How It Will Be by T. S. Joyce

Chapter Three

 

This wasn’t the address.

Ren stared out the cracked front windshield of her trusty old Explorer.

This couldn’t be the address.

The house was an old renovated cabin with a green tin roof. The towering pines around the home had dropped a layer of needles onto it. The front yard was a little overgrown but edged well along the newly poured asphalt driveway that had come off the main gravel road. If she’d continued taking that gravel road, she would’ve ended up at Krome’s house, or headquarters, or whatever it was kings were calling their nests these days. But this? With its rustic feel and sprawling porch and single rocking chair couldn’t be Bron’s address…

She’d seen a picture of this house before, years ago.

This was her brother’s house.

The front door opened and a man walked out. Bron was no longer the ruffian, howling-at-the-moon, shit-starting, half-grown boy she’d known a decade and a half ago. Bron was all grown up.

He looked taller, and had to duck under the lip of the porch before he jogged down the stairs. He’d cut off his rockstar, shoulder-length hair and wore it short and neat now. His face was clean-shaven, and he’d probably put on close to fifteen pounds of solid muscle. He wore a black shirt, and dark jeans held up by a black belt at his V-shaped waist. His defined chest pressed against the thin cotton of his shirt. While most men her age had tattoos on their arms, Bron had scars. Fresh-looking, red, angry scars.

He seemed to be healed though, because he threw up a two-fingered wave easily enough. His eyes were the same. They were pure black and crinkled at the corners with his smile.

“Get out of the car,” she muttered to her body, which had apparently forgotten how to do anything but ogle her brother’s best friend.

Limbs functioning once again, she turned off her car and pushed the door open. “Well you look different,” she greeted him.

“Different good, or different bad?” he asked, pulling her into a rough hug.

“Wouldn’t you like to know?”

She could feel his chuckle reverberate through his chest and into hers, and for some reason, the vibration heated her blood. Cheeks flushing, she pulled out of the hug awkwardly and placed her hands behind her back, lest they get tempted to play grabby-grab on his sexy biceps.

Bron had grown into some serious sex appeal.

Her fee was only eight hundred dollars. She suddenly felt compelled to tell him that and save him some money, but when she parted her lips to voice her admissions, he interrupted her thoughts. “Laken isn’t here.”

“Oh.” She scanned the woods and the sky but no crows sat the branches of the oaks and pines, and no crows coasted the wind currents above. “Is he in town?”

“No…I mean Laken isn’t here anymore.”

“He’s dead?” she blurted out.

Bron shifted his weight from one foot to the other and his eyes locked on the ground between them. “I wish he was.”

“Wh-what? How could you say that? I think he’s a total tool, but you’ve been friends forever.”

Bron swallowed hard, and darted a glance to her, then back to the ground. “Death would’ve been kinder, but he didn’t deserve to go clean.” He cleared his throat. “I was glad when you said you wanted to come pick up the check, because it’s something you should hear in person.”

“Okay.” Why did she feel like crying right now? She didn’t even know what was happening yet, only that it was very, very bad.

Bron gestured to the porch stairs. “Want to sit with me for a while?”

Ren strode for the stairs and plopped down on the top one. Bron took the bottom one and looked out at the surrounding woods. “Laken’s been banished from the Murder.”

“For what?”

“For leading a coup against the King.”

“Oh my God,” she murmured in horror. She shouldn’t be surprised. She shouldn’t be surprised! Her stupid brother had always been an asshole. She couldn’t stand him on a good day, and would never in her lifetime understand him or the reasons he did the things he did.

“Why did he do it?” she asked softly.

“Krome was hurt, and he saw an opportunity.” Bron was quiet for a few moments and then he rested his elbows on his knees and dropped his head. “It was more than that. This war had built up for a long time. Years. Laken didn’t like the way things were run, but you know him. He isn’t the one to lead. He was Second to Krome, and I saw the way he looked at the King. I watched him. He would stare at Krome during meetings, during nights out, always sizing him up. It started when Krome was failing at ending the bear shifters’ line. He kept giving the Banes chances and Laken didn’t like it. And he made sure the rest of the Murder didn’t like it either.”

“Your allegiance shifted,” she whispered.

Bron nodded. “It was a slow thing, but I chose Krome in the end.”

“And you chose the bears. Say that part, too. It’s important. You chose Krome and the Bane brothers. And now you want me to tell our world where your new loyalty lies. Laken will hear of it, right? He’ll hear what you are doing?”

“He’ll hear I’m alive,” Bron gritted out.

“That doesn’t even make any sense. Why would he give a shit if you’re alive if you betrayed him, Bron?” Ren stood. “He might be a dipshit, but Laken is my brother. Friends don’t betray friends. They don’t choose a side in war against their friends. It’s always been the two of you. You were this stupid package deal! Why do you think I had to distance myself from you when Laken and I fought? You always sided with him. I always knew my idiot brother, for all his faults, was okay because he had you at his back. What the fuck, Bron? And now you’re what? Moving in on his house? Moving in on his—”

“He killed me, Ren!” Bron yelled. He stood in a blur and black smoke wafted from his skin as he ripped his shirt over his head to expose a spiderwebs of scars marring his olive toned skin. He jammed at finger at her. “You of all people should know what your brother is capable of. You know me too! Do you think I would betray my friend lightly? You think I’m not haunted? I found out about the coup, and do you know what he did to me?” Bron’s eyes were filled with fire and ghosts, and red crept up his neck. “He ordered the rest of our Murder to beat me, and when I was unable to fly, he dragged my human body up there.” He pointed to the sky. “So high, you would look like a grain of sand. And then do you know what he did? Do you know what he did to punish me for fighting the coup?”

Horror had washed through her at his admissions and she shook her head. “I don’t want to hear. I don’t want to hear,” she gasped as she jogged to her car.

“Yeah, run away. That’s what you do, right? It’s what you’ve always done. Run when things get hard.”

“You aren’t dead!” she shrieked, rounding on him. “You said he killed you, but you’re still here!”

Bron approached her with the slow, stealthy stride of a predator. “Laken dropped me to the earth. There is a crater in Krome’s yard where I made contact, and do you know what I thought the entire time I was falling? My entire body hurt, my bones were broken, even the wind hurt my skin from what he’d ordered to be done to me, and do you know what my loyal, stupid brain thought?”

She didn’t want to run. He’d pissed her off with that accusation. Out of stubbornness she was staying. “What?”

Bron lifted his chin higher into the air. “That Laken would swoop down and save me. I thought he wouldn’t really let me hit the ground. I knew he would fix it. That he would let me live. The good parts of me died because of him. Krome’s mate had to work for days to put me back together. I had plenty of time to find the old me, but he isn’t in there anymore.” He pressed his palms to his chest, rising and falling with his ragged breath. “There’s nothing in there anymore. Just anger.”

God, her heart hurt. It was aching and throbbing inside of her chest. She could see the fury, the helplessness, the despair in his eyes. When a Murder broke apart, it wrecked the Crow Blooded, but Bron was dealing with so much more. Laken had pierced Bron’s heart with his betrayal, and that lance was barbed. She knew Bron. He cared about very few, but those few were his world. That spear would forever remain in his heart, and he would have to live his life bleeding.

Maybe Laken really had killed him.

“Where is my brother?” she asked softly.

“You gonna go save him?” Bron asked.

“No one could ever save him, Bron. You know that as well as I do. I quit on him a long time ago. But our parents deserve to hear what happened to him.”

“He and Krome fought. It was a dirty challenge. Four on one. He dropped me right in front of our King and then they tried to assassinate him. I was…” Another big swallow. “I was hurt. I didn’t see, but from the blood on Krome’s hands and the feathers on the ground, your brother doesn’t have his wings anymore.”

“I hate you.” Ren flinched and gasped in shock at herself. It had tumbled from her lips, and she couldn’t take it back.

Bron looked as shocked as she felt, but she’d meant it, so she said it again, because God it felt good to finally say something real to a man. “I hate you.” She shoved him in the chest. “I hate you for taking his side all those years. For looking past all the bad. For choosing him over and over every time I got hurt by his stupid decisions! I hate you for never messaging me—”

“You told me not to—”

“You never once checked up on me! Do you remember the plan? Do you?” she yelled.

He nodded slightly.

“You two were supposed to find a Murder for all of us, and you were supposed to protect me!” She shoved him in the chest again, and he fell back a step. “And you never did. You never did.” Tears streaked down her cheeks. Stupid tears! She never cried. Crying showed weakness and she was a female crow. She was already seen as weak. “Do you know what it’s like to be a trophy, Bron? To be a shiny thing a Murder can brag about but have no real power?” She sobbed and shoved him again. “I never had a shot at settling into a Murder without you and Laken. But at least you had each other. That’s what I’ve said this whole time to take the sting away. At least they have each other! And now you don’t and you’re broken, and he’s broken, and I’m broken, and it was all for nothing.” She dashed her knuckles across her damp cheeks and called on her crow. Right before she let the blue smoke envelop her, and let the crow have her body, she said it again so he could hear the honesty in her voice. “I hate you.”

A moment of agonizing pain was all it took to shed her human skin. A pop of fire through her veins and she was airborne, leaving the dark blue smoke she’d conjured behind her. She cast a quick glance back as she aimed for the sky. Bron was watching after her. His face was unreadable, but something about it hollowed her gut.

Ren didn’t know where she was going, only that she’d needed to change. Laken’s wings had been ripped off? “Caw!” She couldn’t imagine the pain of it. Couldn’t imagine this being taken away from any crow—the sky. It was like treasure to a dragon. Water to a fish. It was everything, this feeling of freedom. It soothed the soul of a Crow Blooded, and without it? Laken would wither.

But…

He’d done something awful.

Krome’s sprawling home appeared below in a clearing. Even from here, she could see the mangled yard. She needed to see it. Needed to accept it.

Tucking her wings close to her body, she dove for earth. This is what Bron had felt, the wind against him as he fell, but she was able to spread her wings at the last moment and save herself. He’d been rendered helpless.

She couldn’t imagine the fear. The pain of his body creating this…

She landed by the Bron-sized crater in the front yard. There was dried blood on the flattened grass, and she wanted to retch. Ren hunkered down until the feathers on her belly touched the soft weeds, and she imagined him lying here, hurt. Laken had done this to punish Bron for staying loyal to his King.

Another crow landed across the crater from her. Bron? He was bigger than she remembered, and the scars on his human body had showed up in his crow. Patches and lines of feathers were missing, and his wings looked tattered and war-torn.

Laken had done that.

Okay.

Okay.

Punishment for treason to a Crow Blooded King was death, and Laken was still alive out there somewhere, without his wings. She didn’t know if that fate was worse than death, or a mercy, but she did know one thing—his actions deserved consequences.

So, okay.

Bron’s gaze was locked on hers. She still hated him, but she understood him a little better, and that was a start.