The shifters watch me with ranges of curiosity, hope, and more than a few with disappointment and something resembling sorrow. I suppose they wanted something… more. I shake away the humor mixed with a stab of hurt threading its way through my system and making my lips almost tilt in a sad smile.

Jokes on them... I've been dealing with fear, failure, and mass consequences my entire life. Despite what this world has thrown at me, I've come through. With the help of strangers and friends and an ever present Allfather, I've made it here. Wearing a collar of silver after being taken prisoner by the jingoist... twice. Maybe the jokes on me.

I'm not anywhere near where I'd wished to be after meeting Pa again. My dream of coming home and reuniting the boys with their father and life returning to what it was... it was dashed against the shores of what I should expect, knowing the rocky course of what has been my life. Nothing ever goes how I plan nor how I wish. I'm not where I want to be.

When have you ever been where you wanted to be? Cynic asks.

I try to think of a time when I'd ever been, as Cynic said, where I wanted to be. There were glimpses of happiness, times of peace... but it always seemed there was more to be had. More to be done. A better peace to find.

I can't seem to find an answer to his question, so I ignore him.

I roll my shoulders, trying to release the tension within of having so many eyes on me when I am still dealing with the weakness of the wolfsbane and silver.

A shifter with dark hair and skin the color of a warm loaf of bread offers me a set of lock picks jiggling in his hands.

He avoids my gaze, his shoulders slumped.

“I—I have these, sir, if they’ll be of help?” he says, his dark eyes darting up to look at me before his gaze gets trained back on the ground.

“That would be most appreciated. Thank you,” I say, reaching for the picks.

He holds them in a white-knuckled grip. “I can do it—if you’d like?”

I shake my spinning head, but don’t want anyone that close to my neck, even those who just rescued me.

“I know how,” I say, and he winces and recoils at the hint of steel in my voice.

“O-Of course, your highness.” He gives me the keys, jumping when Sir Ri places a hand on his shoulder.

“Thanks, Mouse. I’ll handle the grumpy prince from here,” Sir Rey says, shooting me a wink.

I give Sir Rey a straight look, but the look of gratitude on the little lad’s face has me regretting my stern words. The kid looks one moment away from fainting.

Mouse bows and scrambles away, glancing back furtively and catching my eye for a split second. His eyes... they are blue, like my brother's once were.

It causes my heart to clench. A group of kids about his age, somewhere around fifteen to twenty, welcome him back with slaps on the back. One offers him a piece of jerky.

I heave a near silent sigh, trying to ignore those around me who, in the midst of gathering rations and sipping water from canteens, all send me glances. It seems I once again must prove myself to those who want something from me.

Sir Rey interrupts my thoughts, bringing a pallet over for me to sleep on. “You must rest. We will be moving quickly. Sorry about the collar. We couldn’t sneak the key off the commander.”

I wave off his apology as I stand on wobbly, but mostly sturdy, legs. “No need. I know how to pick a lock. I need to seek the Allfather's guidance before we leave.”

He watches me go with bug eyes and a dropped mouth. I laugh to myself when I get further down the cave and out of sight. I doubt he’d ever guess I’d come to believe. After all, my father raised me to believe only in the power you can see. And with my own thoughts on the issues back then... I shake my head. I truly was a pride-filled idiot; thinking that only the seen is real. But so much is unseen. Hate. Love. Wind. The Allfather. It’s almost as if the tangible things are truly less than the intangible.

It took me reaching my breaking point before I realized that.

I stagger to a darker passageway leading deeper into the mountain. The rocks narrow, and I get down to crawl through a hole.

Why I continued in the state I'm in, or why Sir Rey let me, I do not know.

All I know is I found myself popping out into a cavern large enough to fit my dragon. A tiny pinprick of light came from above, lighting up the cavern just enough for my wolf sight to pick up a rat darting down a hole as I hear a scurrying of his tiny feet against the rocks.

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The scent of musty fur, the deep and earthy aroma of the mountain itself, and the semi-sweet hint of minerals and the sharpness of salt deeper underground meets my nose. It's freeing. Here, there are no scents of anger, animosity, confusion, suspicion, fear, or pain.

A few animals scurry, bats chirp above, and a cry of something larger deeper down that I don't wish to meet makes my ears taper to a point before they round back out under the pervasive pressure of the silver collar.

There is not the invasiveness of people here, only the wildness of the natural creatures where they belong. It makes me long for the woods and a place for my wolf to run until my legs scream at me to stop.

My legs scream at me to stop now, but not because I ran. I collapse against the back of the cave, the rock formations grey to my sight. I sit a hand on a rock beside me that has a sheen of silver from water dripping above, and allow the fear and sorrow of seeing my father and my home in such a state.

It never should have been such a way. Pa doesn't deserve to live with such sorrow and pain. “Help him, Father. Help him. Protect him from those who are against you. Help all those left in my home, bring them back from the brink and give them hope to carry on.”

I burry my head in my hands, blowing out a breath. I don’t know if what I’m doing is right. Am I supposed to take the throne from my cousin and stop his reign of terror? Am I supposed to help this motley crew of shifters who dropped everything to come find me? Who want me to fix all their problems?

But I know I’m not enough. What in all the worlds am I supposed to do?

Ask, his small voice says, a smile in the air.

I look up in surprise, not seeing the dark, pockmarked ceiling. “Ask what?”

Ask what is on your heart.

I blow out a breath. “Am I doing what is right?”

That’s not the question, he chides gently.

My brows lower in confusion. “That’s the question that’s on my mind.”

I want the question of your heart.

Oh. That. It feels so wrong to doubt, but... for some reason, he wants me to ask. “Will you be with me? I feel so... insignificant — tiny — compared to whatever it is you have in store. Will you help me see this through?”

Always. But you won’t always hear my voice. You won’t always be able to tell I am there. You will struggle, My Child. And I am sorry. But I promise your pain will be my pain, and your joy will be my joy.

I nod. “Will you just guide me? I wasn’t prepared for this. I'm not prepared for this.”

A verse comes to mind from a book, a book my mother taught me from a very long time ago. Ask, and the door will be opened. Seek, and you will find.

“Help me. Guide me. Help me free my people from their pain. Protect those I love. Help me be a good leader if that is what you wish. I’m not ready for this. But I think you are.”

His peace settles over me like a blanket, and I drift off, knowing that it shall be just as it should be. And that I am doing my best, and that is all he wants.

~~~

An arm grasps my shoulder and shakes. Without opening my eyes, I grasp the offending appendage. My leg sweeps the person off their feet. I use their arm as leverage and twisting them into their back. I lock their shoulder behind their back.

“My prince,” a surprised voice gasps. “It’s me.”

I finally pry open my eyes to find I’m on top of Sir Rey, slowly squeezing until his breath is but a wheezing gasp.

I jump off. “Sorry,” I whisper. My heart is racing and the collar once again burns through the cloth I'd wrapped around it. I rub the skin under the collar, belatedly realizing I forgot to get it off.

I grab the picks I dropped and shove the stabilizer into the pick, feeling with years of experience for the clicks as I nudge the tumblers out of the way.

Sir Rey slowly turns around. He rubs his wrist while looking me up and down in bemusement. “The wolf I once knew learned some new tricks.” I choke on a morbid chuckle. That wasn’t what I was expecting. “I want to spar with you as soon as we get someplace safe and get that dratted collar off your neck.”

I shake the lingering cobwebbing effects of the Wolfsbane off. “I’d like that. I take it everyone’s ready?”

He rubs his neck and gives me a rueful glance. “Yes. Been ready for quite a time, truly. But no one wanted to disturb you, seeing as you were practically dead on your feet when we found you.”

I almost growl but hold the urge in. “How long? Any stragglers?”

He shakes his head. “Not followed. Had the best of us cover our tracks. Would be enough to throw off most hounds.”

“Good. How long?”

“Six hours or so.”

I feel my eyes widen. No wonder I’m feeling quite rested. She-Dragon is probably a wreck by now, and I hope the two boys with her aren’t causing too much trouble. Maybe she’s already gone and she took the two back to the Werecats. That would be the best thing. It would grate against my internal clock should I have to travel days back to Videlia, but it would be worth it for the boys to be safe.

“I’m not going to wring your neck like I wish to,” I say, a mock growl rumbling in my chest.

“You would try, boy.” I give him a lopsided grin. That is what I remember of my old tutor. It seems we’ve both changed, but the person we once knew is still in there… somewhere.

The collar clicks when the last tumbler rolls out of place, and I grab it, hissing when the silver burns my fingers and palm.

I throw it away, the click and chink of it cracking against the rock grates against my ears as I rub my stinging and burning neck, glad to have it off. I feel for the pets I’ve seen royals have, who were both harnessed and collared, depending on the species of pet.

Sir Rey passes me a cloth torn from his tunic. I accept it with a nod of thanks, using it to rub away the lingering silver still trying to burn through my neck.

He leads the way back to the rest of the Shifters. After the little crawl through that Sir Rey ventured into first, he looks over at me but glances away quickly.

“Where’d you learn to move like that?” he asks nonchalantly. But I can scent the hidden interest in the air like a balm of lemongrass.

“The king didn’t tell you?” I say, watching him closely. I see his shoulders heave a sigh, and the way his brows crease in pain.

He looks at me then, meeting my gaze, but then dropping his eyes to my nose to keep from challenging me as another Alpha. “Your father didn’t speak of you again after that day for many, many years. I was the leader of his packs, tutor of his children, and his best friend, but he didn’t tell me jack squat about the child we both loved. We didn’t lose just your brother that day.” The sad bitterness in his voice is a parallel to the pain of my own heart.

I take a deep breath. “Maybe someday I’ll tell you. It’s not pretty.”

“Life typically isn’t, kid.” He ruffles my hair, and I find myself batting him off just like the old days.

I grin and can feel a hint of light come back into my soul.