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“With my blood, I bind thee, heart and soul, body and mind. I bind myself to you. Brothers we became and brothers we remain, for this day until our last day. I task you, Chase, to live. Live a life at my side, my brother and my friend, and do not pass until we die together protecting what’s ours, protecting what’s right.”
I hold him, our blood mingling, humbled and awed at the power infused in this moment. Ryder’s always been my brother.
He just made us blood brothers.
Even when my choice threatens the fragile peace he’s worked so hard to build.
He had my loyalty before. Now it’s sealed in our bond.
Both trembling, we pull away from each other, and thunder rolls in the distance. Lighting flashes, illuminating Ryder’s eyes, and the air around us feels charged and heavy. “Whatever you’ve done, whatever will happen, we’ll live together or die together. I pledge my life to yours. That is my promise.”
Ryder stands and pulls a small first aid kit out of his bike’s saddlebags. I walk over to him solemnly and let him clean the cut as thunder rolls over the cliff on the horizon and sends the early afternoon into a premature darkness.
The vixen gathers her kits, eyes on the sky, and darts back into her home as rain starts to pour. Spells of this magnitude always take a toll on the weather, and Ryder only uses his gifts when he absolutely has to. Lightning splits the darkness and thunder screams as the billowing clouds settle low to the ground.
“Shed your clothes, brother, we go home as we were blessed to be.”
Ryder shifts without another word, and I stare directly into the golden eyes of his formidable wolf form. Bigger than me by far, the top of my head as a wolf comes to his chin at full height. I kick my boots off and unbutton my pants when Ryder goes preternaturally still and steps towards me with an air of confusion. His nose prods my chest, just below the wound, and his eyes look up at me with concern.
I look down and on my chest is a shadow, a feminine handprint. The shadow darkens, showing fingerprints in their finest detail, until I look like I have a new tattoo branded into my chest.
A woman’s hand.
Ruby’s hand.
Ryder steps back, nodding sagely.“Whatever you’ve done is sealed, as my spell has sealed. I hope you are prepared to face the storm that’s coming, brother.”
I shift reflexively, panic stirring my soul, my mind racing over the valleys to the mountain where Ruby lives. Something’s happened, something monumental, and the desire to run to her rips through my body like a physical blow. I raise my head in the storm and howl in pain, and after a moment, Ryder joins me. In the distance our pack echoes my call and the earth seems to shake beneath my feet.
Ryder steps towards the woods, head held high despite the raging storm, and I follow him obediently, even though every fiber of my body pulls me the other way. The wind shifts, strong and fast, blowing down from the towering mountain where our enemy resides and I freeze in place.
There’s a scent on the wind, death and rot, spilling down the mountain like a miasma of doom.
Ryder feels it as my mind snaps into tracking mode and he’s on my heels as I run as fast as I can. One moment I’m following my blood brother, and the next I’m racing blindly through the storm using only my nose to guide me. Trees blur to nothing as I run into the wind, locked on the scent with growing dread. I know exactly who I’m smelling. Every wolf has their own scent to me, and I’d be able to pick this scent out in the middle of our pack.
I pass my knowledge to Ryder and he howls in pain, loud and mournful. A scream from rises the town below.
Grace, moon above, I’m so sorry.
I follow the scent into enemy territory, not slowing for a moment and not giving a single fuck that I’m breaking the rules for the third time in a week. We climb the mountain as if it were a flat road, dodging rocks and debris and trees as if they were nothing but mist in our way. When a chimney appears in a clearing I slow and stop, crouching low to the ground and crawling on my belly.
"This is sacred ground,”Ryder growls into my mind.
Someone has done something foul, something horrible, and they’ve done it in a space so sacred no wolf goes here without a calling. There’s a small cabin in the clearing, overgrown with willow trees and ivy, and sitting right outside is Scraps, the cat.
She turns her head as we approach, her eyes holding more pain than a feline ever should, and she wanders away with her head low. Ryder and I stand. Scraps being here means no enemy is or she would never have been sitting out in the open. We prowl as wolves to the dilapidated opening that once held a door. Simultaneously, we stop when we register what’s inside.
Howls echo in my ears, rattling my heart and soul, before I even realize one of them is mine. The pain in the mournful sound fills the storm and passes over hills and valleys.
There will be no wolf in earshot who won’t know what has happened here today.
Half blind by rage and sadness I step into the old house. Hanging on a rope by his neck is young Brody; his body is battered and bruised. There are places where his skin has been burned, his nails pulled away. His face is untouched, his open eyes looking down at us still full of terror, even in death. His lower body is transformed, his paws hanging in the natural spring that fills this sacred place with life.
Brody didn’t go missing, he didn't run away. Brody was taken. Brody was tortured. Brody was killed. He was left here to be found, and the evil intent smothers the air and makes it hard to breathe.
My lips pull back in a snarl as another scent overwhelms my mind, two Silver Dawn wolves approaching fast. Ryder and I turn with our hackles high as we leave Raina’s home, and face Cole and Jax at the threshold of the cabin. All four wolves know what’s about to happen, and with snapping and frothing jaws we prepare to rip each other to shreds.
“You stole her and you have the audacity to come back here?”Jax holds his mouth open, eyes crazed with jealousy.
