by TJ Klune
Thankfully I remembered I was a hard-core thirty-nine-year-old redneck before I swooned a little. It was close, though.
The witches weren’t pleased. The woman addressed the Alphas. “She has done what she must in order to ensure the survival of the wolves.” She glanced at Mark. “And since the Bennett pack has found itself with infected members, you must be contained. Surely, if our roles were reversed, you would do the same.”
“See,” I said, “I don’t know if that’s true. We would find a way to fix this. And we are.”
The woman cocked her head at me. “Like the Omega you fixed in Montana?”
I blinked. “What the hell are you—”
And you just had an Alpha’s claws around your throat and lived to tell the tale. You went to my home and were shown mercy. But I am not a wolf. And I’m not exactly human. Veins underneath the earth. Sometimes so deep, they will never be found. Until someone like me comes along. And I’m the one you should be scared of. Because I’m the worst of them all.
“That’s right,” the woman said. “The Omega you killed in an alleyway. A team Michelle had dispatched to track Richard Collins found him before the humans did. The stench of your magic was all over him, Livingstone. So do not speak to us of fixing anything.”
“He was an Omega,” I growled at her. “Who worked for Collins. He wasn’t—”
“And what happens when Mark Bennett turns Omega?” she asked. “Will you do the same for him? When the bloodlust descends and he is lost to his animal?”
The wolves growled as I stepped forward. The strength of the wards bowled over me, causing me to grit my teeth. It felt as if a thousand tiny needles prickled along my skin, not going deep enough to draw blood, but close. They were good. Much better than I expected them to be.
To their credit, the witches looked worried, taking a step back as if they thought I would burst through the wards regardless. Either that or they didn’t like the sound of pissed-off Alpha wolves. They were smarter than they looked.
And it should have ended there. We would have threatened them, they would have retorted uselessly, and then we would have left. The whole point of showing ourselves, Ox had told us, was to make sure Michelle Hughes understood we knew about her. That we wouldn’t be cowed. That she had brought this fight to our door, and once we were done here, once we’d found a way to cure Carter and Mark and had taken care of the hunters, we were going to come after her.
But instead, a figured appeared on the bridge.
For a brief moment I thought it was my father, and my heart stumbled in my chest.
Mark heard, and he crowded close to me. My Alphas brushed against me, tails twitching dangerously.
But it didn’t feel like him. I would know my father’s magic. It wasn’t in these wards. It wasn’t in these witches. Whoever they were, they didn’t belong to him.
It didn’t stop the fear, however brief it was.
A fear that soon changed to disbelief when I saw who it was.
A disbelief that turned to rage when Mark stiffened beside me.
“Dale?” he asked, voice choked.
Dale walked out from the bridge, snow crunching underneath his feet. “Mark,” Dale said, nodding in greeting. “Hello.”
“What the fuck are you doing here?” I snapped.
Dale glanced at me coolly. “I’m here as the witch to Alpha Michelle Hughes. To make sure the wards hold. It’s my job.” He reached up and tapped against them. A deep pulse bloomed in my head as the wards burst in color, and I felt just how far around us they stretched. They didn’t encompass the entire territory, but all of Green Creek was surrounded.
Before I could stop him, Mark half shifted and launched himself at Dale, fangs bared, eyes blazing orange. He crashed into the wards, which echoed brightly with the deep sound of a heavy bell. He fell back into the snow.
The Alphas snarled as they paced back and forth in front of us while I knelt down beside Mark. He groaned, eyes fading into ice blue. “You idiot,” I said, helping him up. “Are you okay?”
He shook his head. “Fine.” He glared at Dale. “How the hell are you a witch? I didn’t smell magic on you.”
Dale shrugged. “There are ways to hide one’s true self, Mark. It’s not that difficult. Isn’t that right, Gordo?”
“When we get out of here,” I promised him, “I’m coming for you first.” I didn’t know how he’d managed to get inside my wards without me knowing, but it didn’t matter now. He’d made a mistake in revealing himself.
Dale wasn’t impressed. “Michelle gave you the opportunity. She told you what would happen if you allowed the infected wolves to live. We do what we must to survive. Surely you can appreciate that.”
“All this time,” Mark said, sounding dazed. “You were working for her all this time.”
Dale looked almost regretful. “I did care about you, Mark. More than I thought I would.” He glanced at me. “Even if your mind was… elsewhere. If that offers you any sort of solace. To be that close to a Bennett, to know you intimately.” He shook his head. “I wouldn’t change that for anything in the world.”
Oh yeah. He was going to be first.
There was the familiar snap of muscle and bone, and Oxnard Matheson and Joe Bennett stood nude in the snow.
Now the witches took a step back.
Even Dale.
“You’re here because of Michelle Hughes,” Ox said slowly. “Because she told you to come.”
“She wanted—”
“That was rhetorical,” Joe growled.
Dale’s face took on the color of the snow.
“Your Alpha,” Ox said, voice deadly calm, “has sent hunters. Into our territory. To take out our pack.”
The female witch bristled. “They are under strict orders to only handle the infected Omegas—”
“And you really think that’s where they’ll stop?” Joe asked coolly. “Don’t you have any idea who they are? They came once. They killed my grandfather. They killed children. You think they’re going to stop at two wolves?”
The woman turned to Dale, eyes wide. “She sent in the Kings? Dale, what on earth is she—”
“She knows what she’s doing,” Dale snapped, and the woman fell silent. He looked at Ox. “They won’t hurt anyone else.”
And I said, “They’ve already killed a human cop.”
“Shit,” one of the other witches muttered. “I knew this was a bad idea.”
Dale looked tense. “If there was a reason—”
Joe wasn’t having any of it. “The reason was that he was in the wrong place at the wrong time. They murdered him. They spilled innocent blood, and that’s on your Alpha. His death is on her hands.”
“Dale,” Mark begged, and Christ, I hated hearing it. “Listen to me. Please. If there was any part of you that cared about me, you need to let them out. My pack. Leave Carter and me here, fine. But you need to get everyone else out of here.”
“Yeah,” I said, taking a step toward the wards. “Open up the wards. Come on. You cared about him, right? Do it. See what happens.”
“Gordo,” Mark said.
“No,” I retorted. “Absolutely not. You really think I’d leave you here by yourself? Fuck that, and fuck you.” I turned back to Dale. “Open it up. Do it now. If you do, I’ll give you a head start. If you don’t and I get out of here, you’re not going to like what I do.” I looked at the other witches behind him. “That counts for all of you. You think this can hold me? It might take me some time, but I’m a Livingstone in Bennett territory. I will get out. And there is nowhere you can run that I won’t find you.”
For a moment I thought one of the witches would break. The men looked worried, the woman fearful.
But in the end, it was Dale who stepped forward.
Mere inches separated us, but they were filled with a wall of magic. I could see the wards clear as day. I could see the magic they used, the swirling archaic symbols that were lock and key.
“You know what must be done,” h
e said quietly, though he had to have known all the wolves could hear him. “The infection will be contained.”
“And you think that if we do as you ask, if we just… kill Mark and Carter, that this will all be over? You can’t possibly be that stupid.”
He glanced over my shoulder, then looked back at me. “It could be. My Alpha is not the monster you make her out to be.”
I laughed bitterly. “She aligned herself with the hunter clan that murdered most of the Bennett pack. The same clan that killed children. And then she sent them here. If you don’t think that makes her a monster, then you’ve got some seriously fucked-up morals, my friend.”
He wasn’t fazed. “She has given the Bennett pack ample warning. This isn’t on her. This is on all of you.”
“We have Pappas. I will kill him as soon as we get back to the house.”
“Alpha Hughes is aware that Philip Pappas is lost to her. It’s regrettable, but casualties always are.”
I slammed my hands against the wards. My tattoos felt like they were burning. Dale barely blinked. “I’ll kill you. I’ll fucking kill you.”
“Empty threats, I’m afraid,” Dale said. “The wards will hold—”
Mark said, “If you promise me that everyone else will be safe, I’ll come with you right now. I won’t fight, I swear I won’t fight,” and I said, “You shut your goddamn mouth. I won’t let you, I won’t let you.”
Mark looked at me with sad eyes. “Gordo. It’s—”
“No,” I said, shaking my head. “I’m goddamn sick and tired of the fucking martyrs in this pack.”
“That’s rich coming from you,” Mark said, taking a step toward me. He winced as he got closer to the wards. “But if it means—”
“And Carter?” Dale asked.
“He would do the same,” Mark said over the protests of his Alphas. “I know he would. As long as you can promise me right here and now that no one else will get hurt. That the hunters will leave Green Creek and never return.”
Dale nodded slowly. “That sounds reasonable.” And before I could figure out how to punch his teeth down his throat, he continued. “The problem with that, though, is that we don’t know who else in your pack is infected.”
“There’s no one,” Mark said. “There’s no one else.”
“Yes,” Dale said, not unkindly. “So you say. But how can you prove it? For all we know, your entire pack is infected. All the wolves. Can we really take that chance?”
It hit me then. I should have seen it before. But I’d forgotten. “He’s lying.”
He looked startled. “Lying about what?”
I looked to my Alphas. “Mark went to Dale. Right after we spoke with Michelle. He went the next morning. He said he was going to end things with him.”
“Mark?” Ox asked.
Mark turned his head slowly to look at me. “Yeah. I did. It was…. He said he was—that he understood. It was easier than I thought it would be.”
“And if he wanted to,” I said, thoughts spinning furiously, “if Michelle actually gave a shit about feral wolves, Dale could have killed him right then and there. But he didn’t. It’s not about the infection. It’s not about Mark and Carter. It’s about the entire pack.” I turned back to Dale. “Michelle Hughes is using the infection as an excuse. To take us out. All of us. She knew. Before. About Pappas. Even though Pappas didn’t think she did. She knew. And she sent him here anyway, knowing what could happen.”
Dale didn’t speak. He just stared at me.
“Dale?” the woman asked, sounding unsure. “What’s he talking about?”
“It’s never been about the infection,” I said, staring right back at Dale. “She doesn’t want the Bennett pack. She doesn’t want Joe. She wants the territory. She wants Green Creek. She sent the hunters here to wipe us all out. Everything else was just ancillary. How did she do it? Did she find my father? Did she make him do this?”
Dale laughed. “Oh, Gordo. No matter how far you run, no matter how you try and hide, you will always have the shadow of being a Livingstone covering every inch of your skin. It’s something you will never escape. No. No, she has nothing to do with Robert Livingstone. And nor do I, before you ask. He is… we don’t know where he is. For all we know, he’s dead.”
“But the rest?” Joe asked, eyes red.
Dale didn’t cower. “The rest is as it is. You run to this place. You always have. Green Creek was a refuge for the Bennetts long before any of you were even a thought. Alpha Hughes understands this. And since you cannot seem to accept your place in this world, she will take it from you.”
The woman said, “This was never part of—”
Dale didn’t even turn to look at her when he said, “Another word and you will end up in there with them. Understood?”
The witches didn’t speak.
“She wrestled with this,” he said, having the audacity to sound apologetic. “It hurt her. It caused her great pain. Especially… especially about Pappas. He was her second. She cares for him. But she knew that in order to protect all wolves, a choice had to be made. And in the end, she was strong enough to make that choice. She is the Alpha of all. Yes, she has underestimated you in the past. She won’t do that again. The hunters are the final solution.”
“Because we’ll take each other out,” I said slowly, the last piece falling into place. “And Green Creek will be left open for the taking.”
“You’re smarter than most give you credit for,” Dale said, and I couldn’t believe Mark fell for his shit. “This place is different. Alpha Matheson can attest to that. Whatever magic is in the earth led to him becoming a human Alpha out of necessity. There was no Alpha here, and the territory needed one. You were here, Gordo, as a gatekeeper, but even you left eventually. There was a pack, but no one to lead them. And so Ox became what was needed.” He shook his head. “I can’t even begin to imagine the power in this place. And I can’t wait to find out just how deep it goes.”
The wolves stepped forward until we stood shoulder to shoulder in front of the witches, in front of Dale. He didn’t back down, not like those behind him, who stepped back. I heard the fury in my head, the songs of the wolves who wanted to sink their teeth into the flesh of those before us. Through the threads, the rest of the pack was howling their anger.
“Michelle played her hand too soon,” Ox said, voice low and strong. “You want a war? You’ve got one. Because once we’re done with the hunters, we’ll come for you. And as my witch said, there is nowhere you can run that we won’t find you.”
And he turned and walked away, heading toward the trees.
Joe spat on the ground in front of the witches before he followed his mate. I heard the sounds of them shifting behind me before Ox howled, the sound shattering the still air around us.
Even Dale flinched at the sound.
“You done fucked up,” I said, smiling tightly. “Maybe I’m just a small-town hick who works in a garage. But I’ve got a long memory, and I will remember each of your faces. You would do well to start running now. Because the last time someone came for our pack, he ended up getting his head torn off. And you can sure as shit bet that’ll be the very least I do to you.”
I turned and followed my Alphas.
I’d only made it a few steps before I looked back over my shoulder.
Mark stood in front of the witches. His hands were in fists at his sides. He wasn’t speaking, and neither was Dale, but I couldn’t help but feel a slick twist of anger on his behalf. Maybe Dale hadn’t meant much to him, not in the long run, but he’d meant something. Dale used him. I swore to myself it was going to be one of the last things he ever did. “Mark,” I said sharply.
Mark nodded at Dale before he turned and walked toward me.
His eyes were blazing orange.
I wanted to say something, anything to make it all right again, to make it how it’d been the night before, but words failed me.
So instead, I did the only thing I could think of when he was
about to pass me by: I reached out and took his hand.
The tightness around his eyes eased. He looked down at our joined hands, then back up at me.
He arched an eyebrow.
“Shut up,” I muttered. “If you make a big deal about this, I’m going to give you to Dale myself.”
He squeezed my hand.
And then I led us home.
come and get me/tug of war
“MOTHERFUCKERS,” CHRIS growled. “Those goddamn bitches. Who the hell do they think they are?”
“Bastards,” Tanner said, sounding furious. “All of them. Can I shoot them? Please? Please say I can shoot them.”
“In the nuts,” Rico spat. “I’m going to shoot them in the nuts, and while they’re screaming in pain, I’m going to shove my fist down their throats until I reach their stomachs. And then I’m going to pull their stomachs out of their mouths and spill the contents of their stomachs on their faces, and I’m going to like it.”
We all turned slowly to stare at him.
“What?” he asked. “They’re in our garage.”
We were hunkered down across the street, hiding behind what remained of the diner. The snow was still falling, the lull having passed. It was thick again, this storm. Robbie had found an old radio in the blue house. Ox said it’d belonged to his mother, and they’d danced in his kitchen to the music it played. We’d managed to find a station out of Eugene, which said the storm was expected to last a few more days.
The tow truck was still lying on its side in the diner, propped up precariously by the boom. A thin layer of ice covered the driver’s side and the hoist from the snow blown in by the wind. It didn’t look as if anyone else had been inside the diner, and I thanked god for small favors. Either the storm or the warnings blared by the hunters had kept people indoors. I didn’t know how long it would last.
The King clan had taken over the garage.
We could see them inside, moving about. The lights were on, and one of the garage doors was open. They’d parked their trucks around the front like a barricade, bumper to bumper. A few hunters looked to be on patrol, moving around the outside of the garage. One stood on top of the cab of one of the trucks, keeping watch.