Sean's curled up at our feet as Dad passes our precious female me. I settle down despite the snarling, pacing wolf frothing at the mouth in rage right at the forefront of my mind. I take my Ili-doll and sit right on the benches once reserved for the council's wolves who are dying en masse today. Motherfuckers couldn't have a better end than here in the room that they've ruled from like despots for generations.

We want to coat our teeth with their blood, these old wolves who interfered in something that no wolf has the right to touch. Fucking with mate bonds is pure sacrilege, not to mention just look at this fucked-up mess. This is why Severing a bond is supposed to be such a big deal. It destroys lives even if it's deemed 'necessary' or 'just' by these so-called leaders.

Sean slumps against my thing. He's shivering and honestly would look completely pathetic if not for the low growl of warning emanating from his chest. He buries his face in Ili's lap, hiding as her emotions roll over him.

He's getting the full force of her bond. All of the emotions that I'm feeling blast from her and her she-wolf. He can feel her pain. Her humiliation. Her sorrow.

All his fault, except, you know, the shit's that my fault. He spat on a diamond to greedily suck on a cunt. I don't care what the scientists and the council did, Georgie-Porgie was not his mate. Not that it matters, now. She's a pile of empty flesh and bone. Her waxy eyes, glazed over in death, are staring at the ceiling with a look of betrayed horror. I hope rigor mortis sets in and the bitch's face rots just like that.

"Sean, it wasn't your fault. They faked a bond," I soothe him, nudging him with my knee. His growl grows in volume. He fucking hates himself.

"Sean," Ili mouths. She curls up more tightly in me. Her hand twitches. She wants her male to stop feeling like shit, but she's in shock over her mom. I rub Sean's hair with my fingers while stroking Ili's back. My wolf struts around, proud to be the strong one today. I let him have his moment. Goddess knows there will be times that I am the weak one. Sean turns his face into my palm and nuzzles me, leaving my hand wet with his tears.

"Shh, c'mon, Sean. She's right here. She's safe with us right here where she belongs," I rumble as I feel Ili's agitation rise.

Putrid self-loathing flickers through the bond. Sean's hatred for himself is so strong that I can feel it through Ili. Sean starts to slip down. Ili's hands flex, trying to grab him. Ungently, I haul his limp body closer to his. "Hey, c'mon tough guy. You're not alone, Sean," I murmur. He presses his lips to my palm.

I am not hard. I refuse to spring a boner when my mates need comfort and the wolf world is imploding all around us.

"Brax, what's he going to do?" our doll worries out loud, her voice the daintiest whisper.

I assume she's talking about Inuit. She could be talking about Dad, too. Or Conner. Maybe even Carmichael. Even Orion is here. Shit, have so many alphas ever been stuffed into one small space before? It's why my wolf is content to be over here. Too much drama over there.

"Who, babydoll?" I ask her.

Her eyes go to Inuit. The King paces through blood and spilled guts on the floor. He looks nothing like the relaxed guy I know from training in the north. Lips curled back in a perma-snarl, he is covered in blood. None of it is his. Nearby, his luna is twirling through body parts on her toes, slinking around as her golden eyes take in the carnage with no expression whatsoever.

I look for Bailey. Fuck, how did I forget that our luna is here? Behind Conner, up on the bench seats, stands our tiny human girl, her hands white-knuckling her laptop, eyes wide behind her glasses. She's untouched, surrounded by males from Dad's warrior unit.

The room begins to fall quiet. Dad's males are corralling the wolves into groups. Any spectators still left standing get shoved into a corner. I see Gerard, Ili's father, there. He looks... broken. He just lost his mate and one 'daughter.' I tug Ili closer. Gerard may have lost her, too.

In the center of the room, where wolves on trial stand, where my doll was just a moment before, are the remains of the council. The ones who are still alive are forced to kneel on their old, creaky knees. Dad's males show them no mercy, slamming them down onto the unforgiving stone.

"Conner?" Bailey calls out. His regard zeros in on her, dismissing all else as unimportant. He's an ass for bringing her in here, especially when she's preggers. I look back at Inuit... Nevermind, Bailey was always safe with the King of wolves here.

"Honeygirl?" Conner strides to his female's side. Despite how tiny our cute human is, she has the attention of every alpha wolf.

"I've compiled the list."

"Hear that?" The alpha king kneels next to the old males on their knees, hands behind their back, petrified looks on their faces. "That genius little human luna that your precious alphason rejected has a list." He says the word 'list' with heavy importance.

The kneeling males don't make a sound.

"Luna Bailey, can I see your list?" the alpha king asks her. Outloud, he reads a list of seven names. "Who are these females?" he asks them. Silence.

Sean rises shakily to his feet, stumbling over to the king of the wolves. "He knows," he mutters, hoarsely, face pasty-white, mouth tinged blue. He points to one familiar face among the kneeling wolves. "And him," he points to another before staggering back to us.

"Grab the blanket, Sean," I say quietly. His lips are blue, he's obviously freezing cold. Having their Claim completed means that Ili, Sean, and I should be curled up in a warm den together. This is bullshit.

Sean grabs a silver-colored emergency blanket that one of Dad's males hands him. I help him wrap it around us before he crashes back to the floor at my feet like a shivering potato in a ball of tinfoil.

"You still don't wanna talk, yeah?" Inuit snaps at the kneeling wolves. "Even now?" The smile on the King's face reveals pink-tinged teeth. "Guess I have to bring in my own witnesses, then." He clicks his tongue and shakes his head mockingly. "I'm young, yeah? Stupid, orphaned alpha of the north. What do I know? It's a good thing I'm good at making friends, yeah? Con, you think I'm good at making friends?"

My brother nods, his face betraying no emotion, arms crossed across his chest, Bailey tucked behind him. "Yeah. The best," he grunts. Bailey pats his arm.

The King smiles. "So I made friends with smart wolves," he says quietly. "A good king knows how to delegate, yeah?" He stands and wraps an arm around his blood-soaked queen. "Luna Bailey," he says politely, "what does the list mean?"

Our luna adjusts her glasses on the bridge of her nose. Conner's hand drops to cover her belly, where their first pup is nestled snugly. Yeah, jackass, because your mate is prego as fuck. Pregnant females shouldn't be exposed to this ugliness.

Is Ili pregnant? My hand drops to cover her flat stomach. Internally I scold myself. She wants to skate and still isn't in peak health. I have to be patient about pups, but shit do I want a few... dozen. Sean's hand creeps up and covers mine. He wants pups, too.

"Well," the tiny luna says, "the list is of wolf pairings. At first, I thought it was another artificial insemination list, but... it doesn't match and the DNA profiles are... strange."

"How are they strange?" the king asks her. He speaks to Bailey gently. I can see how offended the councilwolves are at his careful treatment of the human. Ha.

"It's just a hypothesis..." Bailey murmurs, "but... it looks like pairs, similar to the inseminations, but without a male partner? Like... they were meant to be paired in some other way..." she nibbles on her lower lips, eyes narrowed, the carnage all around her forgotten. "Humans and wolves-" she says slowly.

The kneeling wolves come to life. Protests, the taste of lies and falsehoods taint the air, as they yell and attempt to scramble to their feet. The crowd of onlookers, fading into the background, begin to shout and yell as well. The alphas swing back into motion, fists flying. Dad cold-cocks one male to his right temple hard enough to stun him motionless. No need for claws to subdue these wolves.

"What are they trying to do?" Inuit asks. At his first word, everyone falls silent again.

Bailey shrugs her shoulders. "It's beyond science. Beyond what I can figure out from the DNA."

The king picks up one of the council's males by his neck. "So..." He stares into the old male's watery blue eyes for a long beat. "You are still silent, old male," he says softly. "You're afraid. Is there someone more powerful than me?" He drops the male to the floor in a heap. A frown slowly crawls over Inuit's face.

"Mactiir," his luna purrs, cuddling into him, two dangerous wild beasts. Willa is splattered with blood and, of course, the Wild Luna wore a white dress today. "Calm."

The king bends his head to inhale his mate's scent. We echo his motion to inhale our mates. Many other wolves do, too. In this pack of alphas, he is the undisputed leader our wolves all recognize.

Inuit reluctantly pulls away from his female and paces away, scowling, "I make good friends. One of them ended up in jail recently, yeah?" He looks at the kneeling males and smirks, "he should be here soon."

The old males start to sputter, but their protests are dying fast, just like their frail bodies. Still, they offer no explanations, and it is becoming clearer that the King is correct, they are afraid of someone more keenly than the wolves in this room. The most powerful wolves in the central US and someone has them shaking in their fur more than these males?

"Bring me Alex," the king orders. To my surprise, Trey Wilkinson (douchebag) is the one who leaves.

Only a minute passes before a new male enters the room. We straighten a bit as Uncle Alex walks into the room. We haven't seen him since he was arrested for fraud. Alexander Clear, with a thin, lanky blonde female trailing in behind him, held tight in Trey Wilkinson's grasp. A female we recognize because we saved her, with Orion, on our run from the north. Little Rory doesn't look much better now than she did that day we saved her and the other female.

The former alpha of the ClearHowl approaches the kneeling males, his jaw set hard. He gets close to one of the old males, his face inches away. "Uncle Ted," he says quietly. "I just made ten thousand dollars." He pauses. "Another." Again he waits for a few beats, "and there's another ten." He settles onto his haunches, and tells the old male, "does my success really twist your guts so hard? Did you really think you could hide your crimes from me forever?"

"Tell me, Alex," the king orders.

Uncle Alex stands. "Alpha," he points to the tiny luna's laptop, "this is an example of perhaps the worst of the experiments. For years we have been tracking kidnappings. For decades we believed it was a sex trade ring. The experiments happened, I'm ashamed to say, right under my nose." His voice becomes quieter as the entire room strains to hear his words, "They have been bending the rules of wolf mates," his hand indicates to us. "But that isn't the worst." His gaze scans the assembled crowd and I understand why they were able to stay. More wolves than normal turned out to watch Iliana, a female Beta, go on trial for mate-snatching. Now they are Uncle Alex's witnesses to the council's perfidy.

He takes a breath. "Wolves. Listen Closely." We all collectively hold our breath as anticipation simmers in the air.

"Humans have discovered our existence. It is more than rumors. More than a few fuzzy black and white photographs taken from a trailcam."

A video starts to play on the black screen behind the benches we're sitting on. Photographs of the sort that Uncle Alex is talking about play. Trailcams capturing wolves that are too large to be wild. A pack from the Amazon, yellow stripes decorating solemn faces, a mix of feet and paws. A male mid-shift.

Then the pictures change. Uncle Alex has images from inside the council's facilities. I feel Ili wince as they show females, nude and strapped to cots, males hooked up to machines, dead wolves being dissected on lab tables.

"In the highest levels of government they know about us. They have been experimenting... Creating wolves."

The room buzzes with noise. Some of the watching crowd retch as the images become more graphic. Dad's soldiers stand with stoic faces. Orion looks like he's ready to spit nails.

"Experiments... with creating genetically-modified humans with wolf genes. Splicing wolves onto human souls."

The kneeling old councilwolves lose their defiance, all at once, like a popped balloon. Horror thickens our blood. Our heart beats too slow. Uncle Alex's words hurt. They are a nightmare. This... this can't be happening.

"Rory, come here, pup," Uncle Alex says kindly. Trey hauls her forward, his hold both unforgiving yet gentle.

"Rory, tell us where you were."

A mutinous expression crosses her face, but it's the male holding her imprisoned that gets the worst of her fire, "let go of me, you cretin!"

Trey growls, and the oddest expression crosses her face. It's one of pain mixed with confusion and anger. "That's your she-wolf," Trey murmurs intimately, "telling you to be obedient to your alpha-male for once in your life."

She scoffs but swivels her head back around to glare at Uncle Alex. "My sister and I were born without wolves," she announces. Her voice trembles and shakes. "Our mom is a human and our dad is a wolf. We were... taken... and experimented on." Her hands twist together. "I was given a wolf, but it didn't work with my sister."

The crowd hisses in shock. One she-wolf turns and tries to leave the room, but the doors are all blocked by the alpha wolves. She vomits into a garbage can in the corner.

"Explain," the king barks.

Rory shifts in Trey's grip. His hand tightens as he pulls her back into his body. His other hand strokes her hip, his lips next to her ear. He is murmuring to her and with a jolt I remember that she killed Trey's younger brother, Cole, in a drunk-driving accident only a week or two ago. Yeah, that's a clusterfuck.

"I never shifted," Rory says. "I was wolfless. My brother, Kade, was born with a wolf, but we weren't... Ariel and I... we didn't... and Mom and Dad..." She sniffles and falls silent. I can tell she just doesn't want to cry in front of everyone.

Trey turns her face into his chest, hiding her from the room. Cluster. Fuck. Poor douchebag.

"Thank you, Rory," Uncle Alex says quietly. Then he laughs, sounding tired. "Your greed for stronger wolves under your control has caused our entire species to be on the brink of utter destruction."

"We have no choice but to fight back," Uncle Alex says quietly. "you tried to imprison me for making money for my pack," he tells the kneeling males, "all while committing truly heinous crimes because of your own greed. Now, it's over. The senators and generals and judges and law enforcement you have in your pockets all either belong to me now, or they're dead."

Uncle Alex takes a step closer to the kneeling males, "Alpha Inuit has utterly destroyed your little mad scientist industries in the north. The factory on the tundra, the village in Nova Scotia, even the lab in Alaska. It's all gone."

Inuit steps forward. His hard, near-black gaze scans the room, sending every wolf quailing into submission with only a glance. "This is my territory now," he announces. His hard gaze finds the councilwolves. "And, I've decided to delegate a new council. How's that sound? And my good friend Alex here will be taking over shit for me."

—-

The Other female was nothing and yet we allowed ourselves to be her puppet. We felt nothing when we killed the albatross around our neck, but we feel every hurt that our angel has suffered due to us.

The Brat is our port in the storm as we sift through our female's memories. We don't remember half of her memories of us. We forgot the good in her and cultivated the seeds of evil the Other female planted in our mind.

We tended to the Other because we did not want to be alone. A half-breed, not worthy of the pack. We pushed away our mother and father. We hid our true feelings from the pack, our friends, our alpha. And in the end, we abandoned our mate to the same fate we feared for ourselves; to be alone.

We don't know how long it takes, but slowly we come back to ourselves, kneeling with our head pillowed in our female's lap, our legs wrapped around her and the Brat's legs. Our fingertips are blue from the cold. Our body is frozen, but our mind is pacing, pacing, relentlessly digging through the icy ground until our paws bleed. Still we search for every hurt we caused, every tear shed because we were not a good male. We don't deserve them. They would be happier without us.

No. They are ours. We crawl up over our mates, growling, biting, sucking at flesh, male and female, all that we can eat. They are nude, scenting of us, soft and hard, warm and cool. Perfect.

"Shit, Sean. You fucker. Stop!" the Brat stands, scolding us, but our weakness is vanishing under the strong urge to rut our mates.

Carrying our angel in his arms, the Brat pulls us from the cold, stone chamber into a hallway. "This is fucking ridiculous- shit- yeah, baby touch my dick. That feels good," he grunts as we grasp him and tug gently.

I fall to my knees and suck his thick cock into my mouth, hollowing out my cheeks. The Brat stumbles back as our female's giggles lighten our chest. We suck, then release him with a pop as he stares at us, open-mouthed, panting. Holding his gaze, challenging, daring him to tell us to stop, we slide our tongue over his crown, again and again until he is panting, his hips bucking. Our female is still laughing, laying open-mouthed kisses over his chest. We rub her thighs gently, occasionally releasing the Brat to lick her skin, too. She is drenched, all of her worry and fear disappeared as soon as I sucked the Brat into me.

When he is at the brink of insanity, we guide our female to him. Moaning, writhing, she climbs his body and eases him into her.

"Who the fuck cares about the world, right?" the Brat pants. "It can wait." His hands grasp our female's hips and starts to bounce her up and down. Growling, we surge to our feet and press ourselves against her back. The Brat slows his pounding, his hooded gaze finding us again before a sly smile crosses his lips.

"Ili, Sean wants to know if you can take his cock in your pretty ass," Brat murmurs to our female.

"Love you, angel," we whisper in her ear. I kneel again, to eat our female and let us ease into her.

She stiffens in the Brat's strong arms. "Umm..." she heaves a huge breath. "Can... oh!" she cries out while we play with her tight star. Her thighs start to shake as she has a small orgasm from the stimulation to her tight body.

"Doll, you're an anal slut," the Brat breathes. "Fucking awesome. I didn't think I could love you more, but... fuck."

"Brax!" our female cries out. "Don't say... um... oh, goddess."

We stand and press ourselves to her. She's tight, tighter than anything we have ever felt before and we had her-

"Brat," we rumble. "Do you want this cherry?"