Chapter 28

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

Wilder killed Leo. Wilder killed Leo. Leo is dead. He’s dead.

My mind raced with what I’d just seen. I could barely put thoughts into words, so I just screamed. With a bloody hand, Wilder grabbed my forearm and dragged me away from Leo’s body that lay in an increasing puddle of blood. My legs couldn’t hold my weight as I relied on Wilder’s arm to support me.

Unfazed by what he’d just done, Wilder spoke to me in a smug voice. “I tried to play nice. I asked you where the Lifestone was. All you had to do was give it to me, and your friend would have lived.” I gasped, trying to listen to Wilder between the screams that left my throat. “Now someone else wants to talk to you. Maybe you’ll listen to them.”

I dry heaved as I dangled in his grasp. The iron smell of Leo’s blood had reached my nose, and I did all I could to keep the contents of my stomach inside of me. The sound of rustling trees to my right gave way to two giant white paws that were in stark contrast to the brown floor of the forest. Either unaware or uncaring, the white wolf walked through the puddle of blood next to Leo’s body, turning its paws a pink color.

“True Alpha.” Wilder bent down to one knee, bringing me with him. He bent his neck to the side in submission. I struggled against his grip, but he held true.

The True Alpha shifted in front of us. Bent legs elongated, and giant paws contracted into human hands. A human face replaced the animal snout, and it looked nothing but pleased with what it saw. “Finally, Wilder, you obey me.” The True Alpha’s voice was low and grave.

“Of course, Alpha. I’m yours to command,” he said.

I looked at Wilder in surprise. Since when did he answer to the True Alpha? He seemed like more of a loner type.

“She claims to not have the stone, but I don’t believe her. I can smell it on her. I thought better than to search her before you arrived.” Wilder pushed me forward, handing me over to the True Alpha, who grabbed my other forearm and pulled me close to him.

His grip was crushing, and I whimpered at the feeling. “So, you’re the human who stole my son’s heart.” He took a deep sniff of my body, looking me up and down.

I was tired of being smelled. My fight instinct kicked in, and I raised my foot to kick him in the shin. I was too slow as a human, and the True Alpha easily dodged my attempt.

“Tsk, tsk. Is that the way you treat your father-in-law?” I paused at the revelation. “You think I didn’t know you’re my son’s mate? I know my son very well, although he may not admit it. I tried to keep you away from him from the beginning.” He eyed Wilder with a look of disgust.

“I’m sorry, True Alpha. I tried to make it up to you by bringing her here now. Everett is away at Camp, and…”

“He won’t be for long. Not after you scared her by ending her little friend over there.” The True Alpha motioned to Leo’s dead body. “I expect Everett will be here shortly.”

I looked between them. The tension between the two wolves was high.

“I tried to fix my mistake, True Alpha. I brought her here for you,” Wilder groveled.

“If you had kept your dick in your pants like a good boy, I wouldn’t be in this situation having to challenge my son over his mate,” the True Alpha snapped. “You were supposed to bring her straight to me that night. Instead you had some fun with her—so much fun that you forgot your duty all together. She met Everett, and any chance of leaving my son out of this vanished.”

My thoughts ran wild. Wilder had been instructed to bring me to the True Alpha the night we’d met at No Bars? Then Everett had found us the following morning when he’d come to bring Wilder to Camp. He’d ruined the True Alpha’s plans to keep me from ever meeting Everett.

Out of all the things to be mad about, it was that he had tried to keep me from Everett that had my blood boiling. I pulled against the True Alpha’s grip. He didn’t even flinch at the movement.

A loud growl echoed through the woods as branches came crashing down off trees and the surrounding trees vibrated.

“Right on cue.” The True Alpha looked irked as Everett’s large black wolf ran into the clearing.

Quickly shifting, Everett stood before his father. I could tell from the look in his eyes that he was extremely unhappy that his father was holding me so close.

“Elise, are you okay?” he asked, scanning my body up and down, looking for injuries. I was sure I looked like a wreck. Red, bloodshot eyes and snot dripping down my face from crying and screaming.

“I’m fine,” I assured him while pulling on his father’s grip.

Satisfied with my answer, Everett stalked over to where we were standing, imposing his enormous figure over his father’s. “Give me my mate, Father.” His voice was authoritative and demanding. Any wolf in his pack would have handed me over before he had finished speaking.

The True Alpha was in a hierarchy all his own and pulsed in amusement at Everett’s command. “I would gladly hand over your precious mate, my son, but she has something I need. And until she gives it to me, I will hold on to her.” His answer was just as commanding.

“I don’t have your stupid stone!” I yelled directly at the True Alpha, my voice hoarse from screaming earlier.

Everett looked between his father and me, confused.

“Oh, but you do, little wolf. I can smell it on you. Wilder here can too.” The True Alpha motioned to Wilder, who nodded in agreement. Tracker. Jack had said the True Alpha was a tracker.

Everett set his sights on Wilder, seemingly just realizing that he was present. “What the fuck are you doing here, Wilder?”

He shifted his weight between his feet nervously before answering. “Following your father’s commands.”

Everett snarled in disgust. “You follow my commands. You’re a member of my pack.”

“A member of your pack only in tradition! You’ve never offered to help me! To help me become whole!” Wilder was spitting mad. The tension in this relationship clearly ran deep.

Everett calmed a bit and spoke like a concerned father would. “I can’t help you get your fangs, Wilder. It was something you weren’t born with. You have other skills that help the pack. Hands down, you’re our best tracker. You don’t need fangs to be a real wolf.”

My heart thumped loudly, listening to his kind words.

Wilder smiled knowingly, as if he had Everett bested. “Oh, but you forget. You’re so wrapped up in your own she-wolf to realize that I can never be a real wolf without my fangs. I can never claim a mate.” Everett seemed lost for words at Wilder’s statement. “Your father offered to help me get in touch with others who can help me become whole if I brought Elise to him. I did it to have what you have—a chance at a mate. I won’t ever apologize for that.”

In a way, I felt for Wilder. Even after his second attempted kidnapping of me. I wouldn’t want anyone to miss out on the chance of feeling what Everett and I felt when we were together. Maybe my heart was too soft.

But his confession met deaf years with Everett. “Witches, Wilder? You’re going to the witches for help?” He laughed deeply. “What a joke that is. My father fed you that garbage about the witches helping our kind. Let me guess, he said he would put in a good word for you? Set up a meeting?” Wilder’s face turned red. “Let me tell you a little secret.” Everett’s voice lowered to a loud whisper. “My father doesn’t know any witches. Our packs haven’t seen one in a hundred years.”

Wilder stumbled backward at the words. It was not the rebuttal he’d been expecting. He looked to the True Alpha for confirmation of Everett’s words, and the True Alpha’s silence said enough.

Gray fur sprouted from his shoulders and black claws grew from his fingernail beds as he shifted. His clothing fell beneath him as he fully transitioned, sitting on his haunches. Lifting his snout to the sky, Wilder let out a haunting howl that sent shivers down my back. I must have shaken physically because Everett’s father tightened his grip. The sadness of the howl made its way deep into my bones, and I could feel the disappointment Wilder was feeling. Without a second glance, he retreated into the woods, picking up his pace as he fled.

“Why did you lie to him, Father?” Everett stalked over to his father and me. He held his broad shoulders high authoritatively. I guessed this wasn’t the first disagreement he and his father had had. “You know as well as I do—we haven’t had contact with the witches in decades.” He snarled as he spoke, his canines pushing past his lips.

“Preying on the weakest member of my pack to do your dirty work…” Everett spat at his father’s feet. “I always thought you were better than that.”

The closer he walked toward us, the better I could see the dark gold of his eyes. The swirls that usually spun idly around his irises were still. Black claws peeked out of his clenched fists; he was ready to shift at any time.

“You’re the one who keeps a wolf without fangs in your pack. Only as a favor to Beta Gavrill. It makes you weak, Everett,” the True Alpha said. “A son of the True Alpha cannot be weak. You should thank me for weeding him out. The pack is better off without him.”

The True Alpha’s grip tightened on my arm as he spoke. He seemed unaware that his own claws were extending, piercing my skin. I could tell Everett was continuing to get angrier with every single word he spoke.

“Your ineptitude embarrasses me. The land I gifted to you is dying.” The True Alpha motioned to the brown ground surrounding us with his free hand. “You have the Lifestone right under your nose.” I shrieked as he pulled me forward and shook me in front of Everett. “Your land is dying, yet you do nothing !”

Everett’s nostrils flared as he tried to keep his composure in front of his father.

“A weak leader,” he said. “You’re a weak leader who’s done nothing to save your pack’s land. I’m ashamed to call you my son.”

Something snapped in Everett’s composure. His claws fully lengthened, and black fur started spouting from his arms. Canines elongated in his mouth. He lunged at his father, careful to attack him away from where I was being held.

Laughing, the True Alpha batted him away with a white-clawed paw, having partially shifted. “You’ll have to try harder than that.”

Everett’s voice was nothing but a growl. “I don’t want to hurt you, Father. Just give me my mate.” Crouched on all fours, he continued shifting. Large black paws held his body up, black shiny claws digging into the ground. His arms had black fur on them, as did the bottom half of his legs. He was shaking so hard with the effort to stay in his human form that it looked painful.

His father looked and sounded fully entertained. He hadn’t seemed so enthused even at the opening of the Deca Tournament. “Oh, I think I will keep your little wolf. You see, I know what’s best for the pack. I know we must make sacrifices.”

My breathing stopped and my body froze at the last word.

“This little wolf is not what she seems.” He lifted my body like I was a rag doll and held me dangling by my arm as I squirmed. A low growl emanated from Everett’s throat. “I smelled her when she entered your land. An old breed. Not a lot of wolf blood flowing through her veins, yet it is still there.”

“I’ve never smelled wolf in her.” Everett came closer and took a deep breath through his nose, smelling me.

The True Alpha lowered me to the ground, and I stumbled, trying to find my footing. “Of course not. You’re too intrigued by the other smells emitting from your mate.” I gave him a disgusted look, and I once again tried to pull away. “But I can smell the small amount of wolf blood in her. I would guess there hasn’t been a fully bred wolf in her family for generations. But there is wolf in her.”

“I am not a wolf!” Screaming in frustration, I tried to pull away again. I didn’t get anywhere, just received more cuts on my arm from his claws. Everett prowled closer, growling at his father.

“You can’t help what you are, little wolf, but you can help me.” The True Alpha tried a different tactic, speaking at me slowly, in a soft tone. “Give me the stone. I can smell it on you.”

“I don’t have the fucking stone!” My frustration was reaching an all-time high. Everyone asking me for the stone, the one thing that would save me, the one thing I didn’t have.

“I’ve been searching for the stone for a hundred years,” the True Alpha said. “Ever since the witches took the stone from the tree, the land has been dying. The balance between life and death is crumbling. I’m sure you’ve noticed the surrounding death? The void of new life?” He gestured around the forest.

Walking toward Everett, the True Alpha dragged me along behind him. “Why do you think I continue the Deca Tournament? I send our best wolves to our many pack forests to search for the stone.” My body paused my struggle against the True Alpha, listening to his declaration. “I gave these lands to you, son. For you to rule and heal. Yet you did nothing, let the land continue to die around you. Soon there will be nothing left for you to rule.”

“I was told the Lifestone was nothing more than legend. A scary bedtime story involving witches and the death of pack lands,” Everett said. He had also gone still, listening to his father.

“Your mother did have a penchant for telling you stories. You ate them up as a pup. Too bad your mother was so soft. She made you soft—too soft to see what’s right in front of you.”

The talk of his mother had Everett shifting further. Two black ears popped up out of his head, his human ears sinking into his skull.

His father continued his discourse. “I knew the stone would find its way back. The witches love finding new ways to trick us. This time putting the stone right under our noses, with you being too much in lust to find it. I’m sure Matilda is sitting back laughing, watching this circus.”

His hand squeezed harder, plunging his nails deeper into my arm. I gasped as warm red liquid dripped down my arm and off my fingers, landing in a small puddle on the ground. “I’ll save your land for you because I am a leader, one who puts his pack before anything else. Maybe this will be the tale you’ll remember instead of the ones your mother told you.”

The True Alpha turned to me. “One more chance, little wolf. Give me the stone, or I will go searching for it.”

Glancing rapidly between Everett and his father, I looked for guidance. I didn’t have a stone with me or anything else but the clothes on my body. I was wearing a sports bra, leggings, and a T-shirt.

“I don’t have it.” My eyes squeezed closed. I didn’t want to see what was coming.

A sharp claw hooked the top of my shirt at the collarbone and made quick work, slicing it down my torso. The two halves of my shirt flapped away from my body, exposing my bare stomach and sports bra. Between my tight leggings and bra, there was nowhere else I could hide the stone. I opened my eyes, looking down at my bare torso. Using one hand, I tried to collect the two flaps of my shirt to cover myself.

The True Alpha chuckled at my attempts at modesty. “Not there. I wonder if you’re hiding it lower…” He extended a claw toward the waistband of my leggings as I pulled myself as far away as I could, shrieking and flapping my arms like a wounded bird.

This was Everett’s last straw. He shifted quickly into his full wolf and leapt at his father, looking terrifying. Long white teeth dripping with saliva and foam snapped close to the True Alpha’s arm.

His father grabbed onto a chunk of black fur and threw Everett’s wolf into a nearby tree. The movement took more effort than the first time he’d swatted at Everett. I was still in his clutches, being flung around with the momentum it took to drive Everett’s wolf into a tree.

Everett let out a yelp as his head hit the tree. His body slumped over on the ground, unconscious.

“Everett!” I cried out, seeing his large, black furry body limp.

A tremor rocked my brain, and the world around me shook. I held my hand against my head, trying to stabilize myself. It felt like a warning. Maybe this was part of the mating bond that felt emotions and pain. My mate was lying unconscious on the ground, and I was having a physical reaction to his pain.

As I rebalanced myself, the True Alpha stood beside me, growling at his son. I took a moment to take stock of the situation before me. If Everett, who was an alpha wolf, couldn’t take down his father, what chance did I have? There was no blood around Everett’s head, and I hoped his lack of consciousness would only be temporary. I was on my own for now.

The True Alpha had a look of confusion on his face, his mouth set in a scowl. He looked up and down my body, trying to determine where I could have hidden the stone. His eyes followed the trail of blood that was still dripping out of my arm where his nails had embedded into my skin. With his other hand, he swiped a drop of blood off my fingers before it hit the ground. Bringing his fingers to his nose, he sniffed the blood before opening his mouth and rubbing it into his pink gums.

“I should have known. You have the power of the stone inside of you.” He paced back and forth in the clearing, dragging me along with him. “That is why you could heal my son so quickly during the tournament.”

I looked down at my body, looking for any sign of this Lifestone inside of me. I didn’t feel any different. Healing and growing plants was just something I enjoyed, something I had learned to be good at. He must’ve been just as lost as Wilder. His eyes looked like Wilder’s had—crazed and jumpy. I needed Everett to wake up.

I tried to channel my fear, though I didn’t know what I was doing. Squinting my eyes at his body, I tried to send my fear to him mentally. Maybe sending my fear along the mating bond would wake him.

“You must have it hidden in a different location. Somewhere you can take the stone out and hold it, letting the power seep into your bloodstream. I will find it, little wolf. Don’t you worry.” The True Alpha held me at an arm’s length away, staring at me knowingly. “You’re just another clue in this scavenger hunt I’m on.”

He dragged me toward the giant oak tree where the rot flowed from. I dug my heels into the ground the best I could to slow him, but it didn’t work.

“Your blood will do for now. It will temporarily heal the forest until I can find the Lifestone and replace it.” He threw me back against the oak tree.

Terrified, I watched as his index finger extended, sporting a long, sharp claw he clearly intended to bleed me with. Below my feet was a hole in the dirt at the trunk of the tree, and next to it was a black rock the size of a baseball.

“That’s where you should aim.” Everett’s father pointed toward the empty hole where the missing Lifestone was supposed to rest. “There must be balance, Elise. I apologize, but sacrificing you is necessary to restore some stability.”

I squirmed against the tree, throwing my body haphazardly around in a last-ditch effort to escape. “Everett! Wake up!” I yelled. I only ended up tiring myself, cutting up my back against the hard bark of the tree.

“When he realizes that you have been sacrificed, he’ll be upset with me. But he’ll eventually thank me,” the True Alpha said. “It’s for the good of the pack.”

I let out a guttural scream as the True Alpha manipulated my body so my blood would run into the empty hole when he cut me open. I wasn’t willing to be sacrificed for some magical missing rock. His hand moved from my arm to around my neck, gripping it tightly. My arms dripped blood from the gashes that his had claws left. My airway constricted to where I could only draw in a thin stream of oxygen. He pushed the side of his hip against my pelvis, rendering me immobile. I grabbed his arm that was holding my neck with my hands, scratching and pulling. Anything to get him to release me.

“Keep squirming, little wolf. Your increased heartbeat will make the blood flow quicker.” With his free hand, he took a single black claw and held it to the largest artery in my neck.

I could feel my blood pulsing underneath his finger. I squeezed my eyes shut, still scratching and grabbing at his arm.

A sharp pain traveled through my body as the claw sliced through my neck. Blood flowed freely out of the cut, pumping steadily out of my body and onto the ground. Every pulse of my heartbeat left me weaker and weaker. My ability to fight rapidly left me as I wilted.

“There you go, little wolf,” he said. “Let me move you a little so we don’t waste any of that precious liquid.”

I felt my body being lifted and tilted so my head was closer to the ground, the flow of blood increasing with the new position of my body. My eyelids relaxed with the rest of my body, and surrendering to sleep became tempting. I could hear the dripping of my blood hit the red puddle that had accumulated in the hole next to the tree. I aimlessly wondered how much blood I had in my body. I was starting to feel cold.

“Sshhhh…” The True Alpha’s whisper hit my ears.

I didn’t even know that I’d been talking. My body was lifeless. My mind was empty. And I was gone.

My body hit the ground hard. The sound of my head hitting the forest floor echoed in my brain.

At least I would die where I was the most at peace.