Levi’s mother sat in the sand. She looked out at the sea, her skin pale and luminescent. Her hair was a deep woodland brown, and the breeze blowing off the water made it swirl and dance behind her. The sand was soft under Levi’s feet as he approached, and the sea was a brilliant deep blue instead of its all-consuming crimson. The sky was grey and cloudy, but a pale grey, and brilliant beams of sunlight pierced the veil here and there like spears from above.

“Hello, Levi,” his mother said. A shudder ran up his spine, and he sat heavily in the sand a few paces behind her. This voice was special. Hidden deep, deep in his mind, not the twisted thing that whispered to him outside of a burning cabin, but a pure, genuine thing. A voice that loved him.

“You’ve had a rough time of things,” his mother said.

“Yes,” Levi croaked, not sure what else to say. There were so many things he wanted to say, but he couldn’t seem to free the words from his chest. They got stuck on the way up as he stared at the silhouette of his mother.

“You made it here,” she said, sounding a little happy and a little sad. “That’s good. I’m glad.”

Levi said nothing. He had made it. Arthur hadn’t. Rosa hadn’t. Derrick might go next, and he didn’t know if he could handle losing all three of them. Hell, had he made it? Hadn’t he gone feral? Hadn’t he given himself over to a monster—monsters aren’t real—to the Beast?

“You made it,” she affirmed, as if she could hear the thoughts running through his head like a pack of wolves at play. “You came back. She helped you, dragged you from that feral hell that had its claws in your skin back to the surface of the water.”

A seagull let out a squawk in the distance, a quiet sound over the waves.

“I’m sorry that I wasn’t there for you,” Levi’s mother said. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there to protect you. I’m sorry to you, and to your father. Both of you needed me there, and I left you.”

“Mom,” Levi said with dry lips, “it’s okay, I understand-”

“No, it’s not okay. My baby needed me. And I couldn’t handle it. I couldn’t handle the way you looked up at me. I thought I would do it wrong, be a bad mother.” She sounded almost amused. “I guess I was right about that part. It wasn’t rational. None of it was rational. None of it was because of anything you or your father did wrong.”

“I felt ashamed. I felt worthless. I felt like I was going to ruin you. And I was right, in the end. Because of me, your grandmother beat you, your father neglected you... I can’t believe I did that to you, to your father... but I’m here now Levi. I'm not going to leave you again. I’m going to help you through this, Levi, because you deserve help. You deserve love. Even though you make mistakes, you deserve love.”

Levi’s fists balled up in the sand in front of him, and he squeezed his eyes shut.

“It hurts,” Levi whispered. Somehow, his mother heard him over the surf and the breeze.

“I know, baby. I know it hurts.”

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Levi crawled forward in the sand, until he was kneeling by her side. “Rosa is gone. She loved me unconditionally; with everything she was... and I got her killed.”

His mother didn’t speak. She didn’t argue with him.

“And Arthur... God, I murdered him.”

“That wasn’t murder, Levi,” said his mother. “That was an accident. A cruel, cruel accident.

He heard a shift in the sand behind him and was almost surprised when Arthur sat in the sand on the opposite side of his mother. His mother reached over and ran her hand through Arthur’s hair, a gesture of intimate familiarity, like he was her son just as much as Levi.

“Arthur,” Levi said quietly.

“It’s nice here,” Arthur mused. He sounded relaxed, hands digging into the sand. The cool grains ran through his hands like water.

Levi looked up and saw the clouds beginning to part. Where Levi had expected to see the blue of sky and sunlight peek through, instead the sky was awash with the Milky Way, a blue river running across the sky from one end to the other. And, in the center, awash with brilliance, the moon stood as a sentinel, bright as the sun. It shone down on them, and Levi could feel the wolf laughing under his skin.

Around them, wolves gathered. Wild wolves, on four paws, larger than any real canine could be, as big as horses. They watched with intent, wet eyes, the moonlight glittering off of them. Their eyes flashed red in the dark, and Levi did not find them quite so frightening as he had once.

The tide rushed up and brushed against their legs, leaving foam around their paws.

Arthur looked up at the moon, marveling at its glow.

Gently, Levi’s mother lowered Levi’s head into her lap. She combed her fingers softly through his air, letting her long, painted fingernails tickle at the skin of his scalp. For whatever reason, he couldn’t look up at her, couldn’t see her face. But he could see the moon, and the light of it seemed to bathe everything in ghostlight.

“What do I do?” Levi asked. He felt small, again. A little kid in light-up sneakers and a Rocko’s Modern Life t-shirt, padding up a hill to see the truth. He was small, and just a child, and he was asking his mommy for help with something he didn’t know how to fix. He thought about San Francisco, the people he’d left there to fend for themselves. Jace, writhing on the floor, silver scorching his blood.

“You live. You take things one step at a time. And, when everything falls apart... you learn to let go,” she said softly. Then, quietly, she began to sing.

“Stars shining bright above you

Night breezes seem to whisper: I love you

Birds singing in the sycamore tree

Dream a little dream of me

Say nighty-night and kiss me

Just hold me tight and tell me: you’ll miss me

When I’m alone and blue as can be

Dream a little dream of me”

Levi let his eyes slide closed. His body was slipping, slipping into the beautiful abyss. His mother’s fingertips played through his hair.

He filled his lungs and began to howl. He howled at the sky for all that he’d lost. He howled for what he was to gain. He howled for the curse he bore in his blood and his soul, for the lives he had taken, and the ones he had tried to save. For Derrick, and Jace, and Rhea, and Rosa, and Mark, and Julia, and Elizabeth, and Baxter, and Martha.

The Santa Cruz pack howled around him, adding their song to his own, and the thread pulsed stronger than it had before, drawing them together.

In the dark sea before him, stars began to flicker into existence, one by one. Cosmic confetti, swirling, just for him, a reflection of the sky above. And in its depths, brighter than anything else, the moon, a great silver eye, a train at the end of a long tunnel, glowed. It seemed content.