Chapter 73

Everly POV

Finally, everything was back in order, and I decided that I couldn’t put it off any longer. Since Valarian was with his father for a few more hours. I decided I would go out to the reserve and shift. After everything with the forsaken and the missing rogues, I had been putting it off because I promised I would take Valarian with me next time. Yet, as much as I wanted to keep that promise, it wasn’t a promise I could keep without putting him at risk. However, it had been ages since I shifted, and I was also nervous about what I knew would be an excruciating transformation.

Going through the gate, I pulled my small backpack off my shoulder before glancing around nervously. This place was too quiet today, far too quiet, and it set my sense on edge, yet I was already here, and I needed to do this as much as I was dreading it. I removed my clothes and quickly tucked them into my backpack and stuffed it inside a hollow log.

The shift took longer than usual but surprisingly; it wasn’t as painful. I flexed my claws in the moist soil and stretched out before running deeper into the forest; one thing I noticed though, my wolf form didn’t tire as fast, and after half an hour where I would usually be dead on my feet and dragging my a*s out of the forest, I was keen to keep going. I suppose I had marking Valen to thank for that.

In spite of that, my wolf was still a tiny wolf and not what you would expect from an Alpha female. After another hour, I was about to turn around when I heard the sounds of a whimper. My ears pricked and twitched on top of my head when I tried to find where the noise was coming from when I heard it again. The breeze switched, and the soft scent of blood reached my nose. My eyes scanned the trees as I followed my nose. There was a scent that I swear I had smelled before, but I couldn’t place it; I just knew it was a rogue scent. However, the next whimper I heard couldn’t be mistaken that someone was in trouble, and I picked up my pace, sniffing the ground and air while listening. Looking for any indication of where they were.

I was becoming dangerously close to the boundary line that led into forsaken territory, a place I hoped I wouldn’t have to venture out to. Yet the choking cough I heard next had me running toward the high fences, and my eyes blew wide when I saw a pair of forsaken ripping into something on the ground.

The scent of blood reached my nose stronger, and I quickly identified where I had smelled that particular scent before. Bile rose in my throat as I tried to find a way through the fence. Racing along it, trying to find a gap big enough for me to squeeze through, or I would have to climb it and risk being torn to pieces by the razor wire that ran along the top.