Dasher ran a rough hand through his hair. "I want to get back to my Mate," he told me, and his voice was irritated and borderline childish.
I glared at him. "Trust me, I know." I pulled off from the highway, heart heavy. We had managed to get another one hundred werewolves to our cause, but it wouldn't be enough. Four packs had pledged some of their members to us—but only the ones they didn't want. They saw this a new chance to take the Magus territory, the best territory, for themselves. "I would love to be with my Mate, but being with her right now means putting her in danger in a few days."
"Eden can handle herself."
"And Iris can handle herself. Not to mention, she's at the Coven House. We ought to be afraid for whoever comes near them." I only slight meant that. I still worried about Eden, although I knew the reason she hadn't been touched yet was because, one, her grandmother would not allow my father to touch her, and, two, her grandmother knew she was nowhere near powerful enough to attack Eden by herself.
No, I saw right through that plan of theirs. My father would send werewolves at me, and when Eden was distracted, her grandmother would deliver the final blow. Luckily for Eden, while she planned to get as many protections and witches on our side as possible, I planned to protect her as much as I could.
She wouldn't look after herself. Not until everyone was taken care of.
Dasher sighed. "Why aren't we there? This is a fool's—"
"Again, your Mate is fine." I pulled over on side of the road, in what looked like the middle of the field. The smell of werewolves seeped in through my car, though. This pack I was somewhat close to—it was my mother's pack from a long, long time ago. The pack that had wanted to take me in and protect me from my father. The pack that had mourned her loss.
Hopefully they would still want to protect me. Or, at the very least, help me.
Dasher got out, and he had a grumpy expression on his face.
"Do you understand the severity of this?" I asked, crossing my arms as I leaned against my car. I didn't look out at him, only stared out into the distance as I was caught in a memory for a long, long time ago.
From when I was just Fynley, my mother's beloved son, and my dad had moved to Italy to be King, and she hadn't wanted to be Queen. So we left. She took me in the middle of the night and left.
We lived under their protection for four days—until my father threatened to kill them all if she didn't return to him. Not me, but her. She was his Mate, his property, and dammit, but I understood that need for your Mate; I just hated the way he abused the need and the bond to manipulate her feelings.
Of course, the Mating Bond threw people together based off of who would create the strongest child, not emotional or mental compatibility. I had lucked out with Eden, but maybe there had been much more at play than that.
Dasher nodded his head. "Yes. Goddess, Mother Above, and Jesus Christ, I understand how serious this is."
"Then why don't you act like it?"
"What does acting like it entail, cousin? Am I supposed to walk around and give commands? Wouldn't that be stepping on your toes, Alpha? Am I supposed to pretend to be calm and collected so I don't upset anybody else? Please, tell me how I'm supposed to act like this is serious."
The bite in his voice made the Alpha in me tense up. He made sense. Everybody dealt with situations differently, and my cousin had been through so much in the past three months that I couldn't blame him for however he chose to act right now, knowing he'd come face-to-face with the man that was his real father, the man that had ordered his family's death months ago.
Did that mean I wouldn't react to it? No.
Because I was slowly losing my mind, too. I was stressed out, restless, and I wanted all this over. Eden pretended like she knew we'd come out victorious, but I had noticed the way her hand shook—had slipped into her dreams a time or two when I first woke up to see she had nightmares about what was happening. I let her pretend for her sake because that was what a good Mate did. That was how she coped.
I turned my head slowly. "In a few days, you will become the Leader of the Rogues. Grow up. Realize you can't act however you want to. The Rogues will look to you when your father is dead or.... Or whatever the fuck happens to him."
We really had no idea. He didn't want Dasher dead, or so we thought, but that could've been a ruse—wrong information fed to werewolves he knew may get caught just to save his ass.
And even if he didn't want Dasher dead—what choice did we have but to kill him? He wouldn't go peacefully.
The wrong thing to say. He bristled even more, and his fists clenched as he turned to me. "I didn't ask for that position."
"None of us asked for this shit," I snapped, my temper a string wound too tight and close to breaking. "I didn't want to be born to an evil ass father trying to take over the world. Eden didn't want to be born with enough magic to become a Coven Mother at her age or have a target on her back—"
"A target she got because you put it there."
I winced. I had put it there, and Goddess, I regretted it. I would go back in time and change it all if that meant she wouldn't have to go through it. "That was something I had to do, and I didn't know she would be affected when it happened."
"You killed children."
"I didn't know you were so invested in the Coven you're only in to appease your dead mother."
This time, he winced. In my anger, I didn't regret my words. I didn't even feel any type of way about them because I wanted Dasher to hurt. Maybe he'd take this seriously. Maybe he would see what was going on, and he'd stop leaning on us so damn much and become the Leader of the Rogues. That was his prophecy.
He swung at me—sloppy and wild, filled with anger. "I'm invested in that Coven because of your Mate. Yes, I joined for protection, but I don't need that shit anymore. I stay because it makes Eden happen—she doesn't have shit else to be happy, now does she?"
I grabbed his fist and pushed him back feet away from me, bracing myself for a fight I wasn't sure I even wanted. "Are you talking about me? Are you saying I don't make her happy?" I demanded.
I saw the way she smiled at me, saw the way she relaxed around me. Still, his words planted a kernel of doubt.
Eden was always doing something for someone else.
"Look at what you come with—a father who wants to kill you shackled to the grandmother that wants to kill her. Even if you do make her happy, why would she want that?" he snarled, eyes burning bright with anger. "You tormented my cousin for months. You made her life hell because she was your Mate. You can say you were protecting her and trying to scare her off, but I know the truth."
"Which is?"
"You were a coward. You've always been a coward. That's why you scared her off—you couldn't stand the idea of her rejecting the bond, so you were mean to her first. You kept Iris around, not because you wanted to protect her, but because you knew she wouldn't leave you. The truth is, Fynley, you don't deserve Eden. Even now, you're cowering behind plans and armies, going from person-to-person because you're terrified of your father. You still haven't admitted the truth: that your father is supposed to be the one lost to his child. Not me."
His words sunk onto my skin with a heavy, dark feeling.
Truth—somewhat.
Pain.
Agony.
That string snapped, and I swung before I could stop myself. My fist connected with his jaw because, in part, he was right.
I had scared Eden off because I was terrified of her turning me down, and I had hid behind careful scheming and barbed insults. If I hadn't have been scared, I would've admitted the truth a long time ago.
I could have easily done what I did when my dad visited—tell him I had found my Mate, that I wasn't marrying Iris. I couldn't shackle neither her nor me to an unhappy life like I had seen with my father and mother.
I had been terrified of my father, and I still was. No matter how big or bad I tried to act, every time I thought of him, all I could see was the man who had almost killed me—the man who had beat me, stabbed me, and set me on fire all because I hadn't been able to kill children as a child. The man who forced my hand at murder so I could Change. The man who had told me I was worthless, weak, and pitiful. The only time I had been able to defy him was with Eden at my side.
What kind of man did that make me?
What kind of Mate would I be if I couldn't face someone for her?
I didn't deserve Eden, and it was the worst thing that had come out of his mouth—and the most honest.
"Fuck you," I snapped, hitting him over and over again.
Dasher didn't even defend himself. He let me hit him until I tired, until I stepped back from my rage, ignoring Eden's soft little brushes against my mind. She wanted to talk to me. I couldn't talk to her.
Tears flooded my eyes and spilled as I hit him.
I was weak and cowardly, and he was right.
He was absolutely right, and it saddened me as much as he pissed me off.
After a few minutes, Dasher spit blood onto the ground, his wounds already healing. "I've waited an entire three months to tell you most of that," he said with a deep sigh. "And it doesn't feel as good as I thought it would."
It rarely did.
Chest heaving, I stepped back from him. "Why?"
"Because I love Eden, and knowing you hurt her hurts me. Because I saw, first hand, what your words did to her when she went back to the apartment," he answered, and he didn't look angry anymore, just tired and resigned. "I hated you with her and for her, and when you two Mated, it made me sick to my stomach to keep this in. It makes me sick knowing you won't face your father for Eden."
I was. I had planned to.
"You think you will, Fynley, that's the thing. You're hoping, deep down inside, that someone else kills him. But nobody but you can get close. Or Eden."
"You don't know what I hope." I paused before adding, "I would never put Eden close to him."
He laughed bitterly. "Do you even know your Mate? Do you realize she will put herself close to him because you can't do it? That's what Eden does—she sacrifices everything, even herself, for everybody else. So, you, cousin, need to grow up. Face those demons, face your dad, and put a knife right through that cold, evil heart of his because if you don't, you will lose your Mate, and you will lose your pack."
I didn't bother to hide my tears—Dasher had already seen right through me. "I loved her long before you did."
"Then act like it," he retorted, using my words. "I shouldn't have said anything."
"It was true."
"Only partly." He met my eyes, and I saw fear reflected back in me. Terror was a more apt word. "I'm afraid to lose Iris, for to get hurt. I want her to stay far away, but she won't do that. I'm also afraid that if she does stay away, they'll hurt her to get to me."
I nodded. I understood why he had spoken out, why my words had triggered his anger, made him spill those hurtful words.
"I'm also afraid to win," Dasher continued, and he crossed his arms over his chest, wounds already healing. "I'll have to be the Leader of the Rogues, and I'm not even in control of my emotions. I can't control my magic. I can't fight very well. I can't do shit, but suddenly I'm in charge of thousands? That's terrifying."
Being in charge, I understood that well. Suddenly having to put the well-being of others above yourself. Having to care about things and people. That responsibility for them. "You can do it," I told him. "You wouldn't have been chosen for this path if you hadn't been able to do it."
He snorted. "Yeah, right. We were all just chosen for this path. We were given strength and abilities, and our parents' wrong decisions led us to this." He shook his head to himself, and whatever anger that had been in him left. "Anyway, I'm sorry for what I said. I only meant a little of it. You deserve Eden, and you wouldn't be her Mate if you didn't."
I disagreed. "My mom and dad Mated, and he doesn't deserve her."
"But they made you," he argued. "Your father may want to use you for evil, but your mother has always loved you despite it. You can see it in her eyes. Your mom wasn't Mated to your dad for him—she was Mated to him because no one else was strong enough to deal with him and raise you."
"Are you implying that my mother should've Mated with me?"
"No. It sounded a lot better in my head." He laughed. "This is my attempt to apologize to you and not make you think you're some weak, cowardly werewolf that acts just like his dad."
"You didn't say that last part earlier."
"I was thinking it very hard. I spoke in anger."
"There's always some truth in anger."
"Yeah, some." Dasher took a deep breath and gave me a serious look. "Listen, I can see you didn't have the best childhood, and whatever reason you have for fearing your father is more than valid. I can also see the lengths you will go through for Eden. I just want you to act like you love her. You can't hold fear of your dad in one and Eden's love in the other. Both of them are too heavy to carry at once."
I knew that. I also knew I'd choose her. "My dad has always been an evil fuck." That was the most I would tell him about my childhood. "That has to end soon."
Dasher nodded. "I've always been terrified of responsibility," he added. "Content to have other people take care of me—and, sometimes, I think I don't deserve Iris because I let her be a buffer between me and everything else. Because I couldn't grow up and deal with life. That has to end soon."
It did.
I held a hand out. "We're good?"
"Yes. Just don't tell Eden I made you cry—we don't need to be one less werewolf for the battle."
I laughed. "Cousin's honor."
A new voice entered. "Battle? Is that what it takes to make you finally come visit us, Fynley? We're only three hours away!"
Dasher spun, prepared to defend himself.
A tall, weathered old woman with white-blonde hair stared at me, a hand on her hip, fire in her eyes.
I sighed. "Sorry, Grandma."