When I was first dragged to this place years ago, this cell was my home. I slept in here, with silver bars making up three of the four walls, stone at my back and feet. The witches rewarded me with fresh meat when they remembered, keeping me just weak enough to be thankful. You can't starve a shifter and not expect them to devolve into a feral beast. That's what I was. What I still am.
They pumped me full of magic, and if Deidre was in the mood, she'd grind her ancient witch pussy all over me until she came.
I am the coven's lab rat.
Hundreds of glass vials of my blood sit stacked along a workbench outside my cage—some blended with magical herbs, others mixed with the blood of shifters captured and since killed. They sit there, some dusty and long forgotten, taunting me every day.
A few months after capture, Deidre decided I was broken enough to let me out of my cage, testing the boundaries of the geas, sending me out on missions—close to home at first, andwith a slew of guards, before gradually slacking my leash. I've killed, hunted, captured—all at her command.
In the last couple of years, after letting me roam the continent alone, successfully completing her tasks, my cage got a little bigger—upstairs, four walls and a bed, no door—and she started sending in other members of her coven. I'm payment to them, favors fulfilled. Some of them I fuck. Some of them fuck me while I grin and memorize their faces and scents, ensuring I'll remember every single witch I need to kill when my wolf is finally free of the priestess.
My alpha grunts in agreement.
I glance at Lily, still crying in the corner. I've got a hit list a mile long, and one more death or torture on my conscience should mean nothing, but I still feel bad for the girl.
Fuck. I'm angry she's here. Annoyed. I don't have time to take care of someone else right now. The only flicker of relief I feel is that Mona has a fighting chance.
We're in the witch's basement. Dungeon, more like. It's spelled to high heaven. There's no escape. Not yet, at least.
Of all the wolves Deidre's kidnapped, this is the first time I've bunked with one. What's worse, I know her. She's from my old clan in Silent Peak. She's small; deltas usually are. I wonder if that's why Deidre stole her. Easy to abuse, to control.
Deltas lack the physical strength of other shifters. Nearly as fragile as humans, their senses are duller: sight, scent, tracking. But that's exactly what makes them valuable. They outnumber the rest of us, and while we struggle with the instincts of our designations, they don't fall into a rut or go feral; they live comfortably with their place in wolf hierarchy, while alphas and betas play dominance games. Deltas move effortlessly between our world and the humans, bridging the divide between our ancient, wild natures and human society. Without them, mostclans would live in complete isolation, cut off from the modern world entirely.
Betas are the second strongest designation. They track, scent and fight like a wolf, true predators. All their senses are heightened, and because they're more volatile than deltas, they tend to matriculate with alphas. Male beta wolves can also grow a knot at the base of their cocks. But they don't purr or rut. They don't lose themselves to their designation.
Alphas are the biggest and strongest of all shifters. Physically, their ability to fight, scent, hunt, dominate—it's unparalleled. But they also turn feral when provoked, stripped down to nothing more than primal, base instincts, and no one is safe when that happens. There are fewer alphas than the other two designations. The theory is that their power is too great, and too many alphas would create violence and in-fighting within the clans, destabilizing the hierarchy, leaving the weaker wolves vulnerable to human and witch attacks.
The rarest of all designations are omegas, but they're rarely counted because there are so few. And until recently, I'd never given them much thought.
The memory of bright blue eyes and succulent honey scent makes my mouth water and my cock stiffen, but I shake it off before it can drag me under and keep pacing.
"Are you going to say something?" Lily croaks. "Silas?"
She recognized me the moment they tossed her in here yesterday morning. I barely knew her before. I think she worked at the bakery down the mountain. One of our wolves who traded with the humans. She's considered quite young by shifter standards, maybe in her thirties now. But like all wolves, in human form, she could pass for twenty, and will for many years. Stick-straight brown hair, big brown inquisitive eyes that water with fear. I'd have thought she was cute in another life and taken great satisfaction in corrupting the little mouse.
A month ago, I'd have carelessly informed this little cowering she-wolf that this was Hell, and she'd be lucky if death came quick.
Today, though, I can barely think straight, and the sight of her, and knowing—suspecting—why she's here, what Deidre wants from us, is making me fucking feral. An unhinged alpha is dangerous, and I'm barely hanging on by a thread, doing my best to tamp down the urge to tear any woman who touches me to pieces. The best I can do is ignore her. If my suspicions are correct, Lily and I are in for a fucked-up few days.
If she lasts that long.
Deidre sent me out on missions because I'm stronger than the witches in her coven, and sometimes brute force is necessary to get a job done, and I'm the best tracker she knows. But there's one thing she's always valued more. The thing she regularly stole from me when I was here, in between missions, over the last four years.
Wolf's blood. Alpha's blood, in particular. Shifters are full of magic, and Deidre is obsessed with strengthening her spells, so all the other covens will bow to her power.
This would be so much simpler if death were easy. I'd ask Lily to do it, even to save herself, but she'd never pull it off. My wolf would fight her. I'd kill the girl in seconds, whether I wanted to or not. No, my alpha will fight to his last breath. Especially now.
Reality refuses to sink in.
What a cruel fucking twist that the Moon Goddess would pair an omega with a monster like me. What afuckingtragedy.
Her image haunts me. Sad blue eyes. Vibrant red hair. Jasmine, dogwood flowers on the breeze. Honey. Tears, blood.
My mouth waters, even now, thinking of how I last saw her, at my mercy. I wanted her, even then. My teeth ache, incisors dripping with venom.
Quickly, I wrap both hands around the silver bars caging us in; the pain helps to ground me, to center the chaos. The smell of burnt flesh invades my nostrils. I hold tight, gripping the silver as my skin sears and smokes.
It doesn't stop the panic from setting in. The self-hatred. I'm filthy. Fucking filthy, too dirty for someone like her.
