Stick snaps down, blade cuts clean, and he rips the draw straight back like he owns it. Wrath’s veteran doesn’t even touch rubber before Elias is gone—skates biting, body surging forward, puck already slung to Mats waiting at the blue line.
The barn erupts—but not for Wrath.
For him.
Because Elias throws his head back, curls bouncing, and chirps straight at the Wrath bench loud enough to rattle the glass.
“Better get used to losing, boys! You’ll be licking this ice clean by the second period!”
The Wrath bench howls back, orange gloves slamming, their captain snarling over the boards. The refs blow their whistles uselessly. The crowd screams.
Cole? He’s grinning like Christmas morning, banging his stick against the glass, howling, “THAT’S MY CENTER!”
The Wrath never take long to get petty. Can’t win a clean draw, can’t match the fire Elias is spitting across the circle, so they go the only place they know—dirty.
Second shift, their winger hacks his wrists right off the dot. Stick bites bone, sharp enough to make Elias hiss through his cage. He doesn’t fold. Just snarls back, eyes burning.
Next shift—slash to the ribs. Sharp. Deliberate. Late. Elias stumbles but stays upright, still clawing for the puck like he’ll rip it out of hell if I tell him to.
And the second it happens, my boys close ranks.
Mats bodies their defenseman so hard he folds into the boards. Viktor crunches the next orange jersey who even breathes Elias’s way. Cole’s on the wing snarling, sunglasses long gone, chirping so filthy even the ref looks rattled.
They’re not protecting a rookie. They’re protecting a Reaper.
Elias still won’t stop. His wrists red under the tape, but every time he skates up to the circle, he looks like he’s daring the Wrath to come harder.
And at one point, Christ—he almost does it.
Wrath forward comes at him dirty, stick raised just a little too high, eyes sharp like he’s aiming for Elias’s head. Elias sees it coming, shifts his grip, and for one split second—he’s not holding a hockey stick.
He’s holding a bat.
Both hands gripped tight, stance sharp, blade cocked back like he’s ready to swing for the fences.
The Wrath forward freezes mid-stride. He skates off fast, snarling something half-hearted to cover the fact he justbacked down from a rookie.
Elias lowers the stick slow, smirking behind his cage, and skates back to the dot like nothing happened.
Perfect.
The rest of the period is blood and chaos, Wrath snarling, crowd baying, refs screaming. My boys don’t break. They don’t fold. They dig in, lock down, grind through.
And with two minutes left in the first—Cole rips one clean top shelf, fed from a pass Elias threaded straight between two Wrath defensemen. Net ripples. Horn screams.
Reapers 1, Wrath 0.
The barn boos. My bench roars.
Second period. Wrath’s barn still buzzing, crowd baying for blood after Cole buried one in their net. They don’t want hockey anymore—they want a fight.
And they get one.
The Wrath bench shoves their enforcer over the boards. Big bastard. Six-five, thick through the shoulders, face carved from every fight he’s ever lost. Gloves taped, eyes dead. He’s not here to skate. He’s here to break.
And he lines up right across from Elias.
My pup crouches over the dot like he doesn’t feel the weight of it, but I see it—the twitch in his grip, the flare of his nostrils, the flick of his gaze up through the cage. He knows exactly what they just did.
