The War of the Alphas: Book 1 of the Wolf Rising Saga

35| Red Moon Pack

Alpha Zelus cocks his head to the side, observing me with his scrutinizing stare. "You're my mate, not his."

"Yes," I breathe out, barely aware that I'm speaking at all. All I want to do is run my fingers over every single inch of his body, with an audience or not.

"So why do you carry his mark," he growls out, pulling me tighter against him. I welcome his embrace, staring up at him through my lashes. "Answer me, my little wolf."

I'm so lost in my God of a mate that my mind doesn't process what leaves my lips. "A moment of weakness," I whisper, running my finger gently over his chest. "He lost control, so he says."

Alpha Zelus growls, closing his eyes and lifting his head to the sky. I spread my hand over his pec, feeling his heart beat faster and faster underneath my touch.

"Um, Alpha . . ." speaks a quiet but strong feminine voice.

I'm broken from my trance as my eyes lay on Mary. Droplets of blood, my blood, are splattered across her face. I gasp and pull away from Alpha Zelus. I lose all strength his touch had given me and fall to the ground on my knees. The pain the whip had gifted me returns tenfold as I return to reality.

Alpha Zelus's eyes rest on my crumpled bleeding and bruised form. I look at him as his face turns soft briefly, if only for a second, before turning back into the hard stone covered in hot rage. He turns his fiery eyes to Mary, who keeps her head bowed in respect.

As his fists clench and unclench in his hands, I begin to think that Mary shouldn't have spoken up at all.

"I did not know she was your mate," she whispers, now afraid of the Alpha's wrath. "Please forgive me."

Alpha Zelus takes a deep breath and for a second I believe that he's trying to calm down, and succeeding but then he reaches his hand out and snaps Mary's neck like a twig. The whole crowd, including myself gasps in surprise as her body drops to the ground.

My eyes don't leave her body until I feel two hands lifting me up from under the shoulders. I take a sharp breath in as Alpha Zelus lifts me up, careful not to touch my wounds which have not ceased their pain since I was brought back to reality.

He turns towards the stone steps, taking the first few before stopping. With his hands under my butt, supporting my weight, his face front, his eyes hard as the stone he stands upon, he growls ferociously.

One by one his pack members bow to one knee, their neck exposed in submission, all pointed in my direction. I look at the hundreds of them in shock as Alpha Zelus continues our climb, a slight smile now on his lips.

I got used to being rejected while in Summit Pack, when I was the girl who didn't shift and when I was Ryan's best friend. Even when my own members rejected me when I became their Luna, I wasn't that surprised. Years ago I realized that they would never accept me, under any circumstances.

But the entirety of Red Moon Pack has accepted me in under a few minutes. Even though they did it because their Alpha basically threatened them too, it has made me warmer inside.

I clutch onto Alpha Zelus as we walk under the canopy of trees on a worn down pathway. The more I focus on things about him, like his back muscles that I am not so subtly running my fingers over or his scent that smells like pure wild, the pain in my back begins to dull.

I'm so lost in him that I don't realize that we've arrived somewhere until he slams a door shut with his foot. I lift my from his shoulder and take in my surroundings. The first thing I notice is the curved staircase that leads up to another floor which has only one door on it that I can see from here. Alpha Zelus carries me up the stairs, not uttering a word. I reach out and let my hand glide across the ancient wood of the staircase banister.