The Werewolf of Marines Trilogy

by Jonathan P. Brazee

  Rookie mistake!

  Aiden swung his damaged right leg back and rammed in under Wais’ right hind leg, flattening the Prime Alpha on his belly and giving him full exposure to Wais’ neck. He cranked hard, pushing his forehead into the top of Wais’ skull, driving it down while pulling up with his arm. Wais’ trachea was squeezed shut, cutting off his air while Aiden cranked harder and harder.

  An inherent characteristic of the Tribe, was what Aiden had thought of as lycan primacy. They all assumed that being a varg was better than being a human, and being a lycan was better than being a varg. A lycan was the pinnacle of existence.

  Aiden, however, maybe because he hadn’t been raised in the tribal environment that taught his hierarchy, thought of all three forms as part of the whole, none superior nor inferior to the other. While a varg, he had felt an inherent need to appease Zakia while she was a lycan, but that same feeling was not there while as a human.

  And although even humans tended not to believe it, a full-grown man was more than a match for any dog—or wolf. A pack would be another story, but a man could kill a pitbull, a German shepherd, even a mastiff if he just kept his head and used his abilities, and a mastiff was more than a match for a wolf. Granted, a lycan was much stronger than a natural wolf, but as a blood, Aiden was much stronger than a normal man.

  The spectators in the stands were probably astounded, but in this position, Aiden should be able to persevere. It would not be a miracle but rather the logical conclusion.

  Wais, struggling under him, probably didn’t agree with that. Aiden felt the body shudder under him, and he realized that Wais was shifting. It wasn’t a smooth shift, probably due to a lack of oxygen, but Aiden didn’t think he could choke out a varg. He’d have to shift as well and take the fight to another level, and that was something he didn’t want to do.

  Instead of choking out Wais, he had to finish it. With a huge effort, using every muscle in his body, he pulled as hard as he could. Wais started spasming, his shift stopped, when with an audible crack, his neck snapped.

  Aiden didn’t let up, holding the limp body tight, making sure there was no coming back for the Prime Alpha—the former Prime Alpha.

  He was vaguely aware of feet landing in the arena, but even if others were coming to save Wais, he swore it would be too late. Wais was not going to survive the fight.

  “Aiden, Aiden,” a voice said.

  Still in the death lock, he looked up to see Hozan standing there. In back of him, Claire landed in the arena, falling back on her ass before she scrambled back to her feet to run at him.

  “You’ve won. You’re the Prime Alpha.”

  Chapter 45

  Keenan looked down at the dead varg at his feet, his heart pounding. All his life, Keenan had prepared for combat, from attending West Point to being the honor graduate at Ranger School. He’d been on the cusp of leading his company into Iraq during the invasion, but a stupid Humvee accident cost him that opportunity as well as his leg. Now, as a lieutenant colonel, he had finally tasted it.

  All soldiers thought about combat and hoped they’d pass the test when it came. Most probably feared not injury or death, but in letting down their comrades. Keenan had the same misgivings, and to be blunt, to have passed the test filled him with joy.

  He knew he should feel bad for the man he’d just killed, for taking the top of the man’s head off with the modified Desert Eagle .44 Magnum he carried, modified by taking off the trigger guard and adding a varg-friendly extension to the trigger itself, but whether it was the varg proclivity to aggression or just the soldier in him finally being released, he was on top of the world.

  Two of the three vargs who had come rushing down the corridor were now dead. The third had fled. Each had sneeringly issued challenges when they had stopped them from proceeding to the arena. Each had most likely assumed the challenges would be accepted, but Keenan didn’t play by their rules, just as they hadn’t when they had murdered the five councils before the old Prime Alpha had been challenged.

  Keenan had given the three a single warning to turn back, a warning that had not been heeded. As the point man in the blocking force, Keenan had been the closest to the three, and when the first lunged at him, Keenan met him, slamming into his chest while he drew the Desert Eagle, put it to the varg’s chin, and pulled the trigger. The second varg was swarmed under by three of the villagers and hacked to pieces.

  Keenan wanted to roar to the world that he, Keenan Ward, the one-legged soldier, had passed the test. He glanced down at the thick, muscled leg where his prosthetic had been for the last eight years. For reasons unknown, when he shifted, he had a leg again, and when he shifted back, it was back to his stump.

  Two village vargs came running back up the passage. One gave Keenan a thumbs up, the gesture they’d just been taught. Keenan knew the blood at the door into the arena had been neutralized.

  Killed, not neutralized! he told himself. We are soldiers!

  But their mission wasn’t over. They couldn’t stand there and admire their handiwork. Aiden was counting on them.

  Motioning for the others to follow, he took off down the corridor to the chute.

  Chapter 46

  Nikolai Borisov looked down at the arena in shock. Somehow, the kreuzung Kaas had challenged Wais, and not only avoided First Rights challengers, but defeated the Prime Alpha—and as a human! It was inconceivable!

  He looked at the woman who had stood guard on the door. She was Pashtun, and something told him he knew where she was from. Nikolai had tried to eliminate her village, and it had cost him dearly. Now, they were out in the open? They were no longer feral? And worse of all, allies of the new Prime Alpha?

  Nikolai’s world had turned upside down, and he didn’t like that. He’d come to Germany and decided to see how the great game was played. In Samarkand, he was the big fish, and while he had visions of becoming the big fish here, he was smart enough to know he was out of his depth. With the girl’s damned tribe under the Prima Alpha’s protection now, even his hold on the Hindu Kush was now in jeopardy.

  Nikolai was smart enough to know when to cut his losses. He slipped behind the Pashtun dogs and fled the arena. It was back home for him, and out of the tribal games. He’d get home, consolidate his power, and leave Afghanistan alone.

  Chapter 47

  Hozan and Claire helped Aiden to his feet. He stared up at the crowd, most who seemed stunned into silence. Any of them could challenge him, and at the moment, he wasn’t sure he could manage another fight. His knee was killing him, and that might encourage a challenger. Technically, no one could challenge him until he formally assumed the title of Prime Alpha, but his plans were laid out.

  “I am Aiden Kaas!” he shouted out with the words in which Hozan had coached him. “I have challenged and defeated Günter Wais, and I now claim Prime Alpha!”

  No one objected.

  “So before the gathered, does anyone challenge me for the right?”

  The crowd was probably stunned, but a few up there in the gallery looked own at him as if contemplating their chances.

  “I challenge you as Prime Alpha!” a voice shouted from just behind him.

  Aiden turned to see Hozan standing tall.

  Shouts broke out in the gallery, but Aiden just looked at Hozan, his friend, his mentor, and the father he’d never had.

  With a heavy voice, he said, “I accept your challenge.

  “Claire, please move to the side.”

  Claire nodded and left, but not before hugging him tightly, whispering, “I’m waiting for you.”

  Hozan took off his clothing, kicking them aside as Aiden had done. He shifted immediately to his lycan, and stood there, waiting.

  Aiden looked up to the gallery, where people were moving forward, crowding the wall. With a sigh, he pulled together his energy reserves and shifted.

  Chapter 48

  Aiden stood for a moment, looking at Hozan. He was not used to lycan expressions, but he thought there was
sadness in the old werewolf’s eyes. Aiden felt the same way. This was not the fairy tale ending he would have liked

  Time to get this done, he thought

  Walking up to Hozan, he stopped, his nose inches from Hozan’s. He hesitated, then flopped on his back, legs up, his throat exposed. Hozan stepped forward and took Aiden’s throat in his jaws.

  Aiden tilted his head and licked the side of Hozan’s face.

  Hozan stepped back and shifted to human.

  Aiden scrambled to his feet and shifted as well before stepping up to stand by the new Prime Alpha.

  The crowd was agitated, that was clear. Thrown more than a few curves this evening, many seemed confused, and more than a few were angry.

  “That’s not a fight!” someone yelled out.

  Fights for the Prime Alpha always ended in death—or did they? Hozan had done some checking, and the old group that prided themselves on keeping the traditions had confirmed that any fight could be yielded. Local tribe leaders often yielded to sons or daughters, allowing the next generation to take over without bloodshed, and it was no different for Prime Alpha, even if it hadn’t been exercised for years, maybe centuries. Some of those in the crowd undoubtedly knew that, but others were ignorant, and upset that there was no bloodshed, or maybe upset at Aiden for killing Wais, and looked about to react violently.

  “I have challenged the Prime Alpha, and he has yielded. I claim Prime Alpha!

  “Before I ask if there are more challengers, though, let me break tradition and say this. Our people are in trouble. We formed the Council to protect our very existence, but we have turned against ourselves in obscene quests for power. Just a week ago, five members of the Council were murdered, not challenged, but murdered like animals. We all know that, and we know who instigated it,” Hozan said, pointing at Wais’ dead body. “Yet we let it happen.

  “We hunt down and kill tribes simply because they are feral, because they want to live alone and isolated. We sit here in this castle and sentence people to die because they have not been introduced to our ways and guided in how to act,” he went on, pointing to the village vargs who, with Keenan, were now entering the arena through the chute door.

  “Meanwhile, mankind grows stronger every day. Their means of dispensing death far exceeds our own. But we are part of mankind, and if we don’t want to disappear, maybe we need to work with them.”

  A roar came over the crowd, and Hozan held up his hand to silence them.

  “I don’t mean we should all go on BBC or CNN and announce that we are here. But perhaps there are some ways to initiate contact with the human leaders. I don’t know. I’m just a mountain Kurd, but we have many bright minds in the Tribe. But I do know wrong is wrong, and evil is evil.

  “My contact with Aiden Kaas, the very person that Günter Wais wanted to kill only because he was supported by Nemir Muhmood, and my contact with others I have met, have shown me that the old ways might not be the right ways. If we can become part of the solution to the evil in the world, our security is assured. We will survive as a people.

  “So before I ask if there are any challengers, I ask you to give me a chance. I am an old man, and I see many among you who could kill me easily. I won’t even fight you if you do challenge. But I do have a plan, one I want to develop with all of you, that I believe in my heart will save us from ourselves. I will not attempt to force my plan, but merely offer it where we, as a people, can accept it or not.”

  Hozan stopped his speech and looked to be about to say something else, but instead, he looked back up at the gallery.

  “So now, I ask you, before the gathered, does anyone challenge me for the right?”

  This was the moment Aiden had been dreading ever since they’d worked out this convoluted plan. All four of them had come to the conclusion that Aiden would be challenged, if not immediately, then soon. He couldn’t get around his ancestry, and others would see him as an easy target. He had to defeat Wais to save his life, and probably Claire’s and Keenan’s as well. But he had to give up the Prim Alpha if he wanted to keep living.

  Hozan had volunteered to take his place, but Aiden had refused. It had taken the others several hours to break Aiden down, but he had to admit that Hozan had a better chance of avoiding a challenge. But a better chance did not mean it was assured.

  The eleven Leewekhel vargs, led by Keenan, stepped forward to form a semi-circle around Hozan, Aiden, and Claire. The message was clear, but a challenge was one-on-one. The implied threat might not be enough.

  But maybe it was. Several people looked tempted, but not one issued a challenge. Hozan was Prime Alpha!

  Epilogue

  Aiden stood in the hangar at Ramstein wondering how he’d gotten to this place in time. It really wasn’t that long ago that he was in Iraq, hating every minute of being a Marine and thinking of ways he could get home and on the VA feeding trough. Now, he was not only proud to be a Marine, not only engaged to a woman he loved, but he was werewolf who’d just overturned the status quo.

  Claire and Keenan were talking, and Hozan was giving some last minute instructions of some sort to Kashmala. Ten of the Leewekhelians were on their way home—Izat would be staying with Hozan as a representative of the tribe and to learn what he could.

  Aiden, Keenan, and Claire had a hop back to Dover in an hour before catching a commercial flight from there to DC. Dr. Lowenstein had given the three a remarkable amount of support and free reign, but it was time to pay the piper. Aiden didn’t know what would be expected of them, but Keenan assured him that any mission would be vital to the country, and nothing they did would threaten the Tribe.

  One thing Aiden had requested, though, was that he’d be back with Marines. He admired the other services, and Fort Bragg was a remarkable base, but he’d become a die-hard Marine, bleeding green. With two-thirds of the American military werewolf contingent being Marines, he thought it was only fair, even if Keenan had the rank. Quantico was close enough to DC, he reasoned.

  And far enough from the flagpole to have some independence.

  Hozan, finished with Kashmala, and walked up to Aiden as they watched the villagers happily pick up their box lunches. Aiden had been excited the first time he’d had one, too, so he guessed it was just the novelty, one that had quickly worn off.

  “They going to be OK?” Aiden asked.

  “Sure. I think this will be good for them, to be part of the greater good.”

  “Will it be the greater good, though? They were pretty happy before.”

  Hozan seemed to think it over before saying, “I will try to make it the greater good, Aiden Kaas. I will try.”

  “And what about you? We won’t be here with you.”

  “I may be old, but I have a few tricks left. And Izat is becoming very protective. Besides that, I’ve been feeling my way. There are many who think like we do. Most were afraid or too lazy to say, so my task is to bring them out.”

  “But all it takes is one challenge to undo everything.”

  “And I will win, or I will lose. That is the way of life. We knew that before we came here.”

  “But I don’t want to lose you,” Aiden said, tears beginning to form.

  “You will never lose me, son. You are now part of me, no matter what happens to my earthly body. You are my true son.”

  That hit Aiden. His real father, the one who had bequeathed him with his lycanthropic genes, had abused his mother before abandoning them. Aiden had always considered himself past that, but with Hozan, he realized what he’d missed all these years without a father, and he knew the mountain Kurd had become the father of the Las Vegas punk-ass dweeb. And he couldn’t have been happier.

  He started to reach to shake Hozan’s hand, but Hozan, collected, unemotional Hozan, pulled him in for a hug.

  Damn I’m going to miss him!

  They broke their hug, and silently turned back to watch the villagers getting ready to take the flightline bus to the plane. They had undergone a pretty big transformatio
n as well, and Aiden felt he was responsible. He hoped their support had not been a mistake.

  They were getting in a line, but Kashmala broke free and made her way to Aiden, her eyes filled with determination.

  “Uh-oh,” Hozan said. “I think Keenan needs me.”

  “Coward,” Aiden said to this retreating back.

  “Uh, hi Kashmala,” Aiden said, plastering a smile on his face.

  “Aiden Kaas, I have something to say.”

  “Yes?”

  Aiden tried to keep his eyes on hers instead of the large expanse of cleavage that threatened to burst free of her blouse. Yes, her eyes were better, her green, green eyes, eyes in which a man could drown.

  Fuck, Aiden! Claire’s right over there. And shit, she’s looking at us! Shit, shit!

  “You must know that I am very much good to you. I want to be with you.”

  He was amazed at how much better her English had become in only a few short days. And she was hot, oh so hot. He was a normal man, and he couldn’t help it if a few fantasies crept in the way.

  “But I am engaged to be married, Kashmala. You’ve met Claire,” he said, turning to catch Claire’s eyes and making a big show of smiling at her.

  Claire said something to Keenan, then started walking over.

  “Yes, this I know. But for me, this is not problem.”

  “I don’t think . . . wait, you say that is not a problem? If I’m married?” Aiden asked, confused.

  “No. I wish to be Number 1 wife, but I know this is not to be. Claire is to be Number 1. But in my country, men can have four wives. I will be Number 2. I will obey Claire in all things. This is not problem I think.”

  To his horror, Claire was standing in back of Kashmala, and he knew she’d heard every word. He tensed, waiting for the explosion.

  Instead, to his shock, Claire, his Claire, the strong—and headstrong—Marine, put her arm around Kashmala’s shoulders.