Now, though, I knew the Tribunal would rule against us if they caught wind of our pack attacking a named guest (unfair game), three against one (unfair fight), with the deadly force we'd need to end his current threat (unfair losses).
But I also knew that tonight's stakes were even higher than they'd been during Justin's last foray. Back in the winter, the jealous alpha had threatened to do our pack grievous harm...but now he menaced the safety of werewolves everywhere. Given the intruder's apparent interest in and knowledge of F2F, my wolf and I both knew that we couldn't allow Justin to leave Haven alive.
"Feeling toothless?" the shifter in question taunted as his three opponents stood poised but indecisive by the door. "Have you finally realized that your big bad wolf can't bark me down? No idea how to proceed when you're not the strongest shifter in the room?"
As my brother-in-law spoke, I begged my wolf for a little extra oomph. And as she pulled us into the half-wolf state in which her senses were on full alert within our human body, I noticed a second detail that my mate must have taken in right away.
Somehow over the last fifteen hours, Justin's lupine half seemed to have doubled in inner fortitude. So where I'd once thought our intruder easy to overcome with a simple alpha compulsion, now I wasn't even sure that Wolfie and I could have defanged the intruder if we'd been fully joined by a claiming moon and had been working seamlessly in tandem. Without that unity, there was no point in even trying to overcome the powerful intruder using speech alone.
But while I yearned to find out why and how Justin's inner wolf had been bolstered so dramatically in just a few short hours, Wolfie was still worrying the issue of his brother's purpose here in Haven. "So you just came by for a chat?" my mate prodded. "Let me guess. You're still so shaken up by your label of the older brother who always lags behind in every race that you figured out how to put your inner wolf on steroids and came by to gloat about that false sense of power. Lame, big brother. Lame."
As he spoke, I saw at last what my mate was trying to do. Wolfie was using the same childhood rivalry that had riled his own inner wolf in an effort to jolt Justin out of his gloating sense of security and onto a path of explanation. And, to my surprise, the tactic worked.
"Steroids?" A humorless chuckle filled the darkened room as Justin shifted his grandfather's sword a little closer to his hostage's tender skin. Behind me, Fen shuffled her feet ever so quietly in reaction and I reached back to touch her arm gently by way of reply. The alpha gesture of calming a jittery wolf was surprisingly natural to me now, and Fen stilled beneath my hand.
Before us, Justin was still rankling at his brother's accusation. "I don't need steroids to build up my wolf," he said angrily. "In case you haven't noticed, I'm already twice as strong as every other alpha at All-Pack."
And his statement was technically true...now that my brother-in-law had broken our regional gathering in two, dragging the weaker clans along in his wake as he formed his very own All-Pack. But that still didn't mean our intruder's powers had held a candle to Wolfie's the previous morning, despite my mate having recently siphoned off a good deal of his own alpha dominance to top mine up. So what had changed between then and now?
"Justin the jerk," Wolfie bantered, his voice light and airy despite the way his lupine half snarled and pranced beneath his skin. On the surface, my mate appeared as serene as always, but the evidence of my own wolf senses proved that his reactions were on a hair trigger. I just hoped our opponent wasn't savvy enough to draw the same conclusion.
Luckily, it appeared that the latter hadn't spent enough time with a strong inner wolf to learn the beast's full repertoire while furless. Because Justin merely listened with narrowing eyes as my mate continued to draw his brother into a verbal snare.
"I can see you making a note in that extra-small brain of yours," Wolfie continued. Then he raised his voice into a falsetto as he mimicked the words that he believed ran through his brother's head. "'Check to see if steroids actually do expand your wolf's powers.'"
Lowering his tone back to its usual deep register, my mate laid his trap. "Well, I'll do you a favor and save you the effort of looking up big words in a medical dictionary. Our resident doctor tested a variety of drugs and found that steroids don't work on shifters at all. They go right through you, like a laxative...or like the threats of a weakling bully."
But Justin didn't bite. "Your resident doctor," he mused smoothly, seemingly unmoved by his brother's taunting. I shivered, not liking how the tables had turned. Usually, my mate was the calm, collected opponent whose strength saved the day. So why was Justin now able to ignore the mockery streaming out of his sibling's mouth?
The answer came from our intruder's own lips, brought there at last by Wolfie's relentless teasing. "Speaking of dear old Doctor Dale, I had hours to explore what your strange little pack was up to while you were all dancing around campfires and fêting werewolves unworthy of the name," Justin continued. "And do you know what I discovered?"
To make his point, the shifter held up the syringe he'd been holding in his left hand, causing moonlight from the window to glint off the metallic tip. And as he did so, I finally saw something I should have noticed before. The reservoir of the syringe was empty.
"Your good doctor has developed quite an intriguing drug," Justin said, his lips quirking up into a full-blown sneer at last. "But he didn't think to test out the medication's potential side effects. Shifting a werewolf against his or her will? What's the point when any alpha worth his salt can do the same?
"Probably even your pet alpha-ette can force a shift," the invading alpha finished, nodding in my direction. From his previous lack of interest in the activity by the door, I'd hoped that Justin was only aware of Wolfie's presence and that Fen and I would eventually be able to slip beneath his defenses unnoticed. But it now appeared even that sally was doomed to failure.
"No," my brother-in-law continued in a thoughtful tone, ignoring the anger emanating from his brother and the tension radiating from the other shifters in the room. "So-called F2F is useless as currently envisioned. But I decided to try a dose myself this evening. And guess what? Your doctor's boring little drug does have a purpose after all. It makes an already dominant wolf much more powerful. And every time you inject yourself, you grow stronger yet."
When Justin paused to let us fully soak up his words, my wolf and I pushed our enhanced vision to its limit and peered closer at the scene atop our bed. And as we did so, we saw that our intruder didn't possess only a single syringe. Yes, Justin was only holding one implement in his fist, but the entire top of the quilt was littered with needles that Dale had readied for his next round of testing.
There must have been at least twenty doses arrayed across the bed...or, rather, those doses' delivery devices were arrayed across the bed. The drugs in question were instead flowing through Justin's veins.
So that's why he's so powerful, I thought. And here I'd assumed the situation couldn't get any worse.
And why he's so crazy, too, my wolf murmured silently.
As usual, she was right. The hint of erratic aggression that had been lurking beneath my father's skin ever since the Chief had tracked me down in the woods six months earlier was ten times as evident in the lupine half of the shifter before us. And just as I realized that Justin was yet less rational than he'd been the last time we'd met, our opponent woke Lantana by jerking the little girl abruptly up into his lap.
"So what do I want, you ask?" the menacing shifter continued. "I want you to beg and plead for me to relinquish this spineless baby into your tender, loving care. I want you to offer a trade of hostages—my wife, my child, your own heart served on up a silver platter. I want you to admit that I've won, that there's nothing you can do to stop me now unless I choose to rein in my temper."
Then, bringing his grandfather's blade up to lie across the squalling baby's neck, Justin made his final move. "Yes, I want all that...and then I want to throw your defeat back in your face and tell you t
hat you possess nothing I desire. I want to watch this miniature travesty's blood spurt out across your marriage bed. And then I want to watch you cry.
"So," Justin finished, mocking his younger brother with every word and gesture, "what are you going to do to stop me?"
Chapter 20
"Wolfie isn't going to do anything about it. But I am."
The new voice came from behind my back and was entirely unexpected by my human brain. But my wolf had apparently been monitoring our surroundings more carefully than I had, and she quickly caught me up on why my human brother thought he was capable of saving the day single-handedly against an alpha werewolf with a big, sharp sword.
Ethan and Fen have a plan, she told me succinctly. Before Wolfie's infusion of power, my wolf and I had never been able to share our senses so seamlessly, but now my lupine half had apparently developed the ability to look and listen to features of our landscape that were beyond my conscious focus. So the ever-alert wolf had no problem running back through what she'd seen and heard while my human half had been focused intently on the danger in front of us.
Apparently, Fen had taken advantage of Wolfie's and Justin's chat by stepping outside the bedroom long enough to gather up my brother. And, together, the two must have cooked up some course of action before reentering the room. Or so my wolf assumed when Ethan strode empty-handed but full of bantering words toward the danger poised to behead a small child atop my great grandmother's hand-stitched quilt.
"For threatening a pack member who can't defend herself, I plan to claw out your eyes and rip off your fingernails," Ethan said coolly as he paced forward. His human pupils almost certainly couldn't make out the features of his surroundings, so I held my breath, hoping the teenager wouldn't trip as he advanced upon our enemy. Good thing I'd picked my shoes up off the floor earlier that afternoon.
"And for kicking your own daughter across the floor on the day she was born, I'll break every bone in your fingers and use hot pokers to singe off your eyebrows," my brother continued. Despite my appreciation of his efforts, my stomach was becoming queasy at Ethan's mere words. Still, the threats appeared to be providing the desired effect. Because Justin sat frozen in place, Lantana having crawled off his lap as his arms relaxed their hold in surprise at the verbal attack.
"Then for treating your mate like a pawn instead of like a person, I'm going to open up your belly and tease out your intestines one by one just to see how far they'll stretch," Ethan said as he neared the bed, step by forceful step.
Even as I watched, frozen in place, I spared a thought to hope that my brother was getting these words from scary TV shows. Note to self: remove all television sets from the Barn in the near future, my human brain rambled aimlessly.
Why? my wolf demanded. He's doing a fine job. And look at Fen.
My lupine half was right...and was far more attuned to the relevant facets of this strange scene. Because Justin's attention remained trained upon the human teenager who walked into the mouth of danger as if he were the world's strongest wolf. Meanwhile, the female yahoo was drifting unnoticed around the other side of the room, hugging the wall as she neared our opponent from behind his back.
I slid a questioning glance toward my mate, and it was almost as if we were able to speak within each other's minds. We don't know exactly what they're planning, Wolfie appeared to be thinking. But they're doing an excellent job of it. So let's not do anything to rock the boat.
So even though I itched to change into lupine form and assist either my brother—whose job I was assuming was to be a red herring—or Fen—who I hoped was planning on sweeping away Lantana as soon as the opportunity presented itself—I instead waited and watched.
Meanwhile, my wolf expanded our senses out yet further, so we could now hear and smell the other werewolves hovering on the other side of our bedroom door. Fen had apparently alerted the entire village when she went out to collect Ethan, but the female yahoo must have figured that fewer shifters in the room was better during a hostage situation. So the remainder of our pack held themselves in poised anticipation, their nervous tension roiling through the air.
Fen's decision was evidently a good one. Because Justin's inner wolf was becoming more and more agitated with each step and word that Ethan took, and I half expected our intruder to rip through his clothes at any moment and rush my brother with fangs and claws. Instead, with an effort of will that likely wouldn't have been possible before twenty doses of F2F increased his animal half's dominance, my brother-in-law merely responded verbally to Ethan's taunting.
"You're going to do all this?" Justin asked, the words mocking but his tone not quite mirroring the disbelief he was trying to convey. "You? A half-blood werewolf who can't shift into lupine form at all without the help of drugs? I knew my brother had given his pack of misfits unrealistic visions of their self-worth, but this takes the cake."
By now, Ethan was nearly close enough to extend his arm and touch his opponent on the shoulder, and Fen was not much more distant on the other side of the bed. But before my own pack members could make their move, an eddy of air currents must have finally brought Fen's scent to Justin's nostrils. Because he whirled in place, alert to the lurking danger at last.
As the intruder spun, the family sword clattered forgotten to the floor at the foot of the bed. And for a moment, I thought the threat was finally over.
But then my brother-in-law exploded into lupine form, shreds of cloth pushed away from his body so forcefully by the near-uber-alpha speed of his shift that they rained down across the entire room like confetti. Growling menacingly, Justin's wolf stilled us all again with a single gesture. He placed one huge paw atop Lantana's back, pushing the infant deep into the covers so her angry cries were muffled by the quilt.
And then, before anyone could move against the shifter's effort to smother a baby, I smelled yet another danger wafting in on the breeze.
***
The uber-alpha padded ghost-like into the room. Both his scent and his bearing had changed since the previous morning, the aroma of sassafras less spicy now that our visitor was being called upon to serve the will of the Tribunal in a punitary setting. Instead, the bone-chilling flavor of frigid spring water seemed to fill my mouth, like a scent so strong it had turned into a taste.
Evidently, the nameless Tribunal member was annoyed at being forced to return to Haven to deal with our piddling dramas. Or so it seemed as his eyes swept across the room, taking in each participant's actions. Wolfie and I were still frozen in place, unsure whether our addition to the drama would help or hinder our pack mates. Ethan was injecting himself with F2F, his clothes falling to the floor beneath the body of a wolf I'd seen only twice before. And Fen was rushing toward our foe in human form, having snatched up the sword that had been passed down through the male lineage of Wolfie's family for generations and now holding the weapon two-handed above her head as she moved in for the kill.
Grandfather's sword is meant to be used to protect our pack, Wolfie had told me eighteen hours earlier when I asked him how an object—albeit a historical one—could be important enough to risk inflaming his brother's well-documented malicious streak. The rest of my mate's explanation had been equally simple and powerful: The sword is a symbol of my duties as an alpha. How could I relinquish that symbol?
Like her pack leader, Fen had clearly taken up the challenge along with the weapon and had proven my own assessment of the situation wrong in the process. Because when my brother first walked into the room, I'd assumed the female yahoo simply planned to yank Lantana away from the half-crazed shifter while my brother distracted Justin's attention. But I saw now that Fen had a more deadly goal in mind. Ethan was the one who had been set in charge of rescuing the defenseless infant. Meanwhile, the Barn rats' unanimously elected leader had taken upon herself the lofty goal of saving our entire pack and all of werewolf-kind in one fell swoop.
And how did Fen plan to defeat our enemy once and for all? Through the simple action of skewerin
g Justin with his ancestral sword and then watching him cough out his life's breath.
The plan was simple and brave. And five minutes earlier I would have cheered my young friend on.
But now, with the nameless uber-alpha breathing down my neck, I understood that there would be no wiggle room if we broke shifter law a second time. If our pack killed a supposedly harmless guest within plain view of a Tribunal member, then someone would have to pay the price.
Those thoughts roiling through my mind, I called out a sharp "No!" just as Ethan sprang and Fen lunged. There had to be another way to protect Lantana and neutralize the threat that my brother-in-law represented, one that didn't put us all in danger at the teeth of the uber-alpha standing at my back.
Wolfie apparently disagreed with my assessment. In the seconds I'd spent looking away from my mate, he'd shifted into lupine form, and even now he was racing toward the melee as quickly as four paws would take him. So, ignoring the uber-alpha and my own misgivings, I ran two-legged to join my mate.
But I could see that both Wolfie and I were much too distant to impact the resolution of this drama. Because it seemed that there really wasn't any way to save Lantana other than to follow the plan that the female yahoo had set into motion. The infant's cries had become more frantic while I wavered in the doorway. But now they abruptly quieted, causing my throat to swell with anticipated sorrow.
No! It can't be too late!
Tribunal be damned, I was glad now that I hadn't thought to push alpha compulsion into my voice while yelling negation. Instead, I vowed that, if Fen could save the infant's defenseless life before the hostage suffocated against the soft fabric, then I'd accept whatever punishment the uber-alpha doled out.
The only question was—could Ethan and Fen take Justin down while Lantana's heart still beat? Or would they also be too late?
Alpha Ascendant: A Fantastical Werewolf Adventure (Wolf Rampant Book 3) Page 14