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SHANE
I knewwhere Raika was going, where Conri was taking her. Back to the Nightshade lands. My pack lands.
My first instinct was to follow them, challenge Conri, and take my pack back—whatever was left of it.
But that was a death trap. If I couldn't simply challenge Conri; he wouldn’t follow wolf shifter rules. He would cheat, either using the help of the Nightmist witches again or his demons, and I would lose.
And this time, instead of being imprisoned by witches, I would be killed.
I couldn’t help my pack if I was dead.
So I did the next best thing I could think of: I went back to DuMoir Castle, where a certain vampire lord seemed to know a lot about every supernatural in North America.
Before we left NYC, Twyla and Daleigh had asked if they could help me with anything. When I told them I was good, they portaled back to the fae realm. But on the way to the castle, Killian and Lavinia weren’t buying it.
As Killian drove, he kept glancing at me in the backseat through the rearview mirror.
“So you have a mate,” he said. “Why didn’t you tell us about her before?”
I shrugged, my eyes fixed on the few stars in the sky not obscured by ambient light. “I thought she was dead. It didn’t seem important.”
Lavinia twisted in her seat, staring at me with her big hazel eyes. “You told us the Nightmist witches along with some other wolves attacked your pack. They killed everyone and took you. What changed?”
I closed my eyes and I tried to see details I had missed before.
The Nightmist witches had been our allies, but during Minsi’s birthday party, when they had been invited for a magic show, a drunk wolf assaulted one of the Nightmist witches and almost raped her.
The witch killed him, his mate killed the witch, and our alliance was severed.
The witches kidnapped Minsi, but they couldn’t leave the pack lands without the alpha allowing it—that was how the barrier worked. They hid in the forest and we went after them.
During the chase, I ran into Raika. She and Minsi had a special bond. They had become friends despite the age difference. Minsi had always been quiet and shy and anxiety prone, and I knew Raika was good for her. She was one of the few people who understood Minsi and cared for her.
I had been torn. I wanted her away from the mess. Safe and sound.
Before I could ask her to leave, we saw the witches, but we hid in a rock fissure, our bodies pressed against each other, our faces only inches apart.
That was when the bond snapped.
And I kissed her.
Or tried to. Our lips had barely touched when the witches moved on and my father found us a couple of minutes later. We sprang apart before he noticed anything, and because he hated Raika, he sent her back to town, while I joined him.
I wanted to go after her, but I had to find Minsi. We could sort this mating thing later.
My father and I found Minsi, then other pack wolves joined us, and we rescued her … and in the process, we killed a handful of witches. And they killed a bunch of wolves. The forest floor was stained deep red.
My father offered them a deal: He would open the barrier and let them go, but the decades-old alliance was over and the witches shouldn’t come back. Ever.
The witches agreed and left.
A week later, before I could figure out what to do with Raika and our bond—because if my father found out she was my mate, he might kill her—the witches came back with Conri and his lackeys.
The attack happened so fast, we barely had time to react.
Conri killed my parents in front of my family and me. I went for him, but Conri used his alpha command to stop me. To stop all of us.
The fighting restarted. I was separated from my siblings and Raika, and Conri handed me on a silver platter to the witches. They dragged me away while I saw my pack being slaughtered and the town burning to a crisp.
