Chapter 25 DANE

Every time I softened toward her, every time I started to trust her, she betrayed me again.

“Dane, please! I’m telling the truth. Goddess, you never believed me. You never trusted me, and I never lied to you. Of everything you’ve done to me, that’s what hurts the most. Since the moment I met you, right here, eight years ago, I’ve been loyal to you. But it never mattered. You hated me anyway. You never gave me a chance.”

There were tears in her voice. Her words shocked me enough that I pulled away for a second.

It was the opening she was looking for. She ripped her hand from mine and bolted.

I roared and shifted into my lycan form. The night—which had been so dark I could barely see—suddenly became brighter. My sense of smell sharpened, as well as my sense of hearing.

I threw my head back and howled into the sky.

She wasn’t going to escape from me.

She sprinted through the forest, and I ran after.

I wasn’t in a rush. Let her run from me.

I had time. I could hunt.

But I didn’t expect her to turn deeper into the woods, to run uphill, where the forest met the ancient mountains. We were too close to the borders of my land here, where what I claimed and held mixed with blurry borders I still disputed with the Reeds, places I knew their wolves still lurked.

By the time I caught her, it was too late.

“Let me go!” she screamed.

I turned to run back to my land. If I could leave before their pack guards caught us, no one ever had to know we were here.

Before I could take a step, howls split the night all around.

AURORA

Fear speared through my chest. Not of Dane—though I knew he could kill me with one swipe of his claws, one snap of his teeth, there was part of me that had never been able to stop feeling like he was somehow safe.

No, this was a deeper, older fear.

The fear of a child for the things lurking in the dark.

The fear of my family.

Dane had me over one of his massive shoulders, but the howls came from all around, and they were so close.

So familiar.

Then they were there, four lycans stepping out of the trees. Two were male, and two were female. Two dozen mottled, starving wolves behind them.

The wolves circled Dane and I, trapping us.

“Alpha Montague,” the bigger female lycan growled. Esther. She had eyes as yellow as her teeth and was covered in patchy, pale fur. “Don’t you remember the pact? To step on our land is a threat. That means we can spill your blood, and the blood of any you protect.”

She was taunting him, reminding him of the words he’d said earlier that night once he offered me his blood and his protection.

“My wife is right. Give me one reason I shouldn’t kill you,” Waylon growled. He was bigger than her, his fur a darker gray with white tips. It was patchy, and he was covered in scars.

“It was a mistake,” Dane growled. His muscled shoulder shifted beneath me as he tightened his grip, holding me more securely. “Let us go. We don’t have to rip open this scar, Waylon. We don’t have to restart this war. It will only make the Council end both of our packs.”

Esther laughed. So did the others. Even some of the wolves made choking barking sounds, like hyenas. It made the hair on the back of my neck stand on end. “We aren’t afraid of the Council. We serve something stronger. Older. Now, come with us, or die.”

“Dane,” I whispered against his back, “Offer to hand me over. Maybe they’ll let you go.”

I felt his body tense. He shifted. I thought he might be looking for a weakness in the circle, somewhere he could break through and run.

“Dane,” I begged.

From our meeting earlier, Esther and the Reeds seemed to want me alive, not dead. I didn’t know if they’d offer Dane the same.

He lowered me so he carried me against his chest instead of thrown over his shoulder and looked down at me. His golden wolf’s eyes glinted in the moonlight.

“I gave you my protection.” I could feel Dane’s voice rumbling through his chest, deeper and rougher in his lycan form than it was when he was a man. “Where is my famed honor if I give you over now?”

“Stubborn wolf,” I grated, digging my fingers into his fur. “Don’t.”

Then, with a touch I hadn’t felt in five years, Dane’s mind brushed across mine. Just the faintest whisper, the way Alphas could even with wolves outside their pack when they chose.

Hold on.

But before he could move for the edge of the circle, there was a loud pop! A flash of light, like from the muzzle of a gun.

Dane’s body lurched. He staggered. Blood oozed from a wound on his shoulder. He let me slide to the ground, then sank to his knees.

“Dane!”

He clutched his shoulder and groaned. “Silver…”

Then he fell.