Reborn (Shadow Beast Shifters Book 3)

On the other side of the portal, there was no sign of the white hallway. Before I could take a step into this new room, Sam darted in front of me. Wondering what had her worried, I looked around quickly, finally following her line of sight above our heads.

Oh, shit. The black sparking smoke that had hovered around the doorway was following us. Floating like a cloud of evil, it was actually much calmer than before, its energy now curious versus murderous.

Sam and I exchanged a glance, and it was at this point that I initiated the change back. It was time for us to discuss what was happening here because this was messing with my head. My wolf didn’t fight me, and a few minutes later, I was able to stand.

Shaking out my limbs, I waited until the sensation of bones breaking and bodies reforming faded. Immediately, I noticed that I felt stronger here; that couldn’t be a coincidence, right?

“Where are we?” Sam asked huskily, rubbing at her chest as she straightened from her shift.

“I have no idea,” I said breathlessly because a lowkey excitement had started thrumming through my chest. “To my knowledge, I’ve never been here before. Never stepped out of Torma into another damn dimension or tangled with an angry cloud of smoke, but at the same time… this feels familiar.”

She halted me with a hand on my arm. “I have no idea what happened to you, but can I just say how badass you are, taking this on without a clue of what was waiting on the other side of those magical doorways?”

Badass or stupid. Such a fine line.

“Why did you step through?” I asked, reminded that she’d followed when she should have stayed safely in Torma. “This isn’t your fight, and you already went above and beyond in trying to help me. So why?”

Sam ducked her head, a long sigh escaping. “Would you believe that my life has been such a miserable suckfest that I actually don’t really have that much to lose by following you on your adventure?”

Empathy rose inside of me. I understood more than I wished to. “I think that’s part of why I felt such an instant connection to you,” I said, shaking my head. “You and I are the same, just raised in different packs. I would literally choose anything over staying in Torma.”

“It’s better for you now,” she whispered, lifting her face, her eyes shiny as the ghosts of her past spilled out in a few stray tears. “You’re a strong alpha, and you’re respected. You didn’t have to beg… fucking beg for years to get another pack to take you in. One of the other teachers told me that it was only thanks to Alpha Torin’s soft spot for rejected females that my transfer was approved. Otherwise, I’d have been stuck with my old pack forever.”

I snorted. “That bastard only has a soft spot because he’s trying to make amends for what he did to me, but whatever the reason, I’m happy you were able to escape your pack.”

She shrugged. “Yep, but as I said, I’m still a mess over it, so I’m trying to—” She paused, searching for the words. “Change my fate, I guess. And in doing that, I need to stop hiding and living a half-life. In doing that, I have to take risks. It was what drove me to track you down in the first place.”

Nudging her side, I let out a long, calming breath. “I understand you on a level that’s somewhat scary, but on the other hand, I love that we’re doing this together. I’m scared too, but we’ve got this. Women can do anything, especially when we stick together. I truly believe that.”

She linked her arm through mine, seemingly bolstered by my words. “I believe that too,” she said, her voice growing in confidence. “Let’s do this. Together, we can figure out why you’re here, what the hell happened to this place, and what sort of smoke demon pet we just inherited.”

I was struck by the truth that real friends, as rare as they were, could be recognized in how they encouraged us—either via words or actions—to be the best versions, the strongest versions of ourselves. And when we couldn’t be strong, they were there to pick us up and hold us together.

Like right now, our confidence together was what pushed us to take our first steps into the new unknown we were facing.

Sam shook her head as we observed the carnage around us. “It was a library, right?” she asked.

“Yeah, I’m pretty sure it was,” I said, staring from the carved ceilings soaring above, down to the multiple windows that lined the walls. They were cracked and broken now, as was everything else in this place, having been reduced to mere rubble.

Only pieces of white shelving remained, piled haphazardly across the shiny floor. The books that had once adorned those shelves had fared no better, now just scattered pages and torn covers.

“Are you a book lover?” Sam asked, sounding choked up.

I nodded, my head bobbing like one of those stupid dolls. “Huge book lover,” I said through my tight throat. “I feel like I’ve stumbled into my worst nightmare, and the only thing that could make this worse is if a fucking clown car drove in, eighteen tiny clowns piled out of it, and then they pummeled me to death using the broken books.”

Sam cleared her throat. “Oh, good. I was worried I’d be the dramatic one in this friendship.”

“Rest assured…” I choked out. “You have no need to worry on that front.”

She actually laughed, and somehow I felt a tiny bit better.

Walking farther into the room, I found myself growing uncharacteristically angry. “Whoever did this is a fucking murderer,” I rumbled. “How could they?”

Sam wasn’t laughing now. “Yep, a book murderer, and if we find them, I’ll help you bury the damn body.”

She was dead serious, and I was right there with her.

“Do you have any thoughts on where we are exactly?” I asked because it was clear that we were… a little outside our normal existence. “Do you think we’re still on Earth? Or maybe…?”

Sam paused, right beside another pile of broken dreams. “Look, I’m not one to believe in magic, but after today… there’s not a hope in hell we’re still on Earth. I’d bet my left tit on it.”

“My left tit is my favorite,” I told her. “But I’d still bet it because I agree with you.”

She snorted. “Good to know.”

But was it? Because not being on Earth changed the whole narrative here, and I wasn’t sure where we were going to end up once we uncovered the truth of this place.

The farther we walked into the broken library, the larger the wreckage was, until we almost couldn’t make it any deeper into the room.

“How is there no one here?” Sam asked, pushing up on her toes to try to get a better look. “Do you think they all died during this destruction?”

“I don’t know,” I said, frustration and confusion warring within me. I’d been so sure my truth was here, but all I’d found was a broken library. Maybe it was an allegory for my brain because right now I felt like I was one step away from being nothing more than what I saw here.

“Maybe we should try to climb over that largest pile,” Sam said, stepping closer to kick some of the shelving out of the way. “We shouldn’t give up yet—”

She was cut off by a faint sound, a scuffle, near to where we stood. Sam and I exchanged a quick, wide-eyed look, before we both hurried forward. “Hello?” I called, starting to lift books and wooden fragments off the side closest to where I’d heard the sound. “Is anyone there? We’re digging you out.”

There was another scuffle, and with it came the faintest scent of old moss and earthy soil. Those were not library scents, but rather a living entity. “There’s someone under there,” I said with urgency, and Sam and I worked frantically to move the items off the pile.

It took us a few minutes to lessen the heaviest part, and by this time, the scuffling was louder. “I really hope it’s not a giant rat,” Sam said, staring down with a look of unease. “I have my doubts anything else could survive under that much weight. Unless it was small enough to move between the pieces.”

If it was a larger being, they would have to be exceptionally strong to survive. Strong and possibly dangerous. Still, I couldn’t leave anyone trapped and hurt when I could help; it wasn’t in my nature.

With that in mind, Sam and I scrambled to get the final layers of debris off, and much to our surprise, the cloud helped as well, zipping down to scoop up the heaviest objects, its misty substance apparently able to solidify and wrap around shelving, to drag it from the pile.

The physical work helped to keep my mind from wandering into panic territory, though I did find a second to hope that this was a new clue to uncover.

I’d come looking for answers, and at this point, I only had more questions, but as long as we were moving in the right direction, I would keep on pushing.

I had no other choice.