“So the wolf should never be allowed ascendancy?”
“You misunderstand,” Salvatore’s English was flawless, yet his explanation left Brett with more questions than answers. “A latent is not human. Nor are they fully Wolf. They are both, existing within one being. One is suppressed and the other in ascendance. The bonds which we share with our beasts, which bleed through and allow us to be both at the same time do not exist within a latent. It is…”
“A disconnect. They aren’t wired the way the rest of us are. So if we are the norm, they are abnormal in that sense.”
“Yes.” The Italian Alpha released a long breath. “Exactly. Within my packs, there are two latents. They are most often the product of…damaged DNA? We have little research in the area because latents are so rare.”
“All right, accepted, they’re rare. How do we help one, especially if her wolf is beginning to show?”
“Do you know what triggered the ascendance?”
“I have an idea.” Though he had no intention to share the information. The acid she’d tripped on had allowed her wolf an opening, forged a chemical connection she’d been lacking. If he were a gambling man, and he wasn’t, it was where he would place his bet.
“Then, much like the proverbial cat leaving the bag, the wolf will not retreat again. We are stubborn creatures, after all. Is there any chance the latent is submissive?”
Not a single one. “No.”
“Pity. A submissive will accept your dominance, and you can guide the wolf, help her through the transition.”
“And a dominant?”
“You will have to humble the wolf much as you would a recalcitrant youth who does not want to obey or sees no need to obey.” The advice didn’t sit well with Brett.
“Have you had any success with bringing a latent through the transition?”
“Only once,” Salvatore admitted, dashing his faith against the rocks.
“You said you have two.”
“The second’s wolf remains silent. We treat him no differently than we do our other pack mates…” A shrug echoed at the end of the statement. “For the first, however, she spent several months working on landmine removal in Bosnia and Croatia. The stress may have triggered her wolf. The danger is always that the wolf will overwrite their human half.”
“Like a total Fade?”
“For lack of a better word in your language, yes. What makes us Fade is our lost interest in humanity, in the day-to-day things that keep us grounded as human and beast. For the latent, it is the beast shucking off the cage and refusing to ever return to it—so you must teach the wolf that it is not isolated, that it can be welcomed and…that the latent must welcome it. Then it is no longer a battle between wolf and woman, but one they can wage together.”
Staring at Colby’s wolf eyes told him it sounded straightforward and simple in theory, not so much in practice. “Colby,” he called his lover, not the wolf. He wanted the woman at the forefront, the woman who had no idea what the hell was going on. Every instinct he possessed was on her side, and if he had to dominate her wolf to do it—his wolf surfaced higher and he let his eyes shift. Let her beast see his. His wolf agreed with him, they’d welcome her wolf into the world but on Colby’s terms.
“Brett…” Luc.
“Shut. Up.” He didn’t soften the words or the order within them. Luc went silent and his sister went to her knees. In the woods beyond, wolves came to the edge of the forested area the pack owned. Some had been out playing, some had simply gone to stretch their legs. But his pack answered him and they came, settling in, and their power flowed through him.
Colby shook her head and tried to look away, but her gaze tracked to him again. The complete absence of scent from a wolf that had no scent because the wolf had never been allowed to be.
“You want out, and I understand,” he told the wolf. “But not now and not at her expense. Go to sleep.”
A keening note came from her throat, a sound so low and plaintive it had never come from the tough, wise-cracking woman he’d spent the last several days learning to love. Not even when she told him about the jackass who screwed her life over. She didn’t blame him, she owned her part of the mistake and rose above it.
“Go to sleep,” he told the wolf. “Colby, you come back, right now.” The wolf had been running when he’d come home. He understood it. The acid might have woken the wolf, but being around the pack was lending it strength. Strength she didn’t know how to fight because she didn’t know the battle to be waged and the animal to learn.