The True One

Chapter 35

Verity

I half expected us to have to swim out to a ship where we would encounter Flora's mom tied to a mast, while a crew of Aurum Venari pirates drew swords on us as we attempted to board the vessel.

"Really selling the treasure hunt them, aren't they?" I'd say to Alek, who'd toss off his jacket to reveal a peasant shirt underneath a tight leather vest, a sword appearing in his hand out of nowhere. I'd admire his form as he leapt onto the deck, striking down our enemies, swashbuckling his way to a final showdown with Norvin himself.

There was no boat, however. No eyepatches or scurvy-ridden crew with homemade tattoos and missing teeth. We drove down a road hugging the coast and then turned onto another, cutting inland a bit. A few minutes later, Alek slammed on the breaks. I jostled forward and then back again, hitting my head against the headrest. Flora swore from the back seat.

Our headlights shown onto a concrete road barrier. On it, an off-center sign read "DO NOT ENTER."

Alek put his car in park and cut the engine, then studied his phone. "I guess we're supposed to go the rest of the way on foot."

"That sign doesn't look like we're supposed to go in that direction, on foot or any other way," Flora said.

"We have to go where our coordinates lead us." I opened my car door and climbed out. "Just pretend you're Geocaching, Flora."

"This isn't for fun, though," she said as she joined me to stare at the barrier and the narrow road behind it. Without the headlights to illuminate our path, the road disappeared into a void. "It feels... ominous."

"It is ominous. That's the point." Alek walked towards us with a flashlight in one hand, his phone in the other. "Remember." He shone a beam of light at my feet. "You wanted to get here and get this over, right?"

"I'm not the one putting up a fight, but..." I peered into the darkness, imagining an ambush waiting for us as soon as we proceeded, then recalled the words written on the backside of the message we'd found back at the state park: the moon doesn't care if a dog barks at it.

Reading that expression had pulled a memory up from the dim recesses of my mind. My mom at the kitchen table, weeks, maybe even merely days before she'd died. Me, crying to her because the neighbor boy kept saying mean things to me. She'd told me about the moon's indifference to a yapping dog. Seeing my confused face, she'd elaborated.

"You're the moon, Verity. You're so far above him, you can't even hear what he's saying. He just likes the sound of his own voice."

I swallowed that memory, and pushed back the confusion—why that proverb? Did it relate to my mother? If so, how? Those questions would have to wait for another time, however, like maybe when we weren't facing our impending doom.

"Let me call out my wolf before we go any further," I said.

"Are you sure that's a good idea?" he asked me.

"Why wouldn't it be?"

Pursing his lips, he stared at me silently before shaking his head. "It's your body. Or...bodies, I guess. You know best."

Damn right I do, I called to him in my mind, but if he heard me, he made no response.

A minute later, three humans and a wolf walked beyond the barrier, down a gloomy and uncertain path.

I used all my heightened senses, hoping they would give us enough of an edge to avoid calamity. My wolf ears listened for signs of life around us. We passed into an area where coastal live oak trees lined the path, large enough to imagine someone hiding amongst their branching trunks. The air stank with the musty aroma of my anxious human companions.