Wolf's Bane (Monstrous Hearts #2)

Chapter Eight

"Do you know why your mother left you?" Cruel words, but Magdalene's voice sounded gentle, even sad.

They sat facing each other, Magdalene serene among the creeping ferns and Alice shivering, bare feet tucked beneath her and shoulders hunched under the thin sleep shirt. Thick moss gleamed green between them. Firs loomed all around. The sky looked jet-black—not a single star in sight to suggest with its wheeling path where they were or how long they'd been there.

The question stung at Alice's thoughts, but instead of answering, she glanced out at the dark water of a stream that burbled mere feet away. Fresh shivers ran through her at the lack of frogs croaking on its muddy banks, at the lack of rustling in nearby undergrowth where water rats or raccoons would have surely foraged. And the trees—they didn't shift in the wind that tugged at her hair like cold fingers. Their shadow-black trunks absorbed none of the light from the moon that hung overlarge in the sky. No, this certainly wasn't the throbbing, heedless nature that she knew.

"Where are we?" she said, aware of Magdalene's unwavering attention.

"In a place where we can talk in peace." There was a silkiness to the words that suggested no firmer explanation would be given. "I've answered your question. Are you going to answer mine?"

Without looking in her direction, Alice quietly said, "My mother left me because she was crazy."

"She was, but that's no reason to do what she did. Many people are crazy and yet never abandon their children. The bond between a mother and child is supposed to be the most sacred."

Reluctantly, Alice's gaze returned to the other woman. "Why, then?"

In the strange stillness surrounding them, Magdalene's eyes were the only thing that seemed real, vivid, alive. "It's because she didn't love you enough to stay."

Alice felt her mouth tremble. "How can you say that?"

"What, the truth?" Magdalene leaned closer, her expression still gentle. "Where's the wolf?"

She didn't want to answer, but when Magdalene raised an eyebrow, her voice came out as an ashamed whisper. "I... I chased him away."

"No, he left. He found you to be too much trouble." Then Magdalene reached out and caught Alice's chin, fingers soft as they stroked her chilled skin. "Remember, I study people for a living, absorbing their actions to uncover the truth behind all their lies and posturing. I find their hearts. I see what they try to hide."

Alice didn't trust herself to speak, not when tears threatened to spill down her cheeks even as her jaw remained caught in the other woman's grip. But she didn't pull away, either, and her gaze now met those inscrutable eyes in full, asking the question that refused to come to her tongue.

Magdalene saw it, and answered. "People look at you and like you, Alice, but that's all. They leave because all of them realize you're not worth fighting for."

Alice broke, face crumpling into tears and body sinking like a puppet cut of its strings. Cries wrenched from her throat, echoing raggedly through the trees.

Then Magdalene's arms folded around her, still painfully familiar, and that velvet voice whispered in her ear, "All of them except me."

Alice gave her something that was half-hiccup, half-growl, and tried to shove her away. Magdalene held on. "Have I ever abandoned you?"

"No." Her lungs hurt with each word. "You just fed off me."

Magdalene laughed, the quiet, reluctant one that was the closest she ever came to revealing a vulnerable point of her being. The sound of it made Alice fall still and unresisting even when Magdalene wiped the wet tracks from her cheeks. "I did. I couldn't help it. You were always so pure. So sweet. And I always took it for granted that I could turn to you when I felt too miserable with myself."