Jaylin could smell so many things at once, it felt like he'd been knifed in the sinuses. Antiseptics, blood, metal, sweat—and the faintest waft of grilled meat somewhere in the building. The towel he'd been given was already caked in his blood, but he refused the shower they'd offered him. Not until he knew.

He'd sat in a silent hallway for nearly an hour, curling his toes against the linoleum. Occasionally, someone in a white suit would rush past with boxes of belongings in their arms, eager to finally leave this place and never come back. Sometimes they would stop to ask him if he needed anything. But mostly, Jaylin sat in the silence, listening to the soft whirring and muffled ticking of medical equipment in the room just to his right.

Mostly because the conversation in the room to the left was too much to register.

"I didn't mean to kill Qamar!" Sadie's voice had grown louder in the coming moments. Within that room was Devi, Acadia, Leo and someone Gunner referred to as Councilman Percy. Imani and Nicon and all of the other injured were brought to the same floor. Sometimes, when Jaylin focused, he could find Imani's heartbeat. It was one of the strongest. One of the easiest to find his ears. It was the hard click of a grandfather clock. The sleeping breath of a lion. He listened to it for his own sanity, until Sadie's muffled voice grew again.

"Explain then!" she was shouting. "I didn't touch Qamar. I swear, I didn't. You were all there; you all saw!"

"Alright, calm down." For the first time, Jaylin allowed himself to focus in on the conversation. Leo's voice was gruff, like he'd been holding a keg of air in his lungs. "Someone explain, she's givin' me a damn headache."

"As I told you, Qamar was to die when Ziya died," said Devi's distinct voice. "It's been written in the their history since the day they were born, child."

"Right, whatever," Sadie snapped. "Ziya gave Qamar her heart—I get it. But that didn't actually happen. That was just a story."

"The heart is a metaphor." This voice was old, the kind of old that shivered when breath ran thin. Councilman Percy let out a sigh through his nose—one so loud, Jaylin could hear it clear as day through the walls. "Ziya was on her death bed the day the twins were born," Percy said. "Complications during birth. Their mother called upon an elder witch and Ziya's life was threaded to Qamar by a single spell. But nothing—not even magic—comes for free. Qamar knew that killing her sister meant dying herself."

"How long have you known this?" Sadie asked.

"I was there," the old man said. "I was a councilman to Aisha long before her daughter. But this was critical information. Ziya kept matters like these top secret."

There was a clatter—the backrest of a chair, knocking against the wall.

"I don't understand," Sadie said, her voice more muffled now, like she was cradling her face in her hands. "Why does this make me Queen?"

"For centuries, Queen has been a title passed down by blood. Each time a queen has died, she's had an heir to take the throne from beneath her. Qamar and Ziya were too young for children. Werewolf law dictates that she—strictly she—who kills the queen earns her throne. Might just be my own humble opinion," Percy said, "but I've got the feeling whoever created that law never actually expected this would happen."

"But I'm not a wolf," Sadie challenged.

"It was never specified that you must be. She was all the law stated. She who kills the queen."

A deep laugh came from Devi. It'd been some time since Jaylin heard so much as a chuckle, and it sounded all wrong after such a long drought. "I suppose there are loopholes to everything. Even in this world."

Then the door to the medical lab opened and Jaylin shot to his feet, towel wrapped around him like a blanket. Gunner—with deep, tired lines beneath his eyes—gestured Jaylin into the room, and he followed barefoot along the cold tiles.

The lights in the room burned at his corneas, and the whirring turned to white noise in his ears. He had expected a wolf atop the metal examination table, but instead Quentin laid there. Quentin, with his dark hair and his tan flesh, and the bone-deep wounds in his chest. The sight of it all pressed the air from Jaylin.

He must've been given a dose of mistletoe—turned human to better examine the wounds. He'd been cleaned with a rag or a sponge, scrubbed at just enough to properly examine his face and his chest. Blood still patched on his arms and crusted his hair. Gunner brought the sheet down to his waist to show Jaylin the severity of the wounds. That black spoiled his chest all the way down to his hips, rotting him in dark, decaying patches.

"Looks worse than it is," said Gunner. "We're going to move him to a medick in town. He'll be on fluids and monitored for the next three days."

Jaylin moved around the table, watching the holes in him from every angle. Maybe they were smaller, but to his own eyes, they looked the same. He stopped where Quentin's hand rested by his side, and Jaylin brushed against his fingers, watching the way they reacted to his touch. A twitch. Stillness. Another twitch.

"After that?" Jaylin asked.

"After that, he goes home."

He looked up to Gunner, swallowing down the sick that sat in his throat. "So he'll—You're saying he'll be okay?"

Gunner dropped down into a swivel chair and peering into the lens of a microscope. "His white cells are destroying the infection. The wounds have shrunken two millimeters in diameter. If we're talking hyper werewolf speed, I'd say a week at most."

"A week—" Jaylin stuttered. "A week?"

"He'll be good as new in a week. Two, tops."

Jaylin reached for his face, the skin warm and smooth beneath his fingers. Not cold, not feverish. The heat Quentin always gave. The kind he loved. The kind that he wanted to wrap himself in for the rest of his life.

"Would you like to see her now?" Gunner asked.

Jaylin wet his lips, the taste of blood blooming that rotten feeling in his stomach. "Is she ready?"

"She's ready," said Gunner.

Reluctant as he was to leave Quentin, Jaylin followed him through the door to a second medical room. Felix was the first sight he saw, hunched forward on a plastic chair. He'd been inspecting the gruesome scabs on his wrists, a lock of his red hair fallen over his brow. He looked up to Jaylin and raked it back over his skull. "Couldn't save it."

Quiet as his voice was, it clawed through Jaylin. He felt his stomach drop—the last single plunge toward the real threat of vomit. He ignored the taste of it rising in his throat and lifted his head to the medical bed where she laid, bandages wrapping the right side of her face—all but her rosy cheeks and chapped lips.

Jaylin muttered numbly, "Couldn't save..."

"They tried, lad." Felix raked back his hair a second time, and sat there, hand at the crown of his head. "I watched them try."

Jaylin wasn't even sure he was still capable of crying, but his eyes burned with phantom tears and he scanned the room for the nearest trash can, might that sick feeling in him swell.

Then Felix uttered a soft, "Heard about your friend."

The mention of Matthew was all it took. Jaylin dropped to his knees and reached out for the trash can. Gunner was there before he knew it, holding the plastic bucket beneath him while he vomited until there was only pain, pulling at the walls of his stomach.

Felix didn't flinch. He just turned his eyes to the wounds on his wrist. "I'm sorry," he said. "Should've been there."

Jaylin spat the taste from his mouth and heaved in a breath. "There was nothing you could've done." He wiped his mouth and sat back on his haunches. "There was nothing anyone could've done."

At least that was what he'd been telling himself.

"Maybe not." Felix leaned forward, elbows on his knees, and glanced to the medical bed where Tisper slept. Morning was just beginning to creep through the curtains on the window. A single stripe of it glowed against the bandages. "Just couldn't leave her, lad."

It was silent for a beat, then Gunner set the trash can aside and fetched a pump of sanitizer from the dispenser on the wall. "Not a bad day and age to lose an eye," he said. "Advanced prosthetics are on the market. Eye transplants are breaking ground—"

"She shoots with the right," muttered Felix. There was something in the way he said it that washed the room in silence until only the clicking of medical equipment went on. Felix ran his hands up his face and into his hair and after a long draw of breath, he said, "Wouldn't happen to have any marijuana in those cabinets, aye Doc? Medical use or what have you."

Gunner shook his head.

The wolf shoved himself up to his feet, hands clapping against his thighs. "Excuse me then, gents. Think I might go kill something."

Felix stepped around him and Jaylin watched him leave until the door was shut silently behind him. Then he pushed himself up on his weak legs, addressing the concerned look on Gunner's face. "I'm sure he means a bird."

"Ah," Gunner said, his posture relaxing. "Gotta admit it. I'm counting down the moments until I never have to acknowledge the existence of your kind again."

Jaylin tightened the towel around him and took one, aching gaze at the peaceful look on Tisper's sleeping face. "I don't blame you." He'd been wondering a lot lately what his life would've been like, had he not contracted the lichund curse. Had he not discovered this world and the people in it. Maybe things would've been better for everyone.

Except for the fact that Tyler would have killed him in that cemetery. And Ziya would still be alive.

Gunner clapped a hand on his back and the sudden sting made him jump. "Come on, kid. Let's get you into the showers."

It took an hour to wash the rust from his body. Then Jaylin was given fresh scrubs, and the belongings he'd come with, neatly folded and tucked in a large freezer bag. By the time he'd found the cafeteria, Gunner already had a cup of coffee set across the table for him. He slid into the bench and let the warmth burn into his fingers.

"Here they are," Gunner said, pushing forward a stack of papers. "Twelve of them. Orphans now, thanks to Ziya."

Jaylin turned through the pages, each face in the photos looking more frightened than the last. Not a single one had a name. Numbers—that was all they'd given them. Numbers ranging from Seven to nineteen. A file didn't exist for Nadaline.

"What happened to all of the ones before this?" Jaylin asked.

Gunner shrugged dumping a packet of sugar into his coffee. "Several different things. Sometimes infection. Sometimes experiments just... didn't go as planned."

Jaylin had been staring down into the face of an eight-year-old boy when Gunner said it. They died, that was what he meant. Ziya had killed children.

Jaylin flipped to the next page in the stack. "Where are they?"

"We've put them back in their cells for now."

"What?" Jaylin asked. "Why? Those cells are—it's so fucked up to keep them there—"

"I know." Gunner spoke slowly, as if one wrong step would bring forth the lich. "You're free to release them, but not a damn person here knows how to handle those kids."

"What'll happen to them?" Jaylin asked.

"Naturally, they'll be transported to Washington."

"By who?"

"From here out, everything will be handed off to the Eastern wolves. Our contracts with Ziya are officially terminated. Half of us have already taken our shit and left."

"And you?"

Gunner lifted a suitcase from the floor and dropped it down on the table. The sheer weight made Jaylin's coffee splatter from its cup. "I'm buying a plane ticket. Eight AM flight."

Something almost like jealously spoiled in Jaylin. Gunner got to leave this nightmare behind him. Jaylin would never be able to forget what happened tonight. Every time he crossed paths with a jeep, every time he heard a Southern accent or passed by Matt's place, he'd be reminded.

"Take your little pack, Maxwell," Gunner said. "Go back to Washington. Let this place go up in flames and never look back."

It's not that easy. It's never going to be that easy. Jaylin stared down into his mug, watching the bubbles pop along the edges. He'd never be able to look back from this. But nonetheless, he whispered, "Okay."

"Take care of them," Gunner said. "They're good kids."

He'd started to rise from his seat after that, suitcase tucked under his arm. But before Gunner even rounded the table, the cafeteria doors blew open. Bailey stormed inside, shaking off the woman who puttered desperately after him.

"Sir, you could have a concussion. Please, come back—"

"Where is he?" Bailey clipped, but as demanding as he sounded, Jaylin couldn't take him so seriously with all the bruises and band-aids cluttering his face.

He took the children's files and tucked them into the bag with his belongings. "Who?"

"Your friend," said Bailey. "The dead one."

Jaylin looked to Gunner, who took in a deep, bothered breath and let it out in a hunch. Jaylin knew how badly he wanted to leave, but he too had been wondering about Matt.

"I want to see him too," he told Gunner. "Please."

Gunner ran his hand through his balding hair and let out a second long, suffering breath. "Alright. I'll show you where the morgue is, but I'm gone after that."

Jaylin could only nod. Even he would spend another night in the forest if it meant escaping this place.

Gunner led them both through the cafeteria doors, and upstairs toward the throne room. Bailey had brought his shirt up over his nose, and Jaylin didn't know why until the doors to the upstairs balcony pressed open and the stench of bleach poured out. Several wolves had taken mops to the bloody floor below. The corpses of the queens had been removed, but the stink of their blood still plagued the air. It was a harsh stench. Harsher than the fumes of bleach, sharper than the blood of his best friend.

They followed Gunner around the balcony and for the first time, Jaylin realized how close he'd been walking to Bailey. Close enough to brush elbows or bump into one another. Close enough that Jaylin could analyze the scent of him. He smelled of dirt and sweat and blood, like everyone else in this place. But there was something about the blood.

Jaylin peered up at him, the gouges on his face—one holding the skin together with a butterfly bandage.

"You're not a wolf, are you?"

Bailey glanced to him from the corner of his eye, but quickly turned his gaze back toward the darkness.

They were led through another door at the end of the balcony and down a dark set of stairs. The place may as well have been lit by candles and guarded by men in metal armor suits. The walls were stuck together by bare bricks and mortar, and caged lightbulbs swayed from the ceiling, collecting a pair of moths that couldn't seem to escape their allure. The further they descended, the harder Jaylin felt the cold on his skin. The stairs led to a series of empty hallways and a single white door with the words MORGUE in black letters above.

Gunner drew the door open and the moment Jaylin stepped inside, he was hit with a fresh fetor of hot blood. He had to blink away the overhead light several times before he could make sense of the stench. His eyes finally settled and he felt the vomit rise a second time.

The entire room had been paved in blood. It stuck to the light on the ceiling, dripped like rain from the bricks above. Blood stained the cupboards, the equipment, the empty silver tables in the center of the room. Some of it ran down into the drain on the floor, but most of it just glared in the pale examination lights.

Gunner reached out to touch a tacky splatter of blood on the wall. He wrinkled his nose and inspected the stain on his fingers. "What the hell happened here?"

Eerily, Jaylin turned his eyes to the cold lockers. Only a single door sat open, the metal bent—punched and crimped outward, like it'd been beaten out with steel-toed boots. "Guys..." Jaylin eluded the puddles of blood, crossing the room on his toes. The metal bed within the open locker was empty, but just as bespattered with blood as the rest of the room. And dangling from a piece of metal was a thread of yarn, a little paper tag at the end. Jaylin could hardly read through the russet blood, but on it was the name he'd given the medicks. Matthews.

He turned to the others, suppressing the chill that burrowed up his spine. Gunner was taking a gander at the blood puddles on the empty counters and Bailey was crouched, inspecting a knife that'd fallen to the floor. Jaylin recognized the hilt. Suddenly, he was back in the throne room, watching it plunge into Matt a second time. 

Just then, a squeal came from the door. A woman in a white coat slapped a hand over her mouth, woozily gripping the door frame. "I was just in here, I—It wasn't like this. Rowley, I'm telling you. It wasn't like this."

A drop of blood fell from the ceiling and onto the lens of Gunner's glasses. He pulled them from his face and wiped the blood away on the back of his tie. "How long ago?"

"Ten minutes," she said. "I couldn't have been gone more than ten minutes."

"When did you take this out?" Bailey rose tall, that menacing knife in his grip.

Sidetracked by the sheer amount of blood, the woman muttered, "W-what?"

"The knife, lady," Bailey said, chucking the blade to the ground at her feet. "That knife. When did you take it out of him?"

"I don't know," she muttered. "Half an hour ago?"

"Jesus," Bailey groaned. He muttered something unintelligible, but Jaylin caught the definitive word morons somewhere in the slew.

Then he was moving swiftly through the white door, and Jaylin followed after him, blood splashing beneath his feet.

"What are you talking about? What's going on?"

"The goddamn thing's made of silver," said Bailey, lunging up the steps, two at a time.

"What?  Wait, hold on—" Jaylin caught a hold of the back of Bailey's jacket and the hound whirled around to look him in the eye.

"First of all, don't touch me," Bailey said. Then he lowered his head, that sharp, dark gaze cutting in. "Secondly, your friend isn't dead."

"Yes he is," said Jaylin. "I saw him die, I—"

Bailey turned and started back up the steps, but his gait was too quick for Jaylin to keep up with. He caught Bailey by the sleeve and he wrenched his arm away. "I told you not to touch me."

"Fine, sorry," Jaylin spat. "Now tell me what the hell's going on."

"You're new to this," said Bailey. "So I'll give you this one. But after that, you can shove it with the Q and A."

"Just tell me."

"Silver's an inhibitor. It keeps us from turning."

"What does that have to do with Matt?"

Bailey didn't answer. He turned his head to the door they'd entered the balcony through, like he'd heard a sound from the other side—and just a moment later, it flung open. Alex stood there, still back and blue and twice as swollen in the face. "There you are," he said. "Come on. Hurry."

They followed him through the halls and down a set of exit steps. The morning sun was just beginning to creep up over the edge of the earth, spills of purple cast over a dawning sky. Alex hurried into the trees and Jaylin followed just behind Bailey. Every twig and stone stabbing at the achy pads of his feet. A whistle came from somewhere just beyond a small thicket of trees, and Felix was the first thing Jaylin saw, waving them over to the flat ground he stood on. The sun was still minutes from rising, but the light was enough to glitter from the wet red that caught Jaylin's eye.

Blood. The stink of it, the gleam of it. It covered his body from head to toe, until there was no flesh to be seen beneath the blood. Only blood. Blood in the shape of a boy, hugging his legs in the fetal position. Jaylin rounded the shape slowly. The ridged bones of his spine dripping, the wet curls of his hair sticking to his cheeks and his forehead and the nape of his neck. Jaylin didn't want to breathe until he was sure. Until he saw his face, heard his heartbeat. He sat there in his tight, frightened ball, trembling in such a way that Jaylin could hear the clatter of his teeth like the tick of rosary beads.

"Matt," Jaylin whispered. He dropped to the leaves in front of him and touched the cold blood on his shoulder. When Matt didn't respond, Jaylin reached for his face, wiped the blood away with his palms so he could be sure. So he knew for sure. His freckles and long lashes shown beneath. The tears hit Jaylin fast and he wiped them onto his clean shoulder, hands still cupping Matt's face. "Matt," he said again, "it's me."

Still he didn't look to Jaylin. He was gazing at the long, wicked claws that had grown from the tips of his fingers. His hands shook and the claws clattered.

"Matt," Jaylin said. This time, he jumped to the sound, clutching his fists against himself. Away from Jaylin—like he didn't recognize him at all. Like he was frightened by the sight of him. His eyes blinked wide with fear, and then they registered slowly and a sound came from him—a cry and a gasp as he tossed his arms around Jaylin. The cold of his blood seeped into Jaylin's clothes, but he didn't care. He dug a hand into the matted hair on his head and crushed Matt in his arms. "I thought you were dead. Matt, I thought I wasn't going to see you again. God, Sadie—we have to go tell Sadie."

"I wanna go home." Matt's voice shook, words stuffed into Jaylin's shoulder. "I wanna go home, Jay. Can we go?"

Jaylin clutched him tighter, took in his scent and the steady rhythm of his heartbeat. The tears stung at the gash on his cheek. "Yeah. We can go home."

"I hate this fuckin' place."

"Me too."

Jaylin had to hold him by the shoulders to draw Matt away. He'd never seen Matt cry, but tears streaked his face and his lips trembled. "Jay," he chattered, a tear falling subtly from his lash. "I did die, didn't I? I know I did. I saw..." But then he stopped.

"What did you see?" Jaylin urged him.

Matt didn't answer right away. His eyes set still, like he was recalling something. But after a moment, he shook his head, wiping blood and tears from his face. "I don't know. I don't know—I just wanna leave."

Something white fell over Matt's shoulders—the name tag gleaming Dr. Gunner Rowley. Jaylin glanced up to the man himself, sunlight glinting from his round, blood-tinted glasses. "There's still a nurse or two inside, caring for your friends. I'll take him in to get checked out."

Felix moved forward, reaching beneath Matt's arm to help bring him to his feet.

"No. No!" He thrashed away, grabbing at Jaylin's arm with his sharp claws. "I wanna stay with you. Jay—"

"It's okay." Jaylin met his eyes, loosening his grip, finger by finger. Claw by claw. "It's okay Matt. I'll come in with you, but you need to get cleaned up first. Okay?"

Matt's breath moved through him like a wind. One too frightened to sit in his lungs for more than a moment.

"It's okay," Jaylin told him again. Finally, Matt let Felix and Gunner lift him to his feet. They held him by each arm and led him back toward the building, but every few feet, Matt would glance back over his shoulder with that debilitating fear in his eyes. The feel of his blood stung at Jaylin's palms.

"Alex," Jaylin said. Alex didn't answer, but Jaylin caught the soft snap of a twig as he stepped closer. "What was it he saw?"

"That's the thing," Alex whispered. "I can't hear his thoughts. Not a single one."

Jaylin turned to him, the sunlight casting down on all of the ugly lesions and bruises on his face. "You can't hear anything?"

"No," Alex said. "I can hear you. I could hear Gunner, I could hear—I could hear everything, but I can't hear Matt. Do you think what he said is true? Do you think he really died?"

"I don't know," Jaylin muttered. "He didn't have a pulse."

Alex wiped his hands up his face, wincing when he brushed against a bruise. "I guess we should go tell Sadie. We should let her know that everything's alright."

"It's not right," Bailey said. His eyes stuck steadfast to the billowing white lab coat on Matt's back. "He smells like death."

"Like blood?" asked Jaylin.

"Like decaying bodies?" said Alex. "He was in the morgue, so—"

"No." Bailey stuffed his hands in his pockets and turned away toward a gap in the trees. One last time Jaylin heard him say, "Like death." Then there was only the crackle of leaves and the crunch of twigs as he stalked off toward the rising sun.

In moments, Matt was gone to the building at the edge of the lake, and Bailey to the depths of the forest.

A.n.; I PROMISED A HAPPY ENDING.

.

ps. Just a reminder, here are some acceptable things to put in my inbox:

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- Hey qt here's sum nudes

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Unacceptable things to put in my inbox:

- WhY HaVen'T yOU UpdATEd

I post this shit for free and I don't plan to change that, regardless of Wattpad's new pay to read system. I will update whenever I damn well please, thanks.

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Please don't send nudes.