ELRETH

Elreth sat, tense, but holding herself in check, as her brother met her eyes with the most humility she'd seen in him in years. It immediately disarmed her.

Then, as he spoke, she began to see the way the disformed around him looked at him—like he was one of them. As if they encouraged him on. As if they knew his pain.

As if he was one of them.

Elreth swallowed a pinch of pain. She hadn't felt close enough to her brother to feel like they were in anything together since she was a teenager and he hadn't yet hit his majority.

His voice was low and quiet, but he held her gaze and didn't flinch.

"When I was about sixteen I was mad as hell," he said. She nodded. She'd asked him why many times and he'd never told her. Something had happened in the year or two before that point. But when he was fifteen was when it got bad. "I wanted to hurt dad, and I didn't want anything to do with the Anima in the Tree City. I was stupid enough to go looking for something that would piss him off, and let me show off… I heard Mom talking to someone about the traverse, about the times she'd crossed and I just… I decided that was what I was going to do. I was going to prove that I was strong, I was going to show dad that he could go fuck himself, and I was going to do something he'd done when he was a year older… I guess to prove to myself that I could.

"It took me three months to find it. I knew the rough area, but I literally had to search and sniff it out from the few clues I could get from Mom and Dad's stories about everything that happened when the War of the Wolves started. Anyway, I found it."

Their mother paled. She'd obviously known this part of the story—wasn't surprised. But it still scared her knowing her son had done this.

"Okay," Elreth said, keeping herself as detached as she could. "You got through, obviously."

His expression went dull. "Only just," he said. "It was… it was really close. So close, and so scary, I didn't think I could get back through. I spent a week over there and I partied and tried to ignore it. Then the Guardians told there was a way to get back that didn't need… that meant I didn't have to face them again. And I jumped on it. I had no idea what I was asking for. How precious it was, but… anyway…"

He dropped his head and their mother put her hand on his shoulder. Elreth hadn't seen the two of them so close, or Gar accepting any kind of affection from either of their parents for years, she suddenly realized.

Was this something they'd always had and he'd just hidden from her? Or was something changing today?

"Anyway," Gar repeated, taking a deep breath, "when I got back I was scared. Mom was scared. And… she told me to talk to Aaryn because some of the disformed wanted to go through, but they needed someone to tell them what it was like."

Elreth blinked. Aaryn? He must have already been Alpha? That would make sense. Gar was eighteen. So this was two years ago.

Gar swallowed hard. "When I realized that I could help people… help them be able to do something they wouldn't be able to do otherwise… when I realized I could do something useful for people who felt like me, like they didn't belong, I jumped at it."

Elreth opened her mouth—what did he mean, he didn't belong? He was a fucking prince!

But Gar shot her a look and she remembered that she'd promised not to interrupt him. So she just put her hands up and nodded at him to keep going.

"I found out I was good at helping people," he said reluctantly. "When I saw how the disformed worked—how they supported each other and spent their time together, and helped each other through things, not just big things, but everything. If someone was having a bad day the others would joke with them or give them a hug. If someone was struggling to learn something, the ones that were good at it would coach them, or train them. If someone got hurt, the others would help with their duties, or just be there for them… it seemed like how life should be."

That sounded exactly like life was in the rest of the Tree City, to Elreth. But she understood that the disformed didn't always experience that. But her brother? Why hadn't he?

"So I asked them if I could join them. I offered to help, to cover my space. But I asked them if they'd let me be a part of what they were, and they said yes."

"We love you, Gar!" one of the younger females piped up. A couple others shushed her, but several laughed.

Elreth smiled, but there was a pang in her stomach.

Why had he had to go to the disformed to find his place?

Gar grimaced at the interruption, but then stumbled on. "I'm not going to deny that this was partly attractive to me because it would have pissed Dad off. But it stopped being about that pretty quick. El, you have to understand, until I was sixteen, I didn't feel like I had a place here. And now… this is the only place I feel comfortable. You can't split these people up. What they do is good. It's what the whole city should feel like. And they're doing good work. I'm doing good work. I haven't partied for almost two years," he said, the gleam in his eye making sure she heard that.

Elreth's mouth almost dropped open. Had it really been that long? How had she not noticed? He still slept most of the days away when he was home. If he wasn't partying, why did he do that?

Then Gar rolled his shoulders back and she was reminded just how massive he was as he made himself straight and dwarfed their mother. "El, none of us are perfect, least of all me. But you'd be making a big mistake to break this up. Find a way to keep them together. Find a way to show them to the rest of the people. Because they're doing something right. Something some of us need. Something some of us aren't getting anywhere else."

Aaryn turned and looked at Gar over his shoulder and the two of them traded a small smile and Elreth realized the feeling twisting in her guts was jealousy.

She was jealous that they had all found something that they wanted to protect. Something they did together.

She had so many things she cared about, and so much she wanted to achieve. But it felt like everything was a fight. A battle.

How had her mate, her brother, and her mother all found the same purpose without her?

And how could she become a part of it?

Aaryn turned back then and met her gaze, measuring her, she knew. He even gave the little sign for 'you okay?' She flicked her thumb up to say yes, but it was almost a lie.

Then she took a deep breath. "Okay, then… I won't deny, I can see what you all have here is special. So the next question is, what do you want me to do?"

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