“Behind you!”
I spin. A Thornridge wolf in human form charges down the corridor with a knife in his fist. I dodge his first swing and drive my elbow into his face. Cartilage crunches, and blood spurts from his nose. He staggers backward, and I follow with a kick to his knee. He crashes to the floor with a grunt of pain.
My hands find his head before he can recover.
The snap of his neck echoes through the bunker.
I stare at the body with my hands shaking. My breath comes in short, ragged gasps. I just killed a man with my bare hands. I can still feel the moment his spine gave way beneath my fingers.
There will be time for guilt later. Right now, I have people to save.
Keys are dangling from his belt. I fumble through them, but the first one doesn’t fit. Neither does the second. The third slides home with a click, and then Thea is falling into my arms.
She sobs against my shoulder. I hold her for exactly three seconds before pulling back.
“The others,” she gasps. “Two cells down.”
We free Liman and Fiona. Both are battered. Both are weak. But both can walk, and that’s all that matters right now.
“Can you run?” I ask.
“We’ll manage,” Thea replies.
I lead them toward the exit, and the sounds of fighting grow louder with every step. Snarls. Yelps. The wet crunch of teeth meeting flesh. We emerge from the bunker into carnage.
The clearing has become a killing field. Wolves tear at each other across every inch of ground. Blood has turned the dirt to mud. I spot Reeyan near the tree line. He’s holding off two Thornridge wolves at once. Deon is fighting alone now. Trenton lies motionless near the rocks where I last saw him.
Patrick faces his brother in the center of it all.
They’ve both shifted to human form. Both are bleeding from wounds that stripe their skin. Jonas has a knife. Patrick doesn’t. The fury on Jonas’s face is terrible to witness, but something else lurks beneath it. Hurt. Betrayal. The anguish of someone whose world is crumbling.
“You left me!” Jonas screams. “You left me with them, and now you come back wearing enemy colors?”
“I’m not your enemy,” Patrick insists. “I never was.”
“Liar! You’re a traitor! You abandoned your pack!”
“Thornridge was never my pack. They killed our father. They turned us into soldiers for a war we never wanted to fight.”
Jonas lunges with the knife. Patrick sidesteps and catches his brother’s wrist. They grapple for control of the weapon while I shove the prisoners toward Reeyan.
“Get them out!” I shout. “Follow the riverbed north!”
I shift mid-stride. My wolf explodes out of me, and I sprint toward the brothers. A Thornridge wolf intercepts me. I tear through him without breaking pace. His blood is hot on my muzzle.
Patrick has Jonas pinned when I reach them. The knife lies in the dirt several feet away. Jonas thrashes beneath his brother’s weight, still fighting even though the battle is clearly lost.
“Kill me then!” Jonas snarls. “That’s what you came here to do, right? Finish it!”
“I came here to save you.” Patrick’s voice cracks on the last word. “I came here because you’re my brother and I love you and I couldn’t leave you behind again.”
Something in Jonas’s face wavers.
Patrick!
I scream the warning through our bond half a second before Bastian Corvelli explodes from the trees.
He’s in wolf form, massive, black-furred, and heading straight for me.
