by Ellis Leigh
He approached the little human slowly, carefully, keeping his steps light. She didn’t cower or shrink back, which Luc took as a good sign. Once he reached her, he dropped to his knees so he could look her in the eye.
Cassiel took control of the conversation. “You’re not a biologist.”
“No.”
“Is your name even Luc?”
“It’s what my friends call me,” he said, knowing how bad this all looked. “My real name is Lucifer.”
Cassiel blinked, her head rising a little. “Like the devil.”
“Like the demon—the fallen angel—yes. Though, I’ve carried many names over the years as languages have died and been reborn.”
“You’re immortal?”
“No. Not how humans believe. We simply live a very long time.”
“How long?”
“Hard to say. I’m not even sure exactly what year I was born.”
“But it was a long time ago?”
He shrugged, time being such a relative thing. “Handfuls of centuries, I guess.”
Her huff of laughter carried a tone of sarcasm that was undeniable. “Why did you lie?”
Luc inched closer, softening his voice. “Do you really have to ask that?”
Because he’d seen her hate and fear of the animal he carried within him. He’d heard how much she hated those predators in her woods. How she didn’t trust them. Why did he lie? How could he not?
Cassiel sat and stared for a long time, looking for something Luc had no way to give her. At least not until she said, “You’re a wolf.”
Not a question. A statement. A demand of his agreement.
Luc nodded once. “Yes, but only sometimes.”
Cassiel huffed, angry, pulling her arms tighter around herself as if in protection. “I want to go home now.”
This would not go well. “You can’t.”
She stabbed him with a look filled with fire, with anger. With fight. “Why the hell not?”
“Because there are more wolves, shifters like me, in the forest. It’s why I came up here. They’re here, they’re coming this way, and they’re dangerous.”
“So? You’re dangerous.”
“Not to you, I’m not.”
That softened her a little, though she didn’t seem the least bit happy. Something Luc had a feeling he’d be paying penance on for a long damn time.
“What about my dogs?”
“Taken care of.” Thaus—bad attitude and all—stormed in at that moment, looking positively livid but bringing the sled dogs with him. “Bez said to bring these little ones inside.”
Luc sat back, letting the dogs swarm Cassiel. Letting her reunite with her team. Her family. “Thank you, Thaus.”
But the shifter didn’t turn and walk away. He stared hard at Luc, his lip curling in a sneer as he asked, “Is this it? Are they coming here?”
There was no way for Luc to deny that fact. “Yes.”
“Ariel is here. My son.” Thaus clenched his hands into fists, looking ready to tear the roof off the house. “You invited Ariel here with our child.”
There was no way for Luc to argue that. “I know.”
Thaus took a deep breath, the rage inside him a physical force banging its way inside Luc’s head. All his brothers seemed to be experiencing stronger emotions than usual, which shouldn’t have surprised Luc. Every one of them was worried.
Thaus especially, it seemed. “I’ll deal with you later. After the fight.” He turned and stormed out of the house, heading back out into the night with Levi on his heels.
“Your friends are mad at you,” Cassiel said as she sat with Moxie in her lap.
What Luc wouldn’t give for one stroke of that hand on his skin. Alas, he had not earned that back yet. “They are. They’re afraid for their mates.”
“I’m afraid for my dogs.”
“I know. But they’re inside and safe.” And he would do anything to keep it that way. “You can take them upstairs with you.”
“You’re sending me upstairs?”
“Wolves are coming. Bad ones.” He reached for her, checking his motions when she flinched back. “I just want to keep you safe.”
The woman seemed pissed, seemed so angry with him, but she still leaned forward. Still gave him a tiny kiss on the lips. One that made his wolf howl and his skin go molten.
But then she spoke. “I am so mad at you.”
“You have a right to be.” Luc stole one more kiss before rising to his feet. “Go. Stay up there. I promise to talk more after I deal with what’s coming.”
But Cassiel was not a woman to be told what to do. “What if I don’t want you to talk to me? What if I leave as soon as this fight is over instead?”
Stunned, heartbroken, his wolf howling inside him, Luc said the only words he could think of. “I would honor your wishes, of course. Even if the very thought of losing a single minute with you makes my heart want to die right here in my chest.”
Cassiel didn’t respond. She simply stared at him for a long moment, then headed for the stairs with her six dogs trailing behind her. Leaving Luc with his pack. Well, most of them.
“Sariel, Charmaine, and Zoe—why don’t you go on upstairs with the others?” Luc took a good look around the room, becoming more anxious as the feel of the pack approaching grew stronger. “This cabin will be our stronghold. No one will pass us to gain access.”
Zoe never had been one to hold her tongue. “Apparently you’ve never watched horror movies.”
Sariel chuckled. “Thankfully, none of us is the type to go running slowly through the woods while falling down every twenty feet. We’ll fight back if someone gets in here.”
All three of the women followed Luc’s direction, heading upstairs while chatting as if this were any other night. As if they weren’t about to fall under attack by a rogue pack. As if Luc’s own mate—trapped in human form and afraid—wasn’t up there and unable to fight off a wolf shifter.
If any one of them got hurt, Luc would never forgive himself.
And if the one hurt was anyone other than his own mate, his pack would never forgive him either.
With his heart heavy and his mind cluttered, Luc headed outside to join the rest of the Dires. None looked happy to see him, Thaus and Levi throwing some serious glares his way. They were his brothers—his team—and they would all fight together, whether they were happy about it or not.
But first, Luc had words to say. “Your women are strong and vibrant, filled with the power of the Omega and such gifts to our pack. I am sorry if my actions have put them in danger, and I will do everything I can to make sure they walk away from this fight as whole as they are now.” He looked up, making eye contact with each wolf in turn. “I will lay down my own life for any one of them. You have my word.”
The feeling outside calmed, the wolves all accepting Luc’s words. Which was good, because he’d meant them. If anyone was to die in the fight, it would be him.
Bez finally broke the silence. “Fine. Except no one is fucking dying tonight unless they’re from this other pack.”
“Right,” Levi said with a nod. “No dying. It should be a rule or something.”
Thaus still seemed angrier than the others, more worried as well. He had solid reasons to be—two of them. A mate and a child. So it wasn’t a surprise when he said, “We figure about a mile out. You sure you’re ready for this?”
Luc let his mind wander, let his senses unfurl. Allowed himself to focus on the people upstairs in the house. About pregnant Amy, bringing another blessing to their pack. About Sariel with her sweet smile and freckles; Charmaine and her beauty and huge heart. About Ariel, her bravery in the face of all that fear, and her precious angel baby Micah, who had yet to come into his masculine energy. Michaela and her fierceness. Zoe and her wit. Cassiel, his mate. His one true match who had a backbone of iron. He let his senses connect to all of them, including his brothers. Bringing his entire family into himself and letting their energy fuel his.
He could not let them down.
“I’m ready.”
16
Luc stood with his Dire brothers, overlooking a small valley of sorts halfway between their homestead and the oncoming threat. They’d chosen the higher spot as a tactical advantage, a natural impediment to the other pack’s progress. No Brooks Range wolf was getting up their hill, because if they did, they had a pretty easy run to the cabin where the women were. It simply wasn’t happening.
Without fear of the resulting chaos or personal consequences, Luc pushed his senses a little further, a little harder. He ratcheted his so-called gift to a higher level so he could get a bead on each and every wolf in the pack approaching them. Had he been asked, he would have denied searching out feminine energy, but it would have been at worst a lie and at best an exaggeration. He wasn’t intentionally looking for the women, but he certainly took the time to verify the gender presentation of the energy of the pack. No females. Only males. Angry ones. Scared ones. Good—they should have been scared. The Dires were pumped, pissed off at the threat the pack had enacted against them, and ready for war.
“Lungs okay?” Bez asked, not looking at Luc. Keeping his gaze trained on the tree line across the valley.
“Lungs okay.” Not a lie—his lungs felt fine. His rib cage and the muscles in his chest, on the other hand, ached like a motherfucker. Being shot in the chest certainly wouldn’t kill a shifter, but it hurt. It hurt a lot. As did the very thought of Cassiel leaving to go home without him.
Not something he could worry about right then.
“They’re here.” His warning came out as barely more than a whisper, but his team tensed. Their determination and rage palpable. Every one of them locked on the far tree line, waiting for the first sign of an attack.
There was no attack, though. A few scraggly wolves crested the hill opposite the Dires and stopped, staring at the pack assembled. Then a few more. And a handful more. There was no denying the pack was hungry—their mangy coats and visible ribs and hips proved that—but they were also sick with some sort of illness that seemed to affect them all the way down to their souls. They were weak and easy to control, yet they still threw Luc’s energy into a state of chaos he could barely handle. His power could soothe or inflame the beasts around him, which meant he had a fine line to walk for this meeting. The last thing he wanted was to broadcast that sense of sickness out into the world.
Thankfully, Bez always knew when to run the show for him. “Brooks Range pack. What are you here for?”
One wolf, a man Luc didn’t recognize, shifted human, his scraggly wolf changing slowly—painfully—into an even more scraggly human. Thin. The man was far too thin. “You are stalking our woods and hunting in our territory. Your packmate has already killed two of ours. We’re here to ask you to leave.”
Luc didn’t speak, knowing the packmate he mentioned had been Deus, who stood toward the end of their line. The Dire was filled with a rage that took Luc a second to understand, but then he remembered. His Zoe had run into this pack, a man named Rudkin, in particular. The one who’d told Deus about the two females, who’d tried to add Zoe to that number. Who should have been dead for dropping such a threat on a mated female shifter. Deus held strong, though—not attacking or rushing their line. No way would Deus let the man escape a second time, but no Dires had yet to make a move. They could be patient. No need to fuel the pack’s fire just yet.
Bez stood tall and strong, arms crossed over his chest and his voice sure as he called out, “We’re here on NALB business.”
The thin man shook his head. “We’re not part of the NALB and cede no jurisdiction.”
But it was another male, another rough-looking specimen that had shifted from his wolf state to human and had some sort of tic or twitch in his arm, who fucked up. “The NALB isn’t law up here, and we made that clear to your packmate last time we saw him. We also put our claim on any women in our territory.” The mood shifted, Twitchy taking a step closer—just one—and taking a big, deep breath. “You brought females with you.”
The thunderous rumble of Luc’s pack growling in response filled the night air and quieted every other creature in the valley. All seven males leaned forward a little, ready to fight. Ready to kill anyone who threatened their mates. And for the first time, Luc was included in that number—he had a mate back at the cabin too, and no fucking way were these animals getting anywhere near her.
Deus took the lead on the Dires’ response, though. “You will not come near our mates, Rudkin. You or your pack. If you try, we’ll bury you.”
Luc eyed the walking dead man head to toe, sizing him up. Knowing Deus would be taking on that fight. He’d win, too. There was no doubt in Luc’s mind.
The thin man glared at Rudkin, raising his hands, palms out, as if trying to block the Dires. “We do not threaten your women. We ask you to leave. Your presence upsets our pack.”
But Luc had reached the end of his patience. His senses were still swirling deep into the forest, the sickness this pack carried stirring something dark and painful inside him. The lack of feminine energy driving him absolutely mad.
He couldn’t hold his tongue. “Where are the women?”
The Brooks Range pack growled low and deep, the rumble coming from more than the handful of wolves on the hill. The sound may not have been as strong or powerful as a Dire growl, but it certainly was nothing to scoff at.
Thin Man dropped his hands, looking fierce. “That’s not your business.”
“It is our business if you’re holding Omega shewolves against their will,” Luc said, already sure his offer would be rejected. “Show us your women, let us know they’re safe and have autonomy to make their own decisions, and we’ll leave.”
The pack didn’t respond, but twitchy Rudkin had grown visibly irritated. He’d also caught the eye of another male in his pack. Luc watched the two have a conversation without words, feeling the confidence grow between them. Knowing they had formulated some sort of plan. Thin Man wasn’t the wolf to worry about—it was Rudkin and his friends.
Luc sent his senses further, dialed them up to an eight, to see if he’d missed something. Anything. The Dire mates were safe in the house—worried, but relatively calm—and alone. The only wolves he sensed were behind the hill—thirty from the Brooks Range pack stayed hidden in the trees and on the hill. No new pack, no surprises. Luc had faith in his brothers and their skills, knew they could take down a pack of thirty even with only the seven of them fighting.
Still, he worried. Something was coming from Rudkin and his subset. Something that Luc feared would upend the entire fight.
It didn’t take long for Rudkin to show his hand. “I hear you’ve got a baby hidden away up there with your mates. How about you show us the little one, and then we’ll think about letting you see our women.” Rudkin glanced at his packmate, grinning. “Or maybe we’ll just take the little bundle from you as payment for invading our home.”
Thaus’ roar shook the trees, his body morphing into a nightmare cross between his human self and his wolf side in the blink of an eye. The sudden rage, the total abandonment of patience and calm from the beastly Dire, infused Luc’s power and sent it screaming out of him. There was no controlling it, no holding it back. Luc was broadcasting Thaus’ anger across the range, and the pack on the other side of the valley took the brunt of it.
Instead of standing their ground and talking more, the Brooks Range pack—fueled by Thaus’ energy running through Luc—attacked as one unit. The wolves poured over the hill, flooding the valley. Charging toward the hill and the Dires.
“Boss,” Deus said, as if looking for permission to act.
Luc gave it. “No one gets up this hill.”
And with that, his Dires raced down the incline, diving into battle with the Brooks Range pack. Luc’s energy, his fervor, his unbridled rage that someone or something would threaten his family and his mate, cast itself outward, inflaming the fight. His brothers were par
ticularly brutal in their fighting style—taking down two or three wolves at a time without mercy. Claws and teeth being put to work. Blood soon bathed the grasses around them, darkening the ground and creating a slippery condition the Brooks Range wolves simply couldn’t find their balance in.
Luc didn’t bother to join in the fight. He stood on his hill—the last wall of defense should anyone sneak past his brothers—and attempted to regain control of his senses, tried to pull everything back so he could calm the situation. Too late, it seemed. Already, the Brooks Range pack had begun their retreat, a handful of their members slipping off through the woods and racing away. Scattering. The rest…well, there were a lot of dead wolves in the valley. None of them Dires. There were also a handful of wolves still fighting, as if they had any hope of winning.
Luc’s distraction from the fight started as a blip. An almost invisible pressure on his psyche coming at him from behind. A sense of movement that wasn’t supposed to be there. He wouldn’t have even noticed it, but the pressure created a slight void in its wake. Something he couldn’t have looked for but was impossible not to notice once it had his attention. He lost his concentration, paying no mind to the retreating pack before him and only that blip. The one heading straight for the house where the women and baby waited for them.
Luc didn’t even have time to growl, let alone speak. The realization that something had gotten around them and was heading for their Omegas came at the same time as a group of shifters broke off from the pack, shifted, and raced forward. His brothers shifted human as well, running straight into the renewed battle. All except for two—Thaus and Bez. Both stayed at the back of the fight, almost guarding Luc. Waiting to see if they’d even be needed.
Luc definitely needed them. As did Ariel and Micah.
“Thaus,” Luc said, losing control of every bit of his own mind to the need to follow that blip. “Go. The house…the baby.”
Thaus was running before Luc finished speaking, heading straight for the house. Bez followed him, racing hard after his brother. And Luc…