorable. “No,” Selene told her.
Seff’s green gaze snapped to her blue one. There was no softening of expression. “What *do* you know, then?” When Selene hesitated, she spit out, “My mom wrote a letter with this damn key. She said *that* box”—she jerked her head toward it—“holds generations of journals from my family writing about *reincarnations* and *doppelgängers*.
“I didn’t know why Calla and Zinnia Amaranth sounded unfamiliar to me because my mom hid everything about the records—she didn’t want exactly what happened: you two fighting over me like pups over a bone!
“*I* am the third reincarnation,” Seff said harshly. “And you two were never in love with *me*! You’re in love with who you *think* I am!”
It felt like a prophecy fulfilled. The real truth was finally spoken after months of writhing under the flesh of tongues.
Silence reigned. Five heartbeats—one Moon, three Magnolias, one Sun—pounded out of sync under the weight of a century of turmoil being uncovered anything but gently.
*Who thought* I *would be the peacemaker?* Selene thought as she took a step forward. All others tensed at the movement; she tried not to be irritated. *Skittish fools*. “We came to ask what *you* want, Seff. The box and key belong to you.”
She narrowed her eyes, looking between her and Kiran mistrustfully. “Are you trying to tell me you’ve given up trying to make me *remember*?”
“Given in,” she said softly, “not given up.”
At that her brows knitted, her guard dropping just an inch. *Thank gods you comprehend that more than Kiran*. Seff held the key in her fist tightly to her chest as if clinging to her last bit of sanity. “You don’t want to open the box?”
Selene slid her attention to Kiran, drawing Seff’s with it. “I don’t.”
A muscle twitched in Kiran’s neck as he stared at the little Magnolia Omega. The mask was starting to splinter, but he only held onto the second artifact just as tightly. “You want me to say to let her go?”
The question was not to Seff but Selene. She almost smiled. “Here I thought I wouldn’t be able to change your mind.”
Seff’s hand drifted out of the male’s to pad toward Kiran slowly. Her anger had melted into heartache, plain on her face as she tipped it up toward the Sun Alpha. “I don’t know what it’s like to lose a mate,” she began, “but I can see just how much it can destroy someone.”
She looked at Selene. “Only a part of me wants to read whatever’s in that box, but the rest of me wants it to be gone.” To Kiran she said, “Just so you keep trying to bring back the dead in *my* body.”
Selene prepared two generic scenarios: one was to protect Seff and the other was to defend Kiran. At that moment, it could have gone either way. She had the option to leap between them if Kiran lunged for the key; she had the other option to step in verbally if Seff tried to start barking.
Instead Kiran’s shoulders sank and he offered the box for Seff to take.
Even Selene couldn’t hold back their surprise. *Was it that easy for him to let go*?
Seff was too smart to hesitate. She dipped her head and took the Amaranth records, retreating to the safety of her packmates, now holding onto that like a pup’s favorite toy. None of them looked relieved; just more cautious.
Selene didn’t blame them. She looked again at her counterpart. There was no telling if he would lash out or not. The sick and tiredness had returned to his very being and Selene’s heart hurt again.
She had to break the silence for all their sake. “Now what?”