Arachna

Epilogue: The Fox and the Wolf

Lance tugged at his eyelid, scanning his eye in the mirror. The piercing green irises stared back at him, and the veins in the corner remained red. He checked them every day before he left. Made sure the beast hadn't taken advantage of his unconscious state and possessed him. Every day, he was met with the same reaction; a soft growl from the beast, as if to say, How dare you?

Lance laughed it off. Always laughed it off because every time he looked, something inside him told him that it would be fine. That he was the one in control. But it never hurt to be careful. He blew out a single breath, a reminder that he was alive. That even after everything he'd been through, he made it out mostly unscathed.

He stepped away from the clean mirror and out the back room into his store. With a stretch, he grabbed a breakfast bar from the end of an aisle and was out the door. The sun peeked over the horizon, and the streets were quiet. The silence paired well with the orange haze in the sky.

But at night the silence haunted him, when the darkness of his room settled, the outside was quiet, and the beast was sound asleep. Apparently, it did that—not just rested, but slept.

That was when the fear came. When he was all alone in the quiet darkness, images of the pitch-black cell haunted him. Despite the short amount of time he'd been in there, he couldn't stop that fear in his chest, that nausea in his stomach. Sometimes, he even awoke the beast like a child yearning for their mother. It would awake with a soft grumble, but it would be there. Never did it growl at him in those moments. Never did it snarl. Somehow, it understood, and it cared. And when Lance waited for it to ask for more room, it didn't. It hadn't even bothered trying these past few months.

But even when Lance slept at night, nightmares preyed on him: nightmares of being trapped in that cell, cold, tired, and hungry, awaiting Caleb's smiling face somewhere within the darkness; nightmares of a woman with red hair and green eyes screaming in a hospital room; nightmares of everyone he knew and loved—Derek, Kaela, Eric—dead.

Sometimes, the beast snarled at Caleb even in his dreams, and while the beast never seemed to acknowledge it when he awoke, Lance knew it shared the nightmares he did. Being stuck in some dark void, completely powerless within the Fara-something cage.

Lance ate his breakfast bar as he strolled down the street, a jacket wrapped tight around him. He ran a hand through his dark hair, now cut short.

If Eric was to be believed, he wouldn't have to walk to the hideout much longer.

"I'll teach you to drive like a father should," he'd said.

Lance dipped into an alleyway, threw his wrapper in a nearby trash can, and shoved his cold hands into his pockets. Arachna was facing the heart of winter now. Once, he would've adored the cold, but it just didn't feel the same after that cell. He savored warmth more than ever. Even the shadowy alley gave him an uneasy, sinking feeling in his chest. He gulped.

He weaved down the alleyway and slid through a narrow passage invisible to anyone not looking for it. Within seconds, he was on the other side, and two armed men faced him. They guarded the front of the headquarters, nearly a perfect reflection of the one that had gone up in smoke. But now, it was much better hidden. The back of the building facing the street was paved with concrete, blending seamlessly with the other buildings. Eric had added secret pathways for quick exits—more contingencies, more backups. At least he'd learned from his mistakes.

And he'd listened to his son's advice. As time passed, he listened more to Kaela and Derek, as well. He didn't make any decisions without Lance, and he made few without Kaela and Derek, either.

The two guards wore black trench coats, hiding bulletproof vests underneath.

Lance resisted the urge to shake his head at the sight, regardless of how many times he'd seen them. A black trench coat was Eric's little uniform for his soldiers. It was laughable, but at least he'd had the sense to give them some armor underneath. They both had pistols at their sides.