Chapter 236: Chapter 235

Xander “Ma!” | shouted.

I'd been almost hypnotized, watching my mother and my mate joining their hands. The voice that had come out of my mother had reverberated through me, echoing like she’d shouted into a deep well even though she’s barely raised it. As soon as she fell onto the table, though, | jumped up to help her.

Zane was on her other side, while Mason went to Lanie. She waved him off.

“I'm fine, I’m fine,” she said. “Is Gabriela okay?”

| helped my mother sit upright. Blood trickled from her nose, and her forehead had a bruise alrea blooming on it. She blinked rapidly, eyelashes fluttering, and then her eyes popped wide open.

I'm fine,” she said, trying to wave me away.

| didn’t let her go. “You just face planted so hard | heard a crunch, Ma. You're not fine.”

“Let me get some ice,” Zane said. He went to the freezer and started pulling out the ice cube trays to filla plastic baggie.

My mother gingerly touched her nose and then her forehead, but she gave Lanie a huge grin. “You see what a blessing you've been given, Lanie? I'd hoped, but didn’t want to say anything, in case | was wrong. spent hours opening my mind and heart to the Moon Goddess’s guidance without luck. | knew she hadn't simply abandoned me, but | couldn’t be sure she was finally granting you the full and true Luna gifts that rightfully belong to you now.”

Mason rubbed Lanie’s shoulders. “I thought Lanie already was the Luna. She’s mated to two Alphas, right?”

“We take nothing for granted when it comes to the Goddess,” Gabriela said. She took the ice pack from Zane with a grateful smile and pressed it to her forehead with a wince. “When Orion died and your Alpha powers were awakened, the mate bond between you and Lanie was tied to Xander, and through him, Zane. You four already knew you shared the mind links and that connection, which is something | genuinely have never heard of happening before. | worried the Goddess wouldn’t bless the union, that she might deny Lanie the full realm of her powers.”

“I'd have been the Luna in name,” Lanie added, “but | wouldn’t have been able to access all the Luna gifts.

Gabriela would have kept some of them.”

“And lost some,” my mother added. “Certainly I'd have stepped down as Luna as far as running the pack went. But we don’t have to worry about that, because it’s so very clear that that Goddess has shone her light upon Lanie and the three of you. The Goddess has blessed her with her Luna intuition. That's why | wasn’t able to find a way to solve this problem, and Lanie could.”

“And | did find a solution,” Lanie put in.

[e)

good?”

“We're both fine, my love,” Lanie said confidently and pushed a swell of light and comfort all around me.

Mason bent to drop a kiss on the top of her head, then took his seat again. He poured us all fresh glasses of wine and lifted his glass. “Cheers to our Luna.”

We toasted. As the warmth of the red wine ran down my throat, | looked around the table in wonder at everything that had gone on. One thing after another, we'd all endured enough to rock us to our cores, to drive us to our knees and lay us flat, but we all just kept getting up.

“Tell us what you figured out, Lanie,” Zane said.

She beamed. “Wolvesbane.”

Mason startled. “That’s a myth, isn’t it?”

“Apparently not...at least, the synthetic kind isn’t,” Lanie said. “It can be used to negate certain thing you need to take it with specific other ingredients and in precise dose.”

“Negate what certain things?” | asked suspiciously.

“It can render both men and women temporarily or permanently infertile,” she said. “It can dissolve the magic of binding spells... Basically, from what | could gather, wolvesbane works to tear things apart than tie them together. So, anything that requires a joining of some kind can be prevented or destroyed.”

I Mason muttered out a low curse. “It’s extremely dangerous.”

“Very, very ancient,” my mother added. The ice cubes in her bag cra ckled against each other as she set it on the table. | also thought it was nothing but a myth. You say someone has sy n th esized it?”

risky.”

Lanie nodded. “Yes, and there are several different types. Some safer and more reliable than others.”

“None of them could be reliable or safe,” my mother countered in a thoughtful voice. “Using it would be “I'll do it,” Zane said. “Whatever it is. Just tell me how to get it and how to use it.”

Lanie looked stricken. “It will require a sacrifice, Zane. One I’m not sure | can ask you to make.”