Grace of a Wolf-Chapter 99: Grace: Too Young For This

"The Great One. Isabeau. She’s who’s after us."

Ron’s words come out flat and even, like he isn’t talking about the scariest person in his life. My heart clenches further at how he doesn’t even have the freedom to be a scared child.

Granted, he’s what... fifteen? Fourteen? I’m sure he doesn’t want to break down in front of strangers.

But he should be able to, if he wanted.

"Lyre took care of her, I think. You should be safe now." She hadn’t mentioned names or any real details, but I’m assuming the sanguimancer Lyre dealt with is the same as the monster Ron and the children are hiding from.

Caine gives a slight nod. "She did. I recall the name."

Ron shakes his head and looks back at the sleeping children. "She’ll be back. She’s been around for ages. Older than a witch’s ti—uh." His face goes pink. "Older than your grandparents, even. Blood witches don’t die easy. And she’s got minions. It isn’t safe."

"But Lyre said she killed her," I point out. "I thought—"

"Killing her body doesn’t kill her magic. And she’s not the only one. There are others, all over the world. They hunt kids like us. We might be the oldest ones still living."

"But why? Why would they hunt you?"

Ron looks directly at me, his eyes empty in a way that scares me more than rage ever could. "Because we’re batteries."

"Batteries?" I repeat blankly.

Caine shifts beside me, cutting off the faintest rumble out of his chest.

"Sanguimancers feed on the energy of the living. Soulspliced energy is even better for ’em. That’s what Owen calls us—soulspliced. Aberrants. Our energy runs different. Stronger. More... conductive." He rubs his hands together, and shudders. "Normal shifters give them power, sure. But us? We’re like their own personal nuclear reactors. They’ll kill thousands to capture one of us."

My brain struggles to process the idea of young, defenseless children used as batteries. They’re children. Even Brax took care of me until I was an adult—whatever his reasoning might be.

But there were some in the pack...

Maybe they would have sided with this strange Isabeau.

"Most don’t survive long. Blood witches will feed on every last drop if you let them."

"That’s..." I can’t find the right words. Horrific? Evil? Those seem inadequate.

Ron shrugs, like this is just the facts of life and I should be used to it by now. But it’s not. This is strange and bizarre and so beyond normal, and every part of me aches to grab him and hug him and show him there’s a better world out there. Even if he’s taller than I am and has the faint hint of a mustache on his upper lip, all I can see is a young child, alone and unloved in this world.

"The irony is what they do creates more of us," he says, unusually talkative now that we’re on the subject. I don’t know if he wants to educate us or if he just needs to get it all off his chest. Caine remains quiet as he talks, letting him say as much as he wishes. I want to beg him to stop. To never speak of it again. I’d rather him live pretending none of this ever happened.

But it’s his reality, so he continues, "Every time they destroy one, the imbalance grows wider, and more come to fill the void. So they’re making more batteries by draining them over and over. They just need to keep making babies, and more aberrants will pop out."

The cave suddenly feels colder. I wrap my arms around myself as my stomach twists into knots.

"That’s what Fiddleback wanted us to be," Ron adds, his voice now barely audible.

Caine grunts. "That explains..."

But he trails off and doesn’t finish his thought.

My nails grip into my forearms. They might even draw blood. My entire body keeps trembling, and I can’t make it stop. "What was Fiddleback, exactly? Aren’t they the local pack?"

"Yeah. But they’re not really a pack. They’re just a breeding farm."

My mind flashes to livestock, to animals kept in pens, forced to reproduce for human consumption. But he’s talking about people. About shifters. About children.

None of this can be possible, right? Who’s evil enough for this kind of horror?

"The adults weren’t worth much," he continues, eyes fixed on some distant point. "Old wolves were kept around to make babies. That’s it. More stock."

"And the children?" I ask, though I already know the answer will haunt me.

"Sorted." Ron’s fingers dig into his arms. "The ones with shifting anomalies, strange scents, flickers of power—they’d be sent away once they were two or so. They’re lucky to make it to five, usually."

"Five?" My voice cracks. Five isn’t nearly long enough. "Why only... five?" freeωebnovēl.c૦m

"Best energy-to-lifespan ratio." His clinical tone makes it worse somehow. "Younger, and they’re not strong enough yet. Older, and they start becoming individuals. Hard to control. Five is optimal."

Bile rises in my throat. "And ’elsewhere’? Where is that?"

"Don’t know exactly." He shrugs one shoulder, looking at Caine when the man blows out a deep breath. "It’s one hundred percent mortality rate. That’s all I know."

The Lycan’s energy beside me feels like a thunderstorm, contained in a tiny bottle. A glass one, ready to shatter at any moment.

"Your parents..." I begin hesitantly. "Were they from—"

"Fiddleback? Yeah." Ron nods. "My mom was one of Halloway’s favorites."

The way he says it—so detached, so matter-of-fact—breaks my heart. "Do you know her name?"

"No." He shrugs. "Just her face. Saw her once. Before."

"And your father?"

Ron snorts. "Who knows? All the old wolves fuck around. Part of the program. Halloway’s the worst, though." His lip curls in disgust. "He sold his honor. He didn’t want to be a pack alpha. He wanted more power than that."

I think of Alpha Brax, of how he cast me aside the moment he learned I wasn’t his biological daughter. I thought that was betrayal. But this—this systematic cruelty, this calculated evil—makes my own pain seem small in comparison.

"How many children?" I ask, my voice barely a whisper.

"Hundreds over the years." Ron’s eyes dart back to the alcove. "Most don’t make it out."

"But you did," I say softly.

Ron’s face hardens. "Yeah."

"Are... Jer and Sara? And Bun? Are they all Fiddleback, too?"

He shakes his head. "Nah. They’re not from the program. They’re just from local families. That’s why Owen could get them out alive."

"Was it only pack, then? In the program?" If the other shifter families aren’t involved...

But he shakes his head. "No. Any shifter they could grab. Sometimes new families would move here without knowing, though. Or they’d bamboozle ’em. Humans, too. Sometimes they survived. Sometimes they didn’t."

My trembling intensifies. "And the ones who survived... what happened to them?"

He meets my eyes, hollow and direct. "Pregnant."

Oh.

Of course.

That would... make sense. A horrible, awful sense.

Was Mom a product of something like this? Did Brax also...?

No. I would know if we had a breeding program somewhere in our pack, wouldn’t I? I mean, they can’t hide it from everyone, right?

I don’t know whether to cry or vomit. I do neither. I just sit there, hollowed out.

The silence stretches between us. Ron doesn’t seem inclined to fill it. He’s said his piece, laid bare the horror that shaped his life with the detachment of someone reciting historical facts. But he’s fifteen.

When I was fifteen, I’d been dreaming about kissing Rafe for the first time. Silly adolescent dreams.

"How do you even know these things?" It comes out somewhere between accusation and plea. Because no child should know these things. No fifteen-year-old should talk about breeding programs and energy-to-lifespan ratios with such clinical distance.

Ron scoffs. "You don’t get to stay a kid when you’re born like this."

As if childhood is a privilege we can revoke. An expiration date stamped on innocence.

Caine shifts beside me, the tension in his body palpable. His face is carefully composed, but I can see the storm raging, can feel it in the air crackling around him. Something inside me surges and twists, trying to reach out to him, but failing and falling short.

When he speaks, his voice is low and controlled. Calm, as if we hadn’t listened to the horrors of a child too grown for his years. "It’s late. Go get some sleep."

Ron hesitates, then nods, pushing himself to his feet. He turns and heads toward the alcove, but pauses at the entrance. "Owen’s good people," he says quietly. "If you’re wondering."

Knowing their past, it would be insanity to think otherwise.

He must be an angel, to sacrifice himself for these kids. To try and try again, despite so many failures.

My eyes burn.

Caine waits until Ron is out of earshot before he turns to me. Even in the dim light, I can see the weight of knowledge pressing down on him.

"Grace..." His voice is a whisper, his eyes too somber. He doesn’t want the kids to hear. "The rescue mission. Jack-Eye updated me."

It’s not good news.

If it was good news, he wouldn’t have sent Ron away.

"What happened?"

I don’t think I can take any more sadness today, but I straighten my back and take a deep breath, preparing for the emotional blow.

"They’re all dead. Everyone in the cages. Everyone Lyre found. All of them. Even the kids."

The air leaves my lungs in a slow, painful exhale. "All of them? But—"

"How many?" The question’s hard to choke out.

"Too many."

I close my eyes, trying to block out the images his words conjure. It doesn’t work. I see small bodies in cages. I see blood. I see vacant eyes staring at nothing.

"If we had known sooner... if we had found out earlier—"

"Don’t." Caine’s voice is firm. "That path leads nowhere good."

I bite my lip. Lyre had forgotten about them. For how long? If she’d told us earlier, would we have been able to save them?

Is she okay, knowing they were alive before, and now they’re not?

Is it okay to be angry with her for this?

Harsh lines of grief are etched into Caine’s face. His hand rises, almost involuntarily, reaching toward me. For a moment, I think he’s going to touch my hair, offer some physical comfort, and I yearn to lean into him. But then he flinches. His hand falls to his side, fingers curling into a fist.

Right. No touching.

The small, aborted gesture of comfort makes everything worse. We can’t even console each other without risking my health.

I’ve never felt more isolated.

My gaze drifts toward the alcove where the children sleep. Do Jer and Sara understand what they’ve been saved from? Does little Bun, with her ever-shifting features, have any concept of the fate that might have awaited her?

How many others like them never made it out? How many were consumed by blood witches or syphoned for their energy until nothing remained?

"Thank you," I say suddenly, surprising myself.

Caine tilts his head, questioning.

"For destroying the Fiddleback Pack." The words feel strange in my mouth, but right. Just days ago, I’d seen him as nothing but a murderous monster. The Lycan King who slaughtered an entire pack without remorse. Now I understand.

Lyre had called it pack justice.

"Thank you for stopping them."

It’s not justice when there’s no one left to save. It’s just blood for blood—but the price had to be paid.