We make it in without incident, unless you count the rat's hissing at my feet and scrambling around us. I hate those things, the smell of rotten filth sticking to their fur and the sharp teeth a thing of nightmares.

Heather doesn't have any issue and kicks the things aside as if it were any other day in the life of a mother Werewolf.

I follow my nose, the scent of wildflowers teasing my senses and causing me to have to backtrack multiple times, wasting what precious time we have.

This place stinks of stale rot, blood, and darkness, making it hard to lock onto any scent.

At last my nose zeroes in. I race through the dank and dark cramped branches of this dungeon. It's almost too dark for me to make out, and I wonder how the humans survive with their sanity intact down here without light of day.

We didn't. The voice is a morose whisper in my head.

My wolf whines an agreement.

My steps pause, the cold stone walls closing in on me, my breaths come quicker and harsher.

My knees crumble, and ghostly screams reverberate down the echoes of my mind. Harsh laughter and the echoes of silver-coated whips snap through the air. My body flinches in remembrance of pain.

A whiff of wildflowers that doesn't belong in the nightmare of my waking dream finally brings me back.

It's another minute I don't have to get myself back together in a semblance of sanity.

I rise on shaking knees, sweat stinging the still-healing wounds littering my body like the rats infesting this infernal dungeon.

"Heather!" I call out softly in a quivering whisper, trying to shake the memories back to the cobwebs of my brain where they belong.

“Roland?” The cracking voice barely above a sigh makes my heart ache.

My legs gain a burst of energy and I move quicker than I have in days.

“Ma?” I ask, skidding to a stop in front of a cell where the scent of wildflowers somehow still makes its way past the filthy odor of this place.

A choked sob emerges. The cell is a tiny, windowless thing with four rock walls and bars of iron concreted into the floor and ceiling.

The tanginess of silver within mixes with the copper scent of blood and the wildflower, pine, ink, and book scents of my Ma and brothers.

The silver makes my limbs tremble, but… being this close to my pack… it sends a surge of joy through my veins, making me feel stronger than I have been in weeks.

I peek through the iron bars, seeing the faint outline of two forms chained to the walls and one laying on what counts as a... bed, I suppose. It's more a low table with rags over it.

“Barry?” I ask, the form still except for the scarcely detectable rise and fall of his chest.

“They whipped him for refusing Commander Vex.” Ma’s voice breaks, the harsh timber making me think they’ve been neglected far longer than I hoped.

“Is he…?”

A barely visible nod, a mere movement of her shadow, even to my wolven vision. The shackles on her wrist jangle with the movement. “They let me dress it. He has to make it.”

Another sob emerges, and it tears at me. I should've been here sooner. I should've chased after them immediately after escaping. The consequences could've been stuffed down the gullet of a dragon.

I pull the lock picks out, easing them in the lock. The pins give with screeches of metal on metal.

“I’ll have you out in a jiffy, Ma." I try to keep my voice light past the knot in my throat.

“Roland, you must leave me and Jed. Get your brother out of here.” The command hits me in the chest with the force of a sledgehammer.

“No,” I whisper, putting more force behind the pins, wiggling the edges in their metal base.

“You must.” Her voice is stronger now, even as the rasp of strained vocal chords gives it a harsh edge.

I wiggle the picks again with more force than is strictly necessary, the creaking pins giving slowly.

One pin down. Then the next and the next.

But the last get's wedged, the metal not oiled as it should be. One final push, but my shaking fingers cause me to lose hold of the tensioner.

I drop my head on the cold steel bars, taking a deep breath as I begin again.

“Brute force works, but how about just opening the door?” Heather asks, swinging the door on its squealing hinges as she jangles the keys in front of my face.

I grimace at her grin, her silver eyes shining in the torchlight.

Her grin abruptly drops when she sees my family.

“Great Father,” she whispers, stricken.

I drop to my knees beside the low cot my brother rests on.

I’m thankful I can’t see the extent of his injuries. The semi-sweet scent of an encroaching infection already blisters the wounds, making fear clench my heart as if a hand had come in and squeezed the organ.

Spots of itchiness erupt on my hands and neck. The fleas make me growl, remembrances of losing most of my fur to the little menaces running through my mind at an inopportune time. It made for some chilly cells in winter without fur.

Cells of rot and darkness that smelled a lot like this. Waste, silver, and the overall pervasiveness of darkness. Don’t think darkness has a scent? You’re wrong. It smells like death.

My brother lies on his stomach, the whip marks along his back a darker tint than his unmarked skin. His face is elbowed on his arms, his face turned toward me. He whimpers in his sleep. This close, I can see the furrow of his brow even in the near-absolute darkness.

“Barry,” I whisper, the word catching in my throat.

I force myself to shake off the stupor, needing to move.

“Can you get them down?” I ask Heather, looking over to where she’s picking at the bars of silver holding my mother and brother.

Heather hesitates. The scent of bitter-sweet compassion and the herbal scent of sorrow wafts off her. “These aren’t like the door. They are made with Mage's Darkness. The key needed for these is not physical. We need a keyword.”

I growl, the sound reverberating up the passageway and making Heather wince.

“Is there nothing we can do?” I hiss, the darkness in my voice matching the darkness of the cell.

Heather recoils, and I immediately feel bad at taking the anger out on the only one brave—or foolhardy—enough to follow me here.

“Sorry,” I whisper.

Rising and moving in front of Jed and Ma, I try the locks myself, burning my hands on the pure silver. I growl, long and deep, sinking to knees.

“Ma…” I whisper, leaning my forehead against the wall. To be so close and yet so very far...

“Don’t, Roland. We both know what must happen. Get him out of here before you’re discovered.” Ma says, her voice brooking no argument.

Something breaks in my chest. “I’ll be back for you.”

“Don’t make promises you can’t keep. Just keep my boy alive.”

I nod, then rise on shaky legs to go for Barry.

I ease my brother over to his back, then pick him up in my arms, trying to keep my arms away from the whip marks. His eyes barely flicker, but he flinches and moans.

“Hold on, little kinko. Please.”

I cross the width of the cell with two steps, bending down to kiss her cheek. “Ma… I will be back. They will only keep you and Jed over my dead body.”

Tears glitter in the near blackness, somehow looking like stars in an otherwise lifeless abyss.

“Take care of yourself. Take care of my boy.” I nod, turning to leave. “Roland?” I turn back. “You are my boy, too. Keep yourself alive.”

That is the closest she’s ever come to saying she cares, and it makes my heart swell.

I nod, crossing over to Jed. Tears glitter on his cheeks, too, but he holds himself erect and proud. The soft bookworm… he’s a man now. These weeks have aged him much quicker and sooner than I wished. If I could give my life to give him back the innocence of his childhood, I would trade in a heartbeat.

Tears tingle at the back of my eyes. I have never been more proud of him than in that moment, despite how this instance has come about.

“Stay strong, little kinko.” My voice is as strangled as my heart.

He nods, his voice once again caught in his chest. My shyest brother, the one who prefers books to people but loves the sword and the art of war as much as I.

I put my forehead to his, bathing in his scent of sweet ink and sweat.

I turn to leave, but a strangled sound comes from him. "I…" he begins. I freeze, staying stock still until he can speak again. “Love… y-you,” he stutters out.

My heart shatters.

The tingling becomes tears, making their way down my cheeks. "I love you, too. Keep going. Stay brave. I will be back. I promise with the Allfather as my witness." My voice is gruffer than I’d like, holding back the emotions I can't let free.

He nods, and I race for the door even as boots crunch and pound down the dank dungeon. I race back the way we came, Heather at my side and Barry in my arms.

You left your soul back there, my subconscious whispers.

No, I respond. I left everything back there.