Chapter 252 - Not This Time

~ ZEV ~

The first thing Zev thought when he gained consciousness, even before he opened his eyes, was that Sasha had to be alive, because if she wasn't, Zev wouldn't have woken.

He sighed with relief. But it didn't last long.

Because as his body and mind sought her, naturally, thoughtlessly, like she was breath, reaching out and searching for her presence, her warmth, the echo of her heart, there was… nothing. Nothing but a gaping hole in his chest where awareness of her should have been. An aching, burning wound where he should have felt full and warm.

Zev sucked in a painful breath.

When he opened his eyes it was to find his brother sitting in a chair next to his bed, head in his hands, fingers splayed through his black hair so it fell in chunks, like fat spiders over the backs of his hands.

Rage. Red, hot rage.

"You motherfucking judas," Zev growled. He tried to sit up, to reach for Lhars—to take his throat!—but he was jerked back, painfully, by bonds on his wrists and ankles.

Zev's eyes widened and he scanned down his own body, jerking at the leather straps. "Are you fucking kidding me?"

Lhars' head snapped up, his eyes bloodshot and weary, relief crossing his features first, then his face went hard when he saw Zev's bared teeth.

"You opened your wound again, fighting against us. You idiot."

"Don't even talk to me, you fucking betrayer!"

"Shut. Your mouth," Lhars snarled, pushing to his feet and taking the step to stand at Zev's side. "I'm going to talk and you're going to listen, because you need to see the things I know, and I can't… you have to… just do it."

"I don't need anything from you," Zev spat. "I know what you're doing—working all of this for yourself. Sending my mate—she's mind, Lhars, no matter how much you want her—sending her into the jaws of the fucking lion because it suited you."

"Suited me? SUITED ME?! You think anything that's happened in the past three years has suited me, Zev?" Lhars shook his head. "You and your fucking arrogance!"

But Zev wasn't listening. "You want her out because you know if she goes, I go too. But it's not happening, Lhars. I'm not going to let it happen. I'm not going to let you use this to serve your own status and power!"

"Oh for—get your head out of your fucking ass, Zev," Lhars growled. "She drove this all herself—if you don't believe me, let me show you." He stared at Zev, a challenge in his gaze. And Zev hesitated. Then he blinked.

His brother was offering to open his mind?

A tiny coil of satisfaction started in his chest. He could use this. Get Lhars to show him whatever he'd intended to use to manipulate, but then he'd take more.

"If you want me to believe anything, you let me choose. Show me your truth and let me bet the measure of it."

Lhars' eyes went wide and he rocked back on his heels. It was an invasion that Zev was proposing. A way for wolves to measure each other—for more than one set of eyes to evaluate a memory. But it required intense vulnerability. The wolf opening themselves was baring their throat. A skilled wolf allowed to rifle around in another wolf's mind could take far more than they were offered.

Lhars didn't respond immediately, and Zev gritted his teeth. If Lhars wouldn't let him into his mind, it was just proof—

"Fine," Lhars hissed. "But you take memories from today, or you ask first. You don't just… steal from me."

Zev blinked, surprised. But he agreed. Then his brother took a deep breath and closed his eyes, opening himself.

In a reversal of the usual link, instead of inserting thoughts or images into his brother's head, Lhars' mind was opened to him, like a cupboard. Zev could select what he saw. And at first, he did as he was bid, choosing to see what Lhars had seen at the intersection of trails—including Sasha taking control, ordering the hierarchy with all the certainty and conviction he would have done it.

He swelled with pride for her, his chest aching in the spot that should have been full of her.

Zev watched everything, right through to the conversation she had with Lhars—where he realized that they had the mind-link, and she was able to keep him quiet. Zev was grateful—and a little humbled.

His brother had respected his mate. But that didn't mean he wanted good things for her, Zev reminded himself. Lhars was a strategist. He'd worked with Xar for three years. Nothing he said or did could be taken at face value.

As he considered how to attack, what to strike for to find the truth of his brother's motives, he allowed Lhars' memories to continue to play as if he were watching them.

And as he considered, in his mind, Lhars—as a wolf—sprinted through the forest, desperate to get back to Zev, to stop him from revealing too much.

Zev swallowed and his stomach went heavy as he watched his brother, pleading with the Creator to get him there fast enough—and saw his own pain and desperation, and the way he'd dragged the entire wolf pack into his fear without realizing.

Then, the moment when Sasha disappeared from his conscious, and Zev hit true panic.

He was going to shut down the link, retreat from his brother's head—he couldn't relive that—but as he sang for his mate, panicked at losing her, he saw the thoughts that flashed instinctively through his brother's head.

Mate.

Kyelle.

Mate.

Kyelle.

Zev's mouth dropped open.

This was what Sasha had been talking about? This was why Lhars hated him?

Zev yanked himself out of Lhars' head like he was drowning, gaping at his brother for a long moment, while Lhars clawed his hands through this hair, then meet his eyes, Lhars darker eyes sparking.

"You don't say a fucking word to her—" he growled. "Not a fucking word."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"—I'm not bringing this into everything else. It's not the time."

Zev shook his head. "I'd never…" he swallowed hard. "That's not my story to tell. But… why didn't you tell me? You have to know I don't—didn't—return her feelings?"

"It doesn't matter what you return, it matters the hearts you hold—no matter what you do, no matter how far you go, everyone forgives. Everyone seeks you. Everyone needs you—and they'll dismiss those of us standing in your stead when you would throw everything else away on one of your… noble missions."

"Lhars—"

"Don't talk to me about loyalty and trust—don't talk to me about betrayal. You left, Zev! You left and left us to pick up the pieces. And I did. I fucking did it. And then I handed it back to you when you decided to show up again, and they all ran like puppies in your shadow and nobody gave a thought to me and Dunken, who held this place together while you were gone!"

Zev stared at him, his jaw slack, as his brother's words slapped him full in the face, and he realized just how wrong he'd been.