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033 | VENGEANCE
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2024-10-29 19:42:56When I woke, Ares was gone.
I stretched out in the bed. I felt better when he wasn’t around – more myself, less controlled by the damned mate bond. It was less no vocal, and it still pushed me to slide out of the warm bed and find him, but it was easier to ignore.
We’d ended up cracking open a bottle of wine late into the night, and talking by candlelight until our voices had turned hoarse. We’d spoken of duty, of hope, and of loss. In the calm quiet of the night, my traitorous heart had fallen some more.
And then we’d discussed the wolf I’d found that morning. It had stayed with me, lurking in the back of my mind as the first Warrior Wolf we’d found had. There was something so coarse about seeing a body not upon a battlefield. Although, I supposed, it was a different kind of battle. A darker one that played out with no honour.
I picked up the copy of ‘Born Beneath the Wrong Star’ I’d discarded last night. I tried to focus on it, but my mind kep
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Alpha Ares 034 | THE TRUTH OF THE LIE
My good sense slammed back into me, all at once. “Ares!” I cried, leaping up onto the platform behind him. I grabbed his forearm just before he grasped the man’s prone neck and yanked it back, making him stumble slightly.He glanced at me with a frown. “What is it? Do you want to kill this one?”I shook my head. I had to be honest. I couldn’t let innocent men die because of my lie. “I don’t recognise him, actually,” I hedged, gradually towing Ares back towards the edge of the wooden platform.Ares’s frown deepened, lines cutting into his brow and crinkling the corners of his too-damn-pretty blue eyes. “Well – have a closer look. Walk between them, Haile. Your attackers are here. I am quite certain of it.”“How do you know for sure? There must be hundreds of men that match that description…”He grabbed me by my wrists and hauled me back towards the men.
Alpha Ares 035 | FOR YOU
I couldn’t un-see it.Even now, as Ares towered over me, his broad shoulders and muscular arms caging me in, making me bow down beneath his rage, I could think of nothing but the bloodbath we’d left behind.The screams. I –I would never be able to un-hear those screams. Muffled, wet. Somehow, the fact that they hadn’t even been able to scream properly as they’d died had made it worse. That last piece of defiance had been stolen from them.Ares had yanked me inside, all the way up to his bedroom. My arm still ached and throbbed. I held onto that pain; I would take anything, a thousand times over, if only those men had not had to suffer.“Why did you lie to me?” Ares’s voice was more gravel than honey, now. I could feel the low vibrations rolling in his chest. “What purpose did that serve?”I lifted my chin. He would not steal me defiance from me as well. “I was wor
Alpha Ares 036 | BETA WOLF
My lip curled as Nazte stepped into the bedroom I shared with Ares. His eyes were bright – limned with some dark fantasy about murdering me, probably.“What do you want?” I asked. I’d been aiming for callous and disinterested, but my voice croaked – hoarse from being strangled, no doubt – and it made the whole illusion a lot weaker than I’d intended.His blue eyes tightened, and then darted back to the door he’d just come through. I sighed. I didn’t have time for this – I needed to make a plan and send word to my parents about what I’d witnessed and, worse, the terrible things I might have set in motion by giving away the true identity of my attacks.Unfortunately for Nazte, a little chit-chat about the horrors he’d inflicted upon innocent men didn’t quite fit into my schedule. I let my upper lip curl back further and bared my teeth at him.“Scary,” he said, hi
Alpha Ares 037 | ALL TOO WELL
I decided to follow Nazte.Maybe it was stupid to stick my neck out and risk being caught so soon after Ares had unpicked my most recent – and most damning – lie, but I didn’t care. He’d hurt me in more ways than one, and if one of these awful wolves were going to kill me then I’d go down fighting, damn it.I eased open the door and slipped out into the dark corridor.Nazte walked quickly, purposefully, with his arms swinging jovially at his sides. His cloak billowed out behind him and his blonde hair bounced with every step. He didn’t look like a man weighed down by a guilty conscience – but, until he’d looked at me with his sad, wide, almost sympathetic eyes, I’d not once thought of him as someone who would face any emotional ramifications for his despicable actions. Apparently even murdering innocent people couldn’t bring down his mood. Stars, he was an arsehole.What on earth h
Alpha Ares 038 | LOST
My chest heaved and my thighs ached. I sprinted on and on and on, the sounds of footsteps thundering down the tunnel behind me growing louder and louder and louder –There was no hope. They would catch me. They knew this tunnel well, and they surely knew every possible hiding place I might go if I managed to escape them.“We heard you!” shouted Cendres. He laughed, the sound of it ringing out, clear and crisp as a pealing bell. “There’s no point in running. Come out and play with us, little spy.”“It’s probably Jonet,” said Nazte. “Wanting to hear what we said about his precious nose.” He cleared his throat and then raised his voice. “We said it was ugly!”I pushed on. My mind spun through a hundred different solutions. I could sprint out, force my breathing to calm, and wander back towards them. Surely they wouldn’t suspect me if I put myself somewhere so obvi
Alpha Ares 039 | BRUISED SOUL
What I had to do made me sick to my stomach.But it needed to be done.I took a deep breath, forcing it to calm my racing nerves. The mate bond urged me onwards, desperate to close the chasm that stretched between Ares and I. For once, my logical mind and my stupid heart agreed on what I had to do.I needed to get Ares to trust me – so that I could kill him.After this morning, and my close call in the tunnels, I knew what I’d have to do to get him to even look at me would make me want to vomit. Even so, my heart pounded at the thought of seeing him again, up close, close enough to touch…Damn it. I ground my teeth together and knocked on the door.“Come in.” Stars, his voice like that – honey and gravel and entirely edible – made my core heat. I bit my lip, swallowed my pride, and pushed the door open.Ares was reclined on the bed. Evening sunlight swept across his featu
Alpha Ares 040 | IN THE DARK
I did not see Ares for over a week.I slept in the guest chamber I had first been put in, with no window and only a lumpy mattress. It was not worthy of a Young Luna, but perhaps I was not worthy of that title anymore.I could have just kissed him. I should have.I’d not even managed to write to my parents. My failure, compounded with the endless muffled screams that writhed constantly in the back of my mind, had sent me spiralling. I sat in the darkness of the cave-like room and thought of half-baked plots and plans, none of which would work without me either gaining Ares’s trust or me starting a full-blown war between our packs all over again.I didn’t know how many times I’d considered walking up to him and clawing his head off, but I’d never once moved so much as a toe to actually get up and do it.My parents’ plan made sense. We would be away from Winterpaw, with no witnesses to lay the blame
Alpha Ares 041 | EYE OF THE STORM
I stormed back out into the dining room, my eyes narrowed as I hunted out Ares’s smug, arrogant, despicable… Handsome, muscular body. Damn it.Of course he wasn’t there. Of course he wasn’t. He just had to make everything difficuclt, didn’t he? Seething with rage, I glared at anyone who dared come near me and stomped out into the hallway. He couldn’t have gone far.I squeezed my hands into fists. I wanted to shift into my wolf form – so intense was the anger burning through my veins – but that would achieve nothing. My nails bit into the soft skin of my palms. I focused on the tiny spark of pain – and looked down to see red crescents making the soft flesh.I had to get a grip.Okay, I thought, cramming my temper down. It smouldered, a fire waiting to be stoked again, but it was quiet enough that I could see past the red haze edging my vision. It was Sunday tod
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Alpha Ares 141 | EPILOGUE
One year later I smoothed my hands down over my thick cloak. Nerves swarmed in my belly: not the dizzying kind that made me feel faint, but the sort that cast a hazy glow over everything as I walked along the winding woodland pathway. Torches flickered every few feet; orange roses of light bloomed across the mossy, dew-damp earth beneath my boots. “Nervous?” asked Dad. “A little.” I worried my bottom lip between my teeth. “It’s silly, I know. There’s nothing to be nervous about. I’ve been his Luna for the last year – longer, really – but this feels…” I trailed off, unsure how to word exactly how it felt. Official? Real? “It’s been such a long time coming, sweetheart.” “Yeah. Part of me wishes we’d done this straight after the battle, but it made sense to wait until the pack was remade.” Unable to help myself, a grin pushed hard at my cheeks. Everything looked beautiful today, I thought, the pine trees bottle-green beneath the golden setting sun. Everything was glazed with the
Alpha Ares 140 | COME TOGETHER
As everyone took their seats, Ares and I remained standing. I clutched at his hand: it was a physical reminder to everyone there that we were joined, that Winterpaw Warrior and Blue Moon were enemies no longer.I glanced at Ares, letting him take the lead. He swallowed, straightened his shoulders, and then smiled hesitantly around at everyone. The expression looked strange, uncertain, and it took me a moment to realise why. Ares never smiled at people when he addressed them. He led through fear and control. Not anymore, it seemed. My heart swelled.“Thank you all for coming,” he said, projecting his voice clearly and confidently across the room. “Luna Sienna and Alpha Rodriguez, of the Firepaw Pack.” He inclined his head at the dark-skinned woman my dad had been talking to before, and the bald-headed, well-muscled man sat beside her. They were both older than us by about fifteen years.The Alpha and Luna of the Storm Guardian Pack were older still, well into their fifties, their face
Alpha Ares 139 | KNIGHTS OF THE ROUND TABLE
Ares had given Dad the nicest of the Warrior Wolves’ cabins to stay in. When we arrived, Ares’s arm still latched securely around my waist as it had been every single step of the way, I saw two other familiar faces peering out at us through the window, their creased faces crinkling with smiles so wide I half feared their tissue paper skin might tear.The wind whipped between the cabins, making my eyes and cheeks sting. Dawn had long since settled across the horizon, pale pink fading into the usual white-grey cloud cover. Everything looked strange out here, unreal in a way I couldn’t quite process. I clutched at Ares, suddenly apprehensive as dad moved to let us in.My nerves dissolved as soon as set foot inside. We were both pulled into an embrace on all sides, many arms winding around us and holding us close.“You did it,” Nana Baspy whispered.I scoffed and, after another long moment, I pulled away. “I don’t think I can take any of the credit, Nana. I wasn’t even conscious for half
Alpha Ares 138 | SURRENDER AND SACRIFICE
The world shattered. For a time, it was nothing more than a series of fragmented images and distant, distorted sounds. I heard screaming, felt the tell-tale burning in my throat, but I couldn’t connect the noise to me. I was weightless, without a body, and then there was nothing but silent darkness.Words I couldn’t understand split apart the quiet. “It’s the other packs,” someone said excitedly. I recognised the voice, familiar enough but not someone I was close to. A hazy, half-formed image of a missing hand and foot beneath determined eyes and wispy blonde hair floated just out of reach, and I gave up trying to identify the mystery voice as they spoke. “Firepaw and Storm Guardian. They made it just in time. We did it! We survived.”No, we didn’t, I thought bitterly. Not all of us.“It’s not over yet.” That growl, gravel and honey – that was Ares. Something in me settled. But why had he shifted into his human body? That thought, along with all my others, drifted away, becoming nothi
Alpha Ares 137 | BATTLE OF THE MOUNTAIN
We were all so focused on Aliana that none of us heard the quiet tap-tap-tap of claws pacing the stone hallways of the Pack House behind us.And then Scillian smiled. Behind him, the Sable Stalker Alpha and Luna smirked, too, a cruel hook of their lips that made my blood boil; off to the side slightly, Bloodpelt Prowler’s Alpha grinned toothily. They were all so smug, so sure of themselves. So sure that they’d won.“What is this?” Dad asked flatly.“Oh, this?” Scillian brightened impossibly further as he gestured to Aliana. “A game.”“You wouldn’t hurt your own daughter.” Dad sounded less convinced about that than he had a minute ago. “Let her go, and let the battle recommence.”“My daughter is a traitor. And, worse than that: she was running from a fight.” Scillian scoffed. I watched his face closely as he walked, every stride slow and purposeful, towards Aliana. He caressed her cheek, but I looked beyond that. I searched out his eyes through the snowfall, and I found only adoration
Alpha Ares 136 | THE END OF US
I knew, deep down, that this was my last hurrah. I knew, deep down, that if it were not, I would’ve let the pain and the shock hold me back from fighting one last time. My body was weak, but I would not succumb to its needs. This was no ordinary battle, and I had never been one to give up.I felt the pain and let it make me stronger. Adrenaline surged through my veins. I would fight by my mate’s side, and I would try to make it mean something. That was all I could do, now.We neared the Pack House. The tension surrounding it was thick with foreboding; the stillness of the battlefield was somehow worse than when the air had been metallic with spilled blood and the snow melting from the heat of the felled bodies upon it. Now, fresh snow dusted the blood soaked fur of the dead, masking the worst of the atrocities that had been marked upon the land in stark pools of red.Everything was calm. Everything was quiet. Some dark premonition made the back of my neck crawl with the sense that, at
Alpha Ares 135 | BE AMONGST THE STARS
I was numb, inside and out, as I watched. My mind struggled to break free of the overwhelming melancholy, the agony so strong that the only way I could deal with it was to feel nothing at all.The cold helped. A bitter wind whipped between the boulders, sending snowflakes into a flurry. They turned my vision blurry: everything was black and white and grey again, as it had been in the time before Ares. Everything, that was, except for the blood.And there was so much blood.It was start against the pale backdrop of the mist and snow. A physical mark of violence, marring the purity of the white beneath. And, atop its own puddle of red, sat my ear. I shuddered every time my gaze drifted over it; it was the sort of thing I didn’t want to look at but also couldn’t look away from. It was grotesque, torn at a ragged angle, the flesh pink within – My lip curled. It looked so alien to me now, that missing piece of me. I couldn’t imagine how I looked, bloodied and battered, one ear gone. A sn
Alpha Ares 134 | HAUNTED
Claws ripped into me on both sides. I flung Elena off easily enough; she was so small that, even exhausted as I was from hours of adrenaline-fuelled fighting, it didn’t take much effort on my part to dislodge her. Distantly, I heard her pull herself to her paws again. But in this fight, both physically and in the heart of it, she didn’t matter. This was between Etta and I.I winced as Etta’s claws ripped free of my fur and flesh. Blood spat from the wound, hitting the snow and melting the ice surrounding it. I wrenched myself backwards, darting behind the nearest boulder and peering out around it. ‘Why are you doing this?’ I asked – no, I begged.‘I promised myself.’ Her mental voice was nothing like the one I remembered. Etta was often sarcastic and teasing, but there had been a warmth beneath even her cruellest of jokes that had dissipated after Damon’s death. ‘After you left, and after the attacks began. I had to do something for him.’‘Damon and I were friends.’ I edged backwards
Alpha Ares 133 | ON THE WINGS OF FATE
I’d made my choice when Ares mindlinked me. He sounded weak and weary, but very much alive. My heart leapt at the familiar sound of his voice, of gravel and honey, loosening the knot that had been pulling my chest taut ever since the battle had begun.‘I had to run, beautiful. There were too many of them, but I managed to get away.’That was all I needed to hear. I turned and shifted into my wolf form, preparing to race across the empty stretch of battlefield that had been left behind the attacking armies as they approached.‘Are you okay?’ I asked. There was one other thing I needed to hear, it turned out.‘I’m fine.’ I was pretty sure he was lying, but if he was well enough to lie then I didn’t have to worry about my mate too much. ‘Are you? What happened with Nazte?’‘Nothing. It was weird.’ I fell forwards, landing on paws and snapping my jaws. ‘He wanted to know how Cendres was. We just… Talked.’The cabin’s front door banged open behind me. I twisted around, catching sight of Na
