Chapter 496: The breaking grounds

The instant he said it, Viola became aware of the ground beneath her feet, feeling it begin to crack like the surface of a frozen river giving way. Fear seized her chest as the earth around her splintered further and began to feel like it would give way underneath her paws.

’Cyan, why did you lead us into this part?!’ Viola demanded of her wolf.

’I didn’t mean to. I was killed in this pack before I was ever reborn inside you. The witch placed a killing mark on the exact spot where that building stood during the flood. It’s where she took my last human’s life. I didn’t remember it until we were already there, standing right where she killed my human... It’s happening again. The ground is going to swallow us whole and bury us alive deep beneath it.’

Viola realized something at those words. Cyan’s last human had been killed in this very ground in the flood at the same moment Viola was being born in the sea. And now, they had come to the place of her death, where the ground must have swallowed her.

Viola turned toward her husband. "Sebastian..."

"Don’t move, honey. I’m going to get you out of there."

Meanwhile, back in Viola’s penthouse, Matt had only just arrived, after hours of driving straight through, running up toward the building the moment he knew Sebastian would likely be there.

Though he doubted Nick would actually hurt Zoe outright, there was no way to be entirely certain when it came to a psychopath who’d already proven himself capable of killing his own brother, and Sebastian needed to know what had happened, immediately.

But Matt soon discovered that neither Sebastian nor his Luna were anywhere in the penthouse, and he cursed under his breath, knowing he’d have to track him down before he could act on anything at all, the last thing he wanted was for either of them to walk unknowingly into whatever trap Nick was setting for them.

"Let’s track down the Alpha’s whereabouts." He ordered the warriors behind him as they all flared out.

•••

Sebastian racked his brain, trying to figure out how to get his wife out of there, where it seemed like any small step she took might make the ground split further and swallow her whole. If he went to her himself, their combined weight would likely accomplish what her weight alone hadn’t yet. The ground for at least two miles around her appeared to be in the same fragile condition, meaning even a leap might not help at all.

"Honey, has your wolf mastered the leaping trace of Alphas?" he asked, keeping his eyes fixed on her paws and the cracking ground beneath them.

The leaping trace was a skill every Alpha eventually mastered, allowing them to cover great distances in a single bound, sometimes as far as three miles from their starting position.

What Sebastian couldn’t understand was that he’d walked this ground before, inspecting it himself. Yes, it had looked fragile, but it had never given way under the combined weight of him and his men before, and it had certainly never produced smoke the way it had today. It was as though Viola’s presence alone had triggered something buried here.

Viola relayed Sebastian’s question to her wolf, and Cyan answered, ’I haven’t used this body in years to master the leaping trace, and I don’t think now is the time to attempt it for the first time. I could easily leap us straight into a hole instead.’

Viola looked back at Sebastian and shook her head at his question. Realistically, Cyan was still too new a wolf, and had she and Viola had years together already, they might have mastered leaping and much else besides by now.

"That’s fine, darling. I’ll teach you how to do that another time, but right now, I need you to shift back into your human form. It’ll cut down the weight, and I need you ready for what’s next." He explained calmly, even as his own heart hammered wildly inside his chest.

"Ready for what?" She asked, and Sebastian answered without missing a beat, "To leap onto my back, in a split second. I’ve mastered the leaping trace my whole life, I’ll land on solid ground for only a moment, and in that instant, you need to get onto my back. Can you do that?"

Viola had never jumped onto a moving wolf’s back before, but it was far better than staying where she was, with the ground groaning beneath her feet. She gave him a firm nod, and he praised her,

"That’s my girl. Now shift."

Viola shifted forms with a small cry catching in her throat at the pain, standing in her human form afterward, panting, looking up at him, terrified that they might both end up sinking if he didn’t time this exactly right.

"Hubby..." She muttered, watching him gather himself to leap toward her.

"You trust me, don’t you, love?" He asked, and she nodded without a moment’s hesitation.

"With my whole life." She said.

Sebastian felt a surge of warmth at that, and told her he’d jump on the count of three. Viola felt her heart pounding in her ears, her stomach twisting, as she watched her husband’s mighty wolf form gather itself, and held her breath as he counted down and leapt.

He landed with a heavy thud that made the ground beneath him give way almost instantly, crumbling apart even as he moved. She clutched at his fur and hauled herself onto his back, gripping tight as the ground sank away and he leapt again.

Viola felt almost as though they were flying, and looking down, she watched the earth splitting apart below them, the hole widening and spreading further across the grounds.

"Hold on tight, love." He told her, just as he began descending toward what looked like solid ground, but the edges gave way the moment his weight landed, and half of Sebastian’s body dropped into the hole, his front claws digging desperately into the earth to hold himself steady.

"Climb up, my love, and get to safe ground." He told her, as she began to slide off his back, toward the black hole forming below.

Viola scrambled upward, using his body for leverage, grabbing hold of a root sticking out from the top edge of the ground and hauling herself up and over, out of danger. She immediately spun around, shifted back into her wolf form, and clamped her teeth around his fur, hauling him up and out to safety just as his claws began to lose their grip.

The two of them collapsed onto solid ground, panting, as another section of Mooncreek’s earth groaned and crumbled somewhere behind them.

Sebastian didn’t stay down for long, pulling himself back up and tugging gently at his wife’s fur to help her up as well. "Let’s get out of here, before it spreads to this part too."