* * * Eve’s POV * * * The alarms are still sounding as we rush from the meeting room and out of the packhouse. The pack grounds are in chaos, those with children are bickering about who will fight and who will stay with the pups, the young are scared and crying as they cling onto their parents and caregivers. Everyone, please do NOT panic. You are well protected and the safe house is just a precaution. Proceed calmly and quietly to your destination, we will protect you, Alpha Paul commands using his Alpha tone through the mind-link. The pack calms, only the young are frantic now and everybody goes about their business. “Are you worried?” I ask Alpha Paul. “I swallow my own fear to expand the safe zone of others, to become the stoic leader they deserve,” he tells me. “So, you have a safe house? We were only gone a short while,” I ask him. “I had planned to tell you on your return. We changed the doors and key codes to Charles’s underground hideout. We felt it would be a good pla
* * * Eve’s POV * * * “I REPEAT. BREACH. THE ENEMY IS WITHIN THE WALLS!” the voice cries out again. Down from the wall leaps Max with a fierce cry that echoes as he shifts into Nate’s angry form. His paws touch the Earth softly as he lands. He soon has his work cut out. Alexander looks down from atop the wall, hearing the great rumbling growl of Nate above all the chaos. “The enemy is in the pack!” he cries. “They are throwing their men over the wall and fence. Stand your ground and make them rue the day they challenged us,” he shouts as he leaps down the wall into the thick of the enemy with many men shifting into their wolf’s at his back. Their onset is fierce and sudden, and the enemy gives way before them. Alexander and those around him are fierce and all are slain or driven shrieking further into New Moon, only to fall before the gathered warriors. * * BOOOOM! * * A ground shaking explosion rings out around the pack grounds, so powerful it uproots some of the nearby trees a
* * * Eve’s POV * * * My heart rate spikes; my heart is sitting in my throat and my stomach is churning. “Release her,” Alpha Paul commands them.“You’re not our Alpha. You’re not our King. You do not command us,” the vampire spits at him.The wolves close ranks around the vampire, shielding him from the pack. My blood begins to simmer, how dare they willingly stand for one of their own kind to be slaughtered.“I am Evelyn Rose Jones, my wolf is Cora. We are the Moon Goddess’s own blood and we are the Alpha of all wolves. We are the Alpha Queen. You will submit and end this campaign. You will kneel,” I command. My tone merges with Cora’s to deliver an Alpha command that contains raw power. The wolves around me drop to their knees, perhaps we should have been a little clearer, Cora mutters.The wolves before me stand on shaking legs as their knees give way and their wolves force them to submit to me. The vampires are shocked to see such power, but it has no effect on them. “Release
* * * Eve’s POV * * * The night has stretched on and on, and sleep still evades me. ‘Calm your mind,’ Cora tells me. ‘I can’t. It won’t switch off. You rest. I’ll be OK’, I say. ‘I love you, Eve’, she says sweetly.‘I love you too’, my sister. Every dysfunction is a function if you look at it right, and this sleeplessness is an invitation to think deeply about my life and ask myself what isn’t working and how I can improve it for myself and others.One sleepless night is okay, I'd rather be dreaming, of course, yet this night becomes one extended moment of pondering. So I embrace it. I feel all the reasons why my soul is so perturbed and ask how I may navigate better.My mind is restless, and I can’t switch off from all that we have lost. All those innocent lives are gone. There are better and worse versions of loss. We are aiming for the better version because then we have the strongest base possible for rebuilding. That’s our victory, it’s the only one on the table, and it’s a p
* * * Eve’s POV * * * Horror—the crisis is here. The Beta has created and unleashed rabid wolves within the pack. We all hold a defensive position—half-crouched, our arms extended slightly. They are coming for us. ‘Why?’ I think to myself, wondering why he would do this. The words come through my mind in a snarl that’s louder than I expected. Too loud. ‘I’ve got him. He’s in the armoury,’ Cora growls as she passes this information on to me and the group I’m with. ‘It means that it’s far too late to sneak around now. Most of us need to take on the wolves, and a small group needs to stop the Beta before it’s too late,’ Alpha Paul growls as he assesses the movements of the rabid wolf. Alpha Paul’s body shifts, only infinitesimally, but it tells me where to look. I stare at the black shadows of the Hospital doorway. It’s like having my nightmares walk forward to greet me. Six wolves emerge, eyeing up their prey. My heart beats furiously, loudly, as if to make their target more obvio
* * * Eve’s POV * * * * * * 12 Months Later * * *“Tea, please,” I call through to the kitchen, after Max has asked me what I’d like to drink. He’s been my rock over the last year, I don’t think I could have survived and done it without him. Well, I could have, but it would’ve been harder. And truthfully, I don’t want to be apart from him. “Some things are only true if you believe they are. Take for example the trojan horse in Greek mythology. Those who believe that others of different ethnicities or faiths are as the Trojans in the wooden horse, waiting for their time to take over society in a bloody massacre, treating those others with suspicion, contempt and prejudice. As that group (or groups) increasingly have less to lose, they form groups for social protection and to challenge the order that suppresses and abuses them. Thus the fear and cold hearted emotional indifference causes the problem. After this point there is continuing consolidation of groups who arm themselves for c
* * * Eve’s POV * * * * * * Six Months Later * * * We’ve spent a month up in Scotland at Alpha Darius’s pack. The hunters have been picking off lone wolves, wolves who have wandered beyond the boundary line and any wolves or vampires they come across. Their weapons are designed for one purpose only, to kill. They have been uninterested in peace talks, despite the prime minister and local authorities being involved too. There is very little the human world can do to help. These hunters live off the grid and are funded by businessmen and women with very deep pockets. Occasionally, we have been able to find evidence of those rich people funding the hunts and the government has stepped in to arrest them. The trouble is they seem to multiply, for every head we cut off, two more will take its place. We’ve had several battles with these hunters, we’ve managed to avoid losing lives but there have been a few close calls and injuries sustained. They have remembered which of us have gifts an
* * * Eve’s POV * * ** * * The Final Decision * * *My heart shatters, my soul is crumbling, and I feel empty while floating in the abyss. There’s a hole in my chest, and I want to die. I want to end my existence so that I can reunite with him again. It was never meant to be him; the Moon Goddess said we would have lots of babies. She lied. The biochemical impact and bodily stress of heartache is an actual injury that one never truly recovers from. I will never recover from this injury and loss. “My child, I did not lie to you,” a voice filled with sadness rings out around the darkness. “You said we would have children. YOU LIED,” I cry. I know she’s the almighty and our object of worship, but right now, I hate her. She chose Max’s fate; she planned to cause me this pain.“No. Max deviated from his predestined path. That’s something I’ve never seen before. He was never meant to die.”“Please just kill me. I don’t want to live in a world without him.”“My dear, you don’t need to liv