Ravensong

The second installment in the Green Creek series, Ravensong is narrated by Gordo Livingstone, a witch bound by blood and history to the Bennett werewolf pack. The story moves between Gordo's past and present, tracing how a boy shaped by wolves, abandoned by them, and consumed by rage finds his way back to the people he never stopped loving.

The novel opens in the immediate aftermath of the previous book's events. Joe Bennett, barely eighteen, has become Alpha of the Bennett pack after his father Thomas was killed by the rogue wolf Richard Collins. Joe announces that he, his brothers Carter and Kelly, and Gordo will leave Green Creek to hunt Richard. Oxnard "Ox" Matheson, Joe's mate, must stay behind with Elizabeth Bennett (the widowed pack mother), Mark Bennett (Thomas's younger brother and Gordo's estranged mate), and the pack's human members. Before departing, Gordo confronts Mark, who tells him he no longer believes his promises. Gordo cannot find the words to respond.

Interwoven with the pursuit are extended flashbacks to Gordo's childhood. Gordo's father, Robert Livingstone, a powerful witch, begins tattooing magical runes into Gordo's skin at age six. Gordo's human mother, Catherine, opposes the wolves' claim on her son and tries to flee Green Creek with him, but the pack intercepts them. Robert is having an affair with Wendy, the town librarian, who serves as his magical tether: the emotional anchor that keeps a witch or wolf connected to their humanity. When Catherine kills Wendy, the loss of his tether causes Robert to lose control of his magic, destroying a neighborhood and killing 16 people including Catherine. Gordo, now 12 and orphaned, is formally installed as the Bennett pack's witch.

Mark Bennett, three years Gordo's senior, has been Gordo's shadow since childhood, insisting Gordo smells like "dirt and leaves and rain." On Gordo's 12th birthday, Mark gives him a carved wooden raven, a placeholder for a greater gift he cannot yet give. At 13, Gordo kisses Mark for the first time. Seven months later, the hunter Meredith King, known as Elijah, leads a devastating attack on the pack during a full moon. Most of the wolves, including children, are slaughtered. Abel dies, and Thomas inherits the Alpha mantle. At 15, Gordo and Mark begin a formal courtship with Thomas's blessing, but political pressure from wolves who distrust humans forces Thomas to relocate the pack to Maine, leaving Gordo behind to protect the territory. Mark chooses to follow his Alpha rather than stay with Gordo. Six months later, when Mark visits, Gordo begs him to stay or leave together. Mark refuses, unable to abandon his pack. Gordo returns the stone wolf that symbolizes their mate bond and severs all ties with the Bennetts. Mark leaves a different stone wolf on Gordo's pillow, but Gordo's heart is already broken.

The three years on the road with Joe, Carter, and Kelly form a slow rebuild. The brothers grieve, argue, and cling to each other while chasing cold trails across North America. Gordo reluctantly bonds with them: buzzing Kelly's hair, accepting Carter's peace offerings, staying awake to watch over them as they sleep. An old blind witch in Washington warns Gordo he will face a choice upon which everything depends. Outside Fairbanks, Alaska, they find David King, a hunter whose sister is Elijah. King warns she will return. Richard later murders King, and Joe decides it is time to go home.

One year after the pack's return to Green Creek, Ox has been bitten by Joe and transformed into an Alpha wolf, creating an unprecedented two-Alpha pack. Gordo's childhood friends—Rico, Chris, and Tanner—and Chris's sister Jessie are now integrated into the pack as its human contingent. Feral Omegas, wolves who have lost their tethers and their humanity, keep arriving, drawn by Ox's inherited connection to the Omega wolves that once followed Richard. Gordo and Ox previously sealed a metaphysical "door" in Ox's mind to contain this pull, but some Omegas still slip through. Mark is dating a man named Dale from a nearby town, a fact the humans have tried to hide from Gordo.

Philip Pappas, an envoy of Michelle Hughes (the interim Alpha of all wolves), begins losing control and calls Gordo in the middle of the night, barely coherent. Pappas attacks and kills his own escorts. During the fight, Pappas bites Mark, and Carter is exposed to infected blood while tending Mark's wound. In a tense video call, Michelle reveals a mysterious infection has been spreading among wolves, one that shreds a wolf's tether from within and turns them feral through bite or blood contact. She gives the pack three days to kill Carter and Mark. The pack unanimously refuses, and Gordo secretly contacts other witches, Aileen and Patrice, for help.

Events accelerate. Carter begins losing control during training, his eyes flickering violet. The pack discovers Dale is Michelle's witch, confirming that his relationship with Mark was espionage. Michelle's witches have overlaid wards around Green Creek, trapping the pack inside the territory. Elijah arrives with armed hunters during a massive snowstorm, killing a local deputy and occupying the town. Gordo hears his father's voice chanting in the corrupted wards.

In a brief window of clarity, Gordo and Mark confront their feelings. Gordo kisses Mark, echoing words Mark once refused: "Choose me." They consummate their bond through a mating bite that floods Gordo with Mark's lifetime of memories, and Gordo's magic leaves a permanent raven tattoo on Mark's throat. But the mating accelerates the infection rather than slowing it. Mark wakes feral, and Ox subdues him.

Gordo makes a desperate decision. He pushes Mark into full Omega state and tells the pack they must shatter the metaphysical door in Ox's mind so Ox can call the feral wolves as an army against the hunters. During the ritual, Gordo encounters the spirit of Thomas Bennett, who tells Gordo he will always be his witch. A face forms in the door, Robert Livingstone, warning this is only a battle, not the war. Strengthened by his pack, Gordo shatters the door. Ox's eyes turn red and violet as dozens of Omegas answer his call.

Allied witches led by Aileen and Patrice arrive to help break Michelle's wards. When a surrendering witch pulls a hidden silver knife aimed at Ox, Gordo intercepts the blade, losing his right hand. In the coordinated assault on the hunters that follows, Elijah detonates a suicide vest outside the Lighthouse bar where townspeople shelter. Gordo channels his pack's strength to raise a massive wall of ice between the blast and the civilians. Rico, Jessie, and Rico's girlfriend Bambi, the bar's owner, had already evacuated everyone through the back. The town survives.

Six weeks later, the pack performs a ritual under the new moon. The infection cannot be cured without killing Robert or forcing him to break his spell, but the ritual can close the metaphysical doors in the infected wolves' minds, containing the feral call. Gordo enters a psychic space with Mark, shatters his father's wards from within, and together they slam the door shut. Mark and Carter wake human, eyes still violet but present. Gordo also encounters the spirit of Thomas, who tells him he was foolish and proud and asks forgiveness. Gordo forgives him.

Mark moves into Gordo's house and returns the stone wolf. This time, Gordo accepts it, sealing the mate bond he once rejected. The pack delivers an ultimatum to Michelle Hughes: step down, or they will come for her. She refuses. In a final scene, Robert Livingstone forces his way into Michelle's compound in Maine. He reveals he has a second son, born of his affair with Wendy, a child Abel Bennett made him give up, who was later bitten and turned into a wolf, then became Elijah's captive. Robert demands Michelle help him recover this son and dismantle the Bennett pack. He identifies Robbie Fontaine, the young wolf who defected from Michelle's pack to join the Bennetts, as a tool to turn against them, setting up the conflicts to come.