by H. D. Gordon
Nahari surprised even herself with what she did next, so she knew she surprised Linus. If someone had said just hours before that she was going to do it, she would not have believed them.
Male Wolves, like male humans, had superior strength to females, but females had speed, and the ability to shift into their alternate forms much quicker. Though Nahari had spent most of her life in her mortal form, she still shifted when she had a moment to herself, holding onto that piece of her heritage tightly, no matter how hard the masters had tried to take it from her.
She shifted into her Wolf form quick as lightning, and tore into Linus’s throat and shoulder with the kind of fervor one usually only witnessed in The Ring.
He was still in his mortal form, no thick fur protecting the soft skin of his throat. There was only time for his eyes to widen, for her to whisper with disturbing calm into the children’s minds to close their eyes, for her to hope they’d followed the order.
Then the male was dead before her, his blood coating her tongue and dripping from her muzzle in scarlet ropes.
A low whistle sounded from the shadows, and Nahari lowered her head again, her ears flattening as a menacing growl rippled up her throat. Her eyes glowed Wolf-gold, her fur dark as pitch, like her hair in mortal form.
The Wolves who’d paused to stare took a look at the very dead Linus near her paws, at his blood still dripping from her mouth, and kept on their way.
“Shift,” she told the pups, pushing her will on them the way she’d done a million times in her rearing of them. The fact that they only blinked at her for several seconds meant that they’d already seen enough to scar them for life, and she was sorry that there was nothing she could do to save them from it.
After a little more gentle prodding, Nahni and Norman shifted into their Wolf forms. They were so cute, the coloring of their fur a mixture of both their mother and father, deep brown with streaks of auburn and glittering gold.
The three made their way out of Bayrine in this fashion, the pups sticking close to Nahari’s sides as they passed more mayhem.
The sea sat to the east, so there were only three directions by land that one could leave Bayrine; the north, south, and west. The Ormen house from which they’d come was to the south, so Nahari had run this way in hopes that they could leave behind the chaos of the city more quickly.
What she’d forgotten was that the kennels—the grounds where the Dogs were held and designated—were also to the south, and that, of course, was where the worst of the chaos was taking place.
She paused behind an old building as she looked at the kennels. A cobblestone road tapered off to an earthen path that had been trodden enough times as to remain barren, and beyond that, freedom.
Or at least, freedom from the concentrated population of Bayrine.
But all around that path, Hounds and Dogs were engaged in brutal battles. The sounds of whips cracking and Wolves fighting were enough to make the pups at her sides tuck their tails and shiver. Her will to be strong for their sake was the only thing that kept her from doing the same.
She spotted a path around the kennels, through the small stand of trees to the east, which eventually led off to the cliffs overlooking the Eastern Sea, and decided that getting around there was a better option than making her way back through the insanity of Bayrine.
“Stay close,” Nahari told the pups.
They tucked themselves even closer to her, and made it to the cover of trees. Nahari’s ears swiveled on her head as she listened for anyone ahead. When she didn’t detect anything, they pushed on.
They were almost out when she caught a glimpse of him, the path cutting over the cliffs clear and free for the taking. Nahari wished she hadn’t looked, didn’t know what in the world made her turn her head and check in the first place.
But they locked eyes for the briefest of moments, and her heart paused in accordance with her paws.
The Wolf who had saved her from Linus the other day in that dark alley. The Dog who’d told her gently to run home, who’d stopped to help a stupid girl who’d taken a stupid route in fear of angering her stupid master.
He was fighting the Hounds so gallantly that there was no way not to pause and admire his beauty. He was still in his mortal form, and Nahari concluded that this was likely because the battle between the Dogs and the Hounds had erupted so suddenly that many males had not had the time to shift into their Wolf forms.
In the dying light of day, with the city as a backdrop, the Wolf whom Linus had called “Oz” took down Hounds with both strength and skill.
But he was getting tired. How long had the fighting been going on? An hour? Longer? The Dogs seemed to have the upper hand at the moment, but even Dogs had their limits.
As if the thought had summoned it, as if her bad luck had rubbed off on him, another Hound joined the three who were already engaging with the fearsome male. The Hound’s whip flashed through the air, the barbed end of it coiling around Oz’s throat, yanking tight.
This didn’t pull the male off his feet, but it unsteadied him enough for the other Hounds to move in.
Nahari saw all of this in a matter of seconds, her heart beating double in her chest. Glancing down at the pups who were depending on her, she almost pushed onward and left the Dog to his fate.
Almost.
Instead, she stashed the children in a small alcove in the rock and made them promise to stay put. They, in turn, made her promise to come back for them. She did, though it sounded like a falsehood to her own ears.
Nahari turned back toward the danger near the kennels and headed in.
10
Ozias
The female came from out of nowhere.
Through the haze of battle Ozias had locked eyes with her. It had only been a heartbeat, a stolen moment in what would likely be one of his last, but he’d recognize the golden gaze and dark features anywhere, even in her Wolf form.
It was the female who’d been trapped in the alley with Linus. There was blood on her muzzle, fire in her eyes.
Then the present had sucked him back in. He slammed the head of a Hound into the whipping post hard enough to shatter his skull, and though Ozias had never had any particular lust for battle, he had to admit, it felt good.
How many of these Hounds had whipped and beaten him? How many had poured out his rations on the dirt, and then made him eat it off the ground in front of the others just to humiliate him? How many had raped, killed, and benefited from the unjust system that gave a few so much while so many had so little?
All of them.
Every single last one.
And today was a day of reckoning.
He wasn’t sure how many he’d killed. When the collars had come off, things had happened so quickly. There had been a rumor a few hours before that something was going to happen, and that the Dogs should be ready, but he could not have anticipated this. No one could have. This was outright rebellion.
The instructions had been clear, and they were apparently from the infamous Rukiya Moonborn herself, the Dog who’d slipped her leash and taken down a Pack Master in the process.
Fight and die for the Masters, or fight and live for freedom.
The choice had not been a hard one to make.
“Are you Dogs, or are you Wolves?” someone had shouted only moments after the collars had fallen off, after those initial seconds where Ozias could only stare down at his former shackle in awe.
Free.
He was free.
Or at least he could be, if he could make it out of this blasted city alive.
Which was looking more and more unlikely.
While others had been escaping, he’d been fighting Hounds so that they could escape. Some of the working ladies had rounded up the pups, and were leading them out of Bayrine. Hounds had tried to stop them, so Ozias had stopped the Hounds.
As he’d moved further along, the same kept happening. As the barbed end of a whip coiled around his neck now, and the culmination of the
minor but numerous injuries he’d sustained bore down on him, he knew he should have run when he had the chance.
Four Hounds were too many at once, even for him, even at full strength, which he was not.
As his body struck the ground, he tucked his shoulder to break his fall, and the Hounds converged on him. He was just getting lost beneath them when a flash of black fur streaked across his vision.
The ebony-furred female struck two of the Hounds with enough force to send them sprawling off of him, and before they could find their feet, she’d torn them to shreds with her sharp teeth. Ozias would have stood blinking in wonder if not for the other two Hounds.
He made quick work of them, the female Wolf serving as the perfect distraction. When the four Hounds lie dead at his feet and her paws, Ozias could only stare at the female, into the deep gold of her eyes.
“Thank you,” he said into her mind.
Her tongue snaked out, cleaning some of the blood off her dark muzzle. Her ears swiveled toward the east, where he’d locked eyes with her through a stand of trees abutting the sharp cliffs over looking the Eastern Sea.
“We should run now,” she said.
So similar to the words he’d spoken to her in that dark alley less than a handful of days before.
Ozias took one last look at the chaos still unfolding around him, at the bodies of the fallen Wolves, at the bloodstained earth and burning buildings, and nodded at the dark-furred beauty who’d come to his rescue.
She had pups with her.
High-born pups.
Shit.
Ozias knew they weren’t hers, of course, but rather, they’d likely belonged to whomever had been her owner. He needed only take one look at the slightly crazed gleam in her eyes and the stunned expressions of the pups to know what had happened.
The masters and highborns were being executed in their own homes. The slaves were rising up against them.
It was a wonder the female had made it out of the city alive with them. He was sure there were more than a few Dogs who’d like to have those pups’ heads on the merit of their parents’ sins.
The two pups were well fed and groomed. Their fur was shiny and clean, their bodies unmarred. As Ozias approached, still in his mortal form, they huddled deeper into the alcove in the rock and shivered in fear.
He paused, knowing what he must look like to these privileged pups. He was not the largest of Wolves, but he was plenty big enough, and his deep brown skin was covered in scars and blood. He hated the way they cringed at the sight of him, but knew that his deep voice would only scare them if he tried to speak. So he sighed and stepped back, turning to the female Wolf.
“What’s the plan?” he asked.
The midnight-colored female shifted on her paws. In this form, she was as tall as he stood on two legs, the tip of her perked ears coming to the top of his head.
“I have to protect them,” she responded into his head, her amber eyes flashing back to the pups.
He switched to the more intimate way of communicating.
“The rumors say that the resistance is based in Dogshead. That’s in the Midlands. I figured that’s where I’d go,” he told her.
“Then, go,” she responded, clearly saying something to the pups, because they crawled out of the nook in the rock and tucked themselves under her paws. “The front lines of a rebellion is no place for little ones.”
“Come with me,” Ozias responded, and continued quickly before she could protest. They needed to get out of here, to put as much distance between them and Bayrine as soon as possible. But for whatever reason, he didn’t want to leave her. They had a better chance at surviving if he was by their side.
“We’ll find a place along the way for you and the children,” Ozias told her, unable to draw his gaze away from the gold of hers. “I’ll help get you somewhere safe, and then I’ll go help fight against the Pack Masters.”
She stayed silent for a handful of seconds that felt like eternities to him, glancing down at the pups still wound around her legs, their paws no bigger than a fox’s. They could not be older than five or six.
At last, she let out a huff of warm air, and he got the urge to run his hands through her thick fur, to pull her close and feel that fiery heart of hers beat close to his. But Ozias did not do this. He had a rule: Whenever he touched a female, he made sure that it was what she wanted first.
And this one was clearly still wary of him.
But, she said, “Okay. We’ll travel together until we find a safe place, then.”
With this, she turned south, the pups sticking close to her sides as the Eastern Sea lapped at the shores far below, uncaring of the carnage taking place in the city above.
Ozias shifted into his Wolf form at last, doing so with no shame, despite the unflattering nature of it, as all Dogs had to learn to do in order to survive. When one stepped into The Ring, the only rules were to shift, fight, and survive, and all three were done under the observation of the crowd. Humility was one of the first things the Hounds beat into a Dog.
As shifting took an average of twenty or thirty seconds longer for males than females (which could be a very small or very large amount of time considering the relativity of the circumstances) this was the one disadvantage of being a male. He wasn’t complaining, though. Ozias knew good and well that the females had it worse.
Because females always had it worse. He thought it was a sickness of the hyper-masculine Wolf culture.
She watched him as he made the transformation. As his Wolf, he was easily twice her size, and she had to tilt her head back to look up at him. Warmth flooded into him at the way she looked at him, and a feeling struck him that was so unfamiliar that it took him a moment to pinpoint it.
Hope.
When Ozias looked at her, he felt hope.
“What’s your name?” he asked.
“Nahari,” she answered.
He looked at the children, and spoke as gently as he could into their minds, his deep baritone nearly a purr.
“And what are your names?” he asked, dipping his massive head so that he could meet their bright eyes.
“Nahni and Norman,” said the female pup, her voice so young and innocent that it made his chest ache.
“Hello Nahni and Norman. My name is Ozias… We have a journey to take, so what do you say we make a deal? You watch my back, and I’ll watch yours. Sound good?”
Nahni tilted her little head, her fluffy ears swiveling. “Deal,” she said.
She crept out from under Nahari to stand in the shadow of his massive form. Another feeling that was foreign to Ozias overcame him, and suddenly, the hope he felt was joined with purpose, though he would not have been able to verbalize it so.
He would see Nahari and the children to safety, and then he would head to Dogshead.
Where he would fight alongside Rukiya Moonborn for the liberation of his kind.
All across the realm, Wolves like Ozias were doing the same.
11
Rook
The fighting lasted for hours.
The massive structure that had been the Pack Master’s main house on the plantation burned through the night like a miniature sun, and when the sun rose over the Midlands, the once great house was nothing more than a smoldering pile of embers and ruins.
Bodies littered the area. The blood of Wolves, both Hounds and Dogs, had saturated the ground, and the scent of iron hung thick in the air.
When there were no more enemies left to kill, and all the Hounds had either fled or lie dead, an eerie silence fell over the place.
Gore covered my muzzle, matted my fur. Various injuries—some I hadn’t even realized I’d sustained—ached and burned. I was tired. With a glance around at Goldie, Asha, Akila and her Harpy daughters who’d joined us, I could see that I was not the only one.
The Dogs were silent as well, and as the sun slowly broke over the eastern horizon, they began to gather around my companions and me.
At first, my hackles w
ent up. The newly freed Wolves were approaching in droves, some in their mortal forms, others on four paws. But as I watched them, I sensed no threat, no malice, not even from the males. In fact, as more and more gathered, I felt an entirely different energy on the air.
I swallowed hard. Every set of eyes, many still glowing Wolf-gold from the heat of battle, seemed to be locking on me. I made sure to hold my head high, but I reached out to Goldie with my mind for comfort.
“Why are they all looking at me like that?” I asked my friend.
I knew Goldie well enough to recognize a smile even when she was in Wolf form.
“Because you just freed them,” she said. “They’ve all heard the stories about you. Look at their faces. They know who you are… It’s almost as if they’ve been waiting for you.” Goldie sidled a little closer, a healthy red-gold Wolf with fire in her eyes. “They want you to lead them, Rukiya Moonborn… And every Pack needs an Alpha.”
I blinked, stunned, though perhaps I should not have been. I’d known that word about my recent adventures had spread across the Wolf realm, and if a certain old desert Sorceress was to be believed, word had spread even beyond that, but I guess I hadn’t puzzled out all the implications. I’d been kind of rolling with the punches. I had not begun this journey with the intent of killing Pack Masters and starting a rebellion. I had never aspired to have the kind of power an Alpha yields.
And on top of that, there had not been a female Alpha of a major Pack in hundreds of years. Some of the smaller groups in the Rho Mountains were said to have female Alphas, but certainly not the Pack Master of one of the five Territories.
“I’m a female,” I said to Goldie, the puzzlement clear in my tone.
Goldie’s grin pulled up to reveal her deadly canines, her eyes glowing Wolf-gold, the rising sun dancing in the depths of them.
“Gods damn right, you are,” she replied. “And it’s about time.”
Once all the Wolves who intended to remain Dogshead were gathered, I stood looking out at the crowd who’d created a huge circle around me. They wanted words. I gave them what I had.