Chapter 12

Mila had never once, in her entire existence, needed to consider her purpose or future.

Now she spent the night in the tub rather than the cot, gazing up through the water to the cracks in the ceiling, considering.

It wasn’t as though she’d never made decisions for herself. She made decisions all the time. What did she want to eat that day? How would she dress? Even bigger decisions like military tactics, offense or defense?

All of those decisions she could make. This one, however, bothered her.

It wasn’t like it was that big of an ask. In about two hundred years, every wolf present in this company would be dead. Even if she made a deal with them, it wouldn’t last that long. Not when life for her was set to last until the earth stopped turning.

If she stayed to help, she would be able to secure a spot for herself in the new world. Possibly even a new start for what was left of her species. Agreeing was the best tactical decision. So why was she hesitating.

She realized that a little part of her brain rebelled at the thought of doing anything for the wolves. Good for her species or not, she would need to fall in line under a wolf pack. She would have to accept orders and live their way.

It wasn’t a problem for her to blend in, but she had never taken serious orders from anyone but the first-born and her god. It was blasphemous to consider living by someone else’s rules.

Blasphemy or not, she had been abandoned. The minds of her kin were lost to her. Even if she wandered in the ocean right now, would she be allowed back? Would they even be able to recognize her? She was a freak, cut off and thrown away.

But what if she wasn’t? What if she got called back? Of course, she would go. Regardless of how much these peoples might rely on her in the future, if she was called home, she would leave without a second thought.

Mila had seen all sorts of species on this planet, especially in the oceans which was mother to all surface life now. Eons had been dedicated just to watching the generations, doing nothing at all to help or change. Simply watch the cycle of life, over and over.

Mila had never considered herself like any of them. She didn’t have a proper birth or an infantile stage. She had come to be, unchanging and undying.

There were some like the starfish that when threatened, rejected part of itself. A starfish could cast aside one of its legs as easily as a human could discard a shirt. The leg would shrivel, becoming worthless, but the starfish would go on. It would survive the threat and regrow the missing part as if the old had never existed.

Was Mila like that? Was she the leg of a starfish, cast aside when the firstborn had felt threatened?

That leg would never be reattached. Why even consider it when it was fully capable of creating a new one?

Because she’d always had a purpose, she had never had time to truly think of herself as expendable. But she knew that wasn’t true.

Mila had seen some die.

The oceans were harsh. A single mistake could mean a gruesome death, usually as a meal to something else. Though Mila was effectively immortal, it was possible for her to fail at some point. She’d had no reason to believe that she would wither, as that wasn’t something her kind did, but it was possible to be taken out.

It took a lot to kill her kind, but if she had been thrown away. Would she eventually change? Would she die? Or would she be replaced? Or had she already?

Morbid thoughts didn’t suit Mila. Fear didn’t suit her. Entertaining such useless emotions wasn’t something she did. She hadn’t been built for it. A species that didn’t change did not feel deeply.

She blew bubbles that obscured her ability to see the ceiling.

Centuries of life – even some around the humans, hadn’t prepared her for this. Not only had she never experienced loneliness, but she’d never even had cause to think that she might feel it one day.

The unicorn had helped, but she had foolishly allowed herself to get weak. It wasn’t the creature’s fault. She had been obsessed with keeping it near, she cared for it at the expense of her life selfishly. Her efforts weren’t even necessary to its survival. It was more than capable of hunting for itself.

Unicorns were generally solitary on the surface. This one was remaining close because she coaxed it, but it could still freely leave. She wasn’t necessary to its survival or even happiness.

The wolves were offering her so much more than they knew. If she accepted, she would have a purpose again.

Still, the idea of roots of any kind bothered her. Could she do it?



By the end of the night, Mila had reached a decision. She’d decided she would stay with the wolves. On the grounds of making very little commitment on the slim chance she would be allowed to return to her ocean home.

Winnie brought her some clothes in the morning. They were loose. Even if they were clothes worn by children, they had to be loose. Whelps tended to grow quickly and the constant threat of changing shape meant that clothes couldn’t been terribly confining.

Mila walked around in a t shirt like hung like a dress and rolled up sweat pants with the promise that someone would hem some clothes for her later.

She greeted the alpha table at breakfast, agreeing to their offer. The ancient looking she-wolf reached out her knobby hand to Mila. The kind of her hand was like thin, worn leather. It felt somehow tough, yet fragile as though it were being worn down by the movement of her bones just under the surface.

“You have such smooth hands,” the old wolf said in a soft voice.

Had she been saying this about a wolf, it might have been taken as an offense. Wolves ran through the forest. They hunted and gathered and worked for their pack. Mila’s soft hands would be seen as weak and lazy if she’d been a wolf.

But Mila wasn’t a wolf. The softness of her hands was merely a human guise which was maintained through hydration.

“Don’t be fooled,” Mila said stiffly. “With me, it truly is only skin-deep.”

She could tell that many of the wolves listening in didn’t entirely believe it, but the old she-wolf nodded somberly.



Mila didn’t wait for someone else to hem her clothing. She took whatever loose fabrics were available to her and sat down with an old-fashioned sewing station. The humans had progressed far beyond this in recent years, but the wolves seemed to be contented living in a style barely a step above Amish communities.

It was around lunch time when the first pack scheduled arrived. They were smaller in number, but no less in size. They moved with a sort of gypsy caravan Mila hadn’t seen in years or even on this continent. They did not come without gifts.