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Aiden flinched. He’d convinced his mother he was happier in his solitary existence because it was safer for her, but he’d neverwantedthis.
They reached his front lawn where Nathan stopped. The rest of the crowd stopped twenty feet back, visibly frightened.
Shame welled within him. Aiden knew they feared him; that was why he’d warded his house and why he led this separate existence. He didn’t know it was this bad. He wanted to chastise the wolf, but in truth, it was his fault for not controlling the beast.
Nathan pushed his son forward again. The boy was trembling. He looked five years younger than the last time Aiden had seen him.
“Aiden!” Nathan shouted.
Aiden could feel the fur rising on the back of his neck, but the wolf didn’t make a sound.
“You can’t make them fight,” Kathleen insisted.
“As your new alpha, you better believe I can. Aiden is sentenced to death because his wolf is out of control.”
“No!” his mother screamed.
“And the alpha elect will deliver the final blow.” Nathan stepped close to his son. “And if it’s the other way around, and he kills you, I’ll be well rid of you. I don’t want a weakling.”
He shoved, and the boy went sprawling.
Aiden’s wolf growled.
Kathleen babbled, “Nathan, he’s my son. He’s done nothing wrong. You can’t!”
“The problem will be solved by morning, one way or another,” Nathan said expansively. “And now, if everyone can head to the big house, I can finish moving in.”
“You can’t!” Kathleen repeated.
“Watch me,” Nathan said simply.
With a cry, she threw liquid from a tiny bottle she’d been concealing in her hand.
Nathan screamed as the liquid hit. He staggered back, and Aiden watched his beard curl and smoke. He batted at it with a leer of triumph. “For this treacherous, unprovoked attack, you are banished from our lands.”
The wolf howled; Aiden scrambled for control.
“Grab her!” Nathan shouted.
A couple of men took Kathleen by the arms.
“Search her, make sure she doesn’t have any more weapons.” It would have been intimidating, but he kept having to swat at his beard as the spell burned toward his chin.
The moment the men’s hands touched his mother, the wolf struck, throwing himself at the fencing over the window.
“Aiden, no!” Kathleen screamed. “I’ll be fine. Don’t!”
The wolf howled and rammed straight into the wall next to the fence, trying to get through. But the cabin was built of stout logs that did not give.
“Aiden, you don’t give up. You come for me when the pack is safe, you hear?”
She wanted him to stand by while they banished her?
“You don’t die for me!” Kathleen wailed as they hauled her down the hill, the crowds following.
Let me out,Aiden said to his wolf.
The beast ignored him.
