Page 21 of Big Bad Betrayal
The door doesn’t budge. It’s locked.
I detect a slight vibration in the door when I press my palm against it. There it is again-a thud against the door from the other side.
I duck back, pressing myself against the wall, so I can hide if it swings open. It doesn’t move.
I press my palm against the door again to detect the vibration of any sounds from the other side. The inner part of the lock turns, but still the door doesn’t open.
I feel the thud again and frown. A third thud.
Is she… trying to get out?
It’s an insane risk, but something makes me grab the handle, put my foot against the wall, and heave with all my weight. The door swings back, and a slight blonde female stumbles out, doubles over, and throws up.
Aster
Oh fate, the visions. They came on again as soon as I caught that drone outside my window.
This time, I’m sure—it has something to do with the wolf I’ve been dreaming about. The young man on the periphery of the Blackthroat pack.
I saw him sitting in a car, looking at a phone screen that had my face looking back. After that I blacked out—the visions too fast and intense to interpret. When I woke up, I found myself here at a great iron door. Somehow, I know that I’m at the entrance to the secret tunnel that leads from the Adalwulf manor out to the guard hut at the edge of the property.
It’s been in existence for over two hundred years. Oma once told me there was an escape tunnel dug in case the property was sacked by the Blackthroat pack. A way to get the pups and she-wolves out of danger.
I don’t know how I even found it. How I even got out of my locked chambers. I remember Oma telling me of the tunnel’s existence, but if she ever showed me this door, I have no memory.
But I trust the whispers of the Grandmothers, which tell me to go through it. I turn the ancient key in the lock counterclockwise and shove against the door.
It doesn’t move.
I put all my weight into it, but I’m too weak from the vision spell. My stomach lurches—I’m going to throw up.
I try once more in desperation.
The door seems to swing open of its own accord. I stumble through it just as my stomach decides to empty its contents on the dirt floor of the tunnel. I double over, holding myself up with a hand against the dirt wall. The visions come even stronger now. I can’t manage them. I can’t see anything.
I throw up again, and it takes me a moment to realize someone is holding my hair back from my face.
Noah.
The name comes to me, and it sounds familiar, like I’ve spoken it before, yet I’m sure I haven’t. Was it in a dream?
I reach blindly for him, and my hand hits a sturdy arm. Then I collapse to the floor.
No…
I’m not on the floor, but I am horizontal. I’m in a large wolf’s arms being transported at a rapid pace.
I struggle to slow my breath and see through the visions as we race at breakneck speed through the tunnel.
The wolf smells like pine needles and amber wood–a scent I want to wrap myself in for all time.
“Stop.” I finally manage to speak.
He doesn’t stop.
In fact, he offers no indication that he heard me at all.
“Stop!” I shout this time.
