AllFreeNovel
Share Us
He held onto it. And the hatred simmering in the crack down his middle for the wolf that hadhisface: Malte Öberg of FrostFangare.
He clenched his teeth, gums burning as his fangs shifted in his jaw.
Henri turned back to the wolves, who sported hunched shoulders and submission-laced scents at the domineering First Beta’s presence. “His name is Sterling. He will face Alan of FrostFur for silvering his mate. His mate was since murdered by unknown wolves, presumed to be FrostFur. He abdicated his position as Alpha to pursue vengeance. Alpha Demetrius and Luna Marcella have decided that he can train here, just so the duel is as sporting as possible. He has already killed Elder Alpha Jerron of SilverPaw, so his chances are better than zero.”
Sterling barred his teeth in a grin at the wolves.
Henri ducked towards his ear as he left. “Good luck, wolf. Do not think you are safe here.”
Good. The training could start immediately.
Henri closed the door behind him.
Sterling pushed his way through the cluster of wolves to one of the two untaken beds. Metal frame, thin mattress, thin blankets, one pillow. Clean. Between two other beds. Not ideal, but good to keep his senses sharp. Faced a window on the opposite side. His reflection, imperfect and translucent, looked back at him.
He deposited his duffel on the bed and concerned himself with unpacking.
“Your name isSterling?” one wolf, a younger one, asked.
“Yes.”
“Who names a wolfSterling?”
Sterling continued to unpack his minimal possessions. He paused for a second over his phone. Jun, Cye, and Burian had gone back to New York, and were no longer his packmates. He had abdicated. And any contact he had with them could endanger them.
He ran his thumb over the dark screen. Winter would not answer. His mother had taken her phone. His parents would handle keepinghumanWinter alive. It was a delicate dance of keeping questions from being asked and maintaining their life so they could return to it.
Or whatever was left of it.
If she ever forgave him for giving her to Searle. Jun had tried to convince him not to do it, but Burian and Cye had pled with him—that Winter would want a chance to fight and survive, and not die with a bellyful of turducken.
He didn’t need to be told, though, that she had woken up alone, in a clinic, without knowing how she had gotten there. To find outhewas not coming to see her. That her pack was no longer her pack. That her name was no longer her name. That her life was no longer her life. That her mate was no longer her mate.
And she might not forgive him for it. Because whodidwhat he had done?
A shove on his shoulder.
He snarled at the bigger, older wolf.
“He asked you a question,” the older wolf growled.
Sterling dropped his phone onto the mattress. “I’m not here for your prestige. I am not here for your she-wolves. I am hereonlyto avenge my mate’s murder. Pick a fight with someone less dangerous. Like that board game you’re losing.”
The bigger wolf shoved him again. “You’re the hybrid wolf. The one who was here in the fall. The one who’s trying to take our territory with human money.”
“No, yes, no.” He didn’t want their territory. He wanted his mate.
Hewouldget her back.
And what happened after that…
I will come for you.
The wolf shoved him a third time. Now it had some bite to it. Sterling absorbed it, icing over, emotions draining away and fleeing into the box where he stored them. It all drained, flowed, slid away, leaving him empty and still, clear and cold as forests in winter.
She shone like snow, blinding in sunlight.
Through the absolute clarity, he focused on the scent of his new bunkmates, the press of their challenge. Thecock, themasculine, theterritoryhe affronted by his presence. He wasother. He wasnot-pack, not-welcome, and in a tangle of other young males who already existed in an uneasy peace, he was a threat to be disposed of, because they would accumulate no prestige with him present unless they took his.
