Ezra POV

After the deep lull of the alarms sound, everything starts to happen fast.

I pull away from Klepto. My fangs retract into my gums and I sniff the cool air deeply, trying to sense any danger as my brain goes haywire.

My head whips around, eyes blazing as they seek out my team in the audience. All of them look the same as I feel, completely shocked and on alert at the flip of a switch. Each of them stands and looks to me.

As if on impulse I'm staring at Alpha Veiler like he's already in charge of me, already my leader and commander. His face is, as usual, steely cold and unbothered. I wait for his command. I can practically see him thinking out the situation.

While he decides the game plan, I am taking control.

"What do we do?" I turn to look down at my beautiful mate, still dolled up to perfection. Her gray eyes are brimming with anxiety, questions.

She's scared.

Her words tremble slightly, I can see that she's trying to cover it up and act brave, but she has every right to be worried. I certainly am.

"Don't worry, sweetie. It will be alright." I assure her as my thumb gently brushes her cheek. I don't know that for sure, of course, but I know that one of us needs to remain calm. Once I can tell she's settled down a little bit, I redirect my attention to my team.

"Reid, take Klepto and Stacey to the bunkers." I say and Reid nods, taking his mate's hand in his. For once Stacy is silent at his side and I can tell she's frightened as well.

"What!? You can't just send me there, I want to help, you" Klepto speaks up, her tone not happy at all. Despite the fact that I just promised to make sure she's always happy, her safety comes first and foremost, or there would be no Klepto for me to keep happy.

"You'll help by staying out of the way." I tell her, and I see her spirits drop, lips parting in pain. My fingers grip her chin in my hand and get her to look at me square in the eyes. "You can fight, believe me, but you're needed at the bunker. If anything there goes wrong there, you need to be there to protect the weak."

Her eyes fill with understanding, and she reluctantly nods her head with a new, harsh tilt to her jaw.

"Be careful. Please." She says with determination. I lean down and kiss her hard, pulling her close against me. She tastes so sweet, so good. She is everything to me, and I realize that now. I will do anything to make sure she is taken care of.

Why did this all have to happen in the middle of our marking ceremony?

When we seperate, I give her a grim smile and a short nod, a vow that I will do everything in my power to make it out of this alive.

"I will." I kiss her again, this time a soft peck to the forehead, "I love you." I tell her reverently.

"I love you too." With that, she follows behind Reid and Stacey, glancing at me over her shoulder as they quickly make their way through the woods.

I wished more than anything I could go with her and protect her at all costs.

"You two. You go with them." Alpha Veiler says, clearly directing the words at Dr.Paullini and Klepto's dad. They both stand uneasily in the background, watching and waiting to be told what to do. Once they get their order they obey him.

They leave as well. All eyes are on Veiler now.

By the fierce flicker in his eyes I know he has a strategy and I couldn't be more glad.

It's as if everyone knows he's the one in charge. Hyrum and Ace watch him carefully, waiting for instruction without me even telling them we're possibly joining the Slate Penumbra pack. Something deep inside me tells me that this is indeed a sign that it is the right thing to do.

He is a born leader, made for giving orders, not taking them. I guess that's what happens when you're the most powerful being on the planet.

I wonder again how easy it would be to just give up my full leadership and trust someone else to guide our team.

I hope that King Veiler knows what he's doing.

"We split up. Ace, Miranda, and Hyrum, make your way from the outside in, rounding up any stragglers in the pack that need to be in the bunker, bring them to safety as quickly as you can. You run into any rogues, you kill them, no questions asked. Go."

Ace and Hyrum give me a look, and I nod, running a hand through my gel slicked hair. So much for looking nice for my ceremony.

The three of them immediately run off, shifting as they sprint through the woods, their lycan forms thundering and shaking the ground like an earthquake. I watch my friends go with a renewed nervousness.

This is really going down, and any of one of the people I love could be hurt.

"I knew this would happen. It's good strategy on the Red Alpha's part. The first attack was to distract, make us think it was a one and done. That that was it. This is the real fight. This is what we were waiting for." Veiler's words sink in slowly. This is for real. Things are escalating.

"What's the plan, what do we do?" Savannah asks, and Veiler narrows his eyes, his dark black eyebrows drawing together.

"We fight. Find rogues, take them down, look for the real enemy. As soon as you catch a whiff of the Red Alpha or Ryk you send me the signal." His eerie ruby eyes darts back and forth between the two of us. The lycan is revenge hungry, and I don't blame him. This is personal to Veiler.

It takes me a moment to realize that this is how it will be if I join their ranks, became their Gamma and dedicate myself to their pack.

Alpha Veiler, Savannah as the Beta, and me as their Gamma.

I shake the thought away, there is time to think about this later.

Hopefully.

"How do we signal?" I ask, and Savannah turns to me, her tan skin glowing.

"Howl. He'll know, he'll find you." It sounds simple enough to me. Each of us shifts into our lycans, and it's amazing.

It has been too long since I'd been in fur. I shake out my coat, peering down at the altar I'd been standing at moments ago. The stage looks little now settled between my paws.

It fuels my rage knowing that this night would have been perfect. It's the last day of the year, we were going to have fireworks and alcohol, desserts, dancing.

A New Year's ceremony. I've been looking forward to this very night for over a week, and just when we get around to it, it's ruined.

They will pay for that.

I rush through the trees towards the pack border, my mind set, heart determined. I will crush any rogue in my way. It's much easier to dispose of them in this form then my two-legged persona.

My nose fiddles in the wind as I pick up a scent that propels a dark growl from my throat. Those bastards should have learned their lesson from the first two times they tried to attack this pack.

I veer off to the left, following wherever my sense of smell leads me. The snow crunches noisily underneath me. The sound doesn't help to disguise my presence, but at this size I don't need it really.

As soon as they hear me coming, I'll be on them before they can really do anything about it. They'll all be dead.

My enormous form makes it difficult sometimes to wind through certain parts of the trees. If any two are too close together they give way, toppling over without any effort.

I draw closer and closer to the rotten stench of rogues, and when I find them I will not show mercy.

The first one I see looks terrified, but comes after me anyway. It's a useless, laughable attempt. One bite and the thing is lifeless. I drop the corpse and move on.

Another two rogues nip at my paws. I can scarcely even feel their try at an attack. I lift my paw and bring it down on one, pinning it to the ground. Again, I pick up a wolf in my mouth and crush it with my teeth, the blood pouring down my throat and over my tongue like a bitter wine. I spit is out with a snarl.

Nasty

The straggler under my paw stops struggling. His dark eyes are wary as they stare a way up at me. He is taken care of soon enough. Soon I have made short work of slaughtering at least 15 of the little pests.

My hackles raise when a particular scent ruffles the trees. It's something I've smelled before, months ago while I was crouched low in the bushes watching him.

Ryk.

I don't hesitate before lifting my head over the tree line, pushing my muzzle in the air and letting loose a long, drawn out howl.

It doesn't take long for me to realize that I've followed Veiler's command without question. It seems I have already subconsciously accepted him as my Alpha.

I guess that settles that question.

We're moving to Montana.

Again, I curse myself for my distractible mind and shove the thoughts away. There's a time and a place for daydreaming and now is not it.

I glance down at the massacre at my feet and sigh. Such a waste of lives. Their blood covers my paws, making my fur and claws dark with death.

Since there are no more rogues for me to extinguish, I decide to find the Red Alpha's sidekick. The one and only Ryk. That albino has caused lots of trouble, and now is the time for him to pay for his crimes.

Despite the overwhelming scent of dead, bloody rogues, I pin down his scent and rush towards it. I find myself going farther into the pack grounds. That only means one thing, Ryk has gotten well past the pack borders by now. It isn't a surprising revelation, he is a lycan after all.

We have a way of muscling past any obstacle that stands in our way.

I continue to pursue the smell of him, my nose high in the air as I lock into the hunt like a bloodhound on the prowl.

That's when I hear the sounds of a fight. Snarls and snaps, pounding and pouncing. The aroma of two lycans swirled together as one while they battle.

The King vs the albino.

It is a sight to behold, and a sight I won't be forgetting anytime soon.

Alpha Veiler's lycan is the biggest I have ever seen, his large body covered in a thick, black coat, along with humongous paws with thick claws. His ruby eyes are glowing in the darkening forest. The vision of his scars strewn across his face are like a deadly reminder of what is to come.

Ryk is a complete contrast. His fur is the same color as the snow surrounding us, his calm icy blue pupils calculating and vicious. His nose and the skin surrounding his eyes are so light pink they nearly blend in with his white coat.

Seeing them war against each other is bizarre.

Black vs White.

Good vs Evil.

Yin vs Yang.

I watch from the sidelines as they hash it out, Veiler being cautious as Ryk harshly tries to kill him. It's obvious to anyone that The Lycan King is holding back his power as he easily dodges the bites and scratches of his enemy.

Why isn't he attacking?

My question goes unanswered when the sound of a snap echoes around us. I have no time to see where it came from when a tree quickly comes down on me, covered in a strange red aura of sparks.

I cry out in surprise when I'm forced to the ground from the weight of the large tree hitting my back. It traps me against the snow. The branches of the tree dig into my side, cutting through the skin and making my side slick with blood.

No normal tree could be this heavy. It's as if someone is holding it down.

My eyes scan the surrounding woods as the sounds of Alpha Veiler and Ryk fighting continue to go on without pause. They haven't stopped to see the commotion.

I spot a small figure, a person standing not too far away, dressed in an all black cloak. Her hands are surrounded in the same fiery aura as the tree that continues to push down on me.

Her yellow eyes and bright red hair are like staring into a mirror.

"Hello there, Ezra. It's nice to finally meet you." The light voice calls, her dark painted lips curl up in a malicious grin. It's only now that something slowly starts to dawn on me.

Dread leaks through my veins.

The Red Alpha is not at all what I was expecting.

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If you're reading this, I love you:)