And so he did, staying close but out of sight, watching as the wolf’s struggles grew weaker until finally, he passed out. Duff approached slowly and looked at the massive gray wolf dangling before him—powerful, yet utterly helpless. He should feel triumph. This was his destiny, his birthright, his sacred purpose. He’d caught the very thing that would lead him to the White Dragon. His father would’ve wept with pride.
But Duff felt nothing. Nothing but the hollow ache of a fire that had almost gone out and the echo of Maeve’s voice asking questions he still couldn’t answer. He cut the wolf down with efficient, practiced movements, binding him with ropes reinforced by the Irish blessings he’d learned from his father, who had learned them from his father, and so on.
He managed to get the wolf on the makeshift carrier he’d created, then dragged him back to the cabin. Once back inside, the wolf shifted—a transition Duff had read about but never witnessed, fur receding into skin, bones reshaping, until a man lay where the wolf had been. Roughly Duff’s age, muscular, still unconscious.
This was a man. A man with a mate and a family and a life, reduced to bait by the same anonymous hand that had guided the slayer network for years.
No, he couldn’t think like that. By catching Rhene Hightower, he finally had the opportunity to find answers, andhe couldn’t give up now. He managed to get Rhene into a bed, quickly covering him with blankets, then rekindled the fireplace and stoked it high until heat radiated from it.
Then he sat at the small kitchen table, alone with his prisoner and his doubts and the dying ember of a fire that used to be his whole identity. The hunter had caught his prey. But for the first time in the long, bloody history of the Bás family, the hunter wasn’t sure he was on the right side of the hunt.
And Maeve’s voice, gentle and Highland-soft, whispered from the empty chair across from him:We should know what we’re killing, and why, and for whom.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Three weeks. That was how long it had taken to get twenty-nine traumatized, exhausted, and in some cases barely functional dragon omegas from the Arctic Circle of Sweden to the Hightower pack lands, and Fergal never wanted to do it again.
The journey had been a nightmare of logistics and endurance. After the Dragon Council had imploded—the discovery of the red tent and how omegas were abused there, King Ennis dissolving the Murphy clan, Cladhaire and Baoth stripped of everything, omegas from three different clans declaring they wanted to follow the White Dragon, and Erwan suddenly rushing home after sensing his mother was dying—Fergal and Gregor had volunteered to escort the omegas to their new home. It had seemed like the obvious choice. They had the most direct route through Canada, and Fergal refused to let a group of vulnerable omegas travel with only strangers for protection.
He’d underestimated how brutal the journey would be.
They’d flown the island-hopping route Rhene had suggested before his disappearance—Norway to the Faroe Islands to Iceland to Greenland—traveling at night to avoid detection, in temperatures so far below freezing that even dragon fire couldn’tfully compensate. Several of the omegas had never flown long distances. Two had been so weak from malnutrition that they’d had to be teleported in stages. One had experienced a panic attack mid-flight over the North Atlantic and had to be talked down by Zacharias, the fierce O’Connor omega who’d emerged as the group’s unofficial leader with a natural authority that made Fergal almost envious.
They’d stopped at the Fitzgerald compound first. Standing in the great hall where he’d grown up, Fergal had gathered every omega in his clan and told them the truth—that the True Doyle clan was offering sanctuary, that he wouldn’t force anyone to stay, and that those who wanted to leave had his blessing.
Ten had chosen to go. Fergal had watched them pack their meager belongings and join the growing group, and even though he’d known it was the right thing, even though he’d argued passionately for this exact principle at the Dragon Council, watching his own people leave had carved out a piece of his chest that might never grow back.
“I refuse to hold them against their will, even if they wouldn’t know any better,” he’d told Gregor that night, repeating the words he’d said in the camp. They’d still tasted like broken glass. Gregor had held him and said nothing because Gregor always knew when words weren’t what Fergal needed.
They’d arrived at the Hightower pack lands yesterday, only to discover that Rhene hadn’t made it home. That piece of information—delivered by Rhene’s second-in-command, a frighteningly competent omega named Sivney who seemed to be holding an entire pack together through sheer force of will—had settled over the group like a frost. Erwan had looked haunted, his eyes hollow and his complexion pale.
But the welcome had been warm despite the worry. Cabins had been prepared. Food had been waiting. A wolf omega named Yitro had organized a small army of volunteers tohelp the newcomers settle in, and a wolf beta named Lucan had coordinated medical assessments for those who needed immediate care. The efficiency was staggering, even more because it felt warm and yet practiced, like a community that had done this before and had gotten good at it.
Now Fergal lay in an actual bed, staring at the ceiling of the small cabin Sivney had assigned them, and tried to remember what it felt like to not be exhausted. He’d slept fitfully, his mind still catching up in processing everything that had happened.
Beside him, Gregor was already up. The man’s internal clock was set to military precision regardless of time zone, sleep deprivation, or the fact that they’d crossed an ocean yesterday. Fergal could hear him in the kitchen—the quiet clink of a kettle, the soft pad of bare feet on wood floors, the familiar ritual of tea preparation that Gregor performed with the same reverence other men reserved for prayer.
Fergal smiled into his pillow. Some things didn’t change, no matter the continent.
He dragged himself upright, wincing at the stiffness in his shoulders and back. Three weeks of flying too much, of sleeping on frozen ground and in cramped tents had done his body no favors, and the blissfully soft bed had apparently caused his muscles to lock up in protest at the sudden luxury.
The cabin was small. One bedroom, a kitchen, a bathroom, a modest living area. Sivney had assigned them the cabin together without a question, without a raised eyebrow, without any of the careful diplomatic maneuvering that would’ve been necessary at the Fitzgerald compound to explain why the king and his commander—both alphas—required shared quarters. The casualness of the acceptance made Fergal’s throat tight in a way he hadn’t expected.
He found Gregor in the kitchen, standing at the counter in his sleep clothes, watching the kettle. His hair was sleep-rumpled—one of Fergal’s favorite versions of Gregor, second only to the version whose hair was mussed because Fergal’s hands had been in it.
“Morning,” Fergal said, leaning against the doorframe.
“Coffee’s ready.” Gregor nodded toward a mug on the counter.
Gods bless him. Fergal picked up the mug and took a sip. Strong, black, perfect. “Did you sleep?”
“Some.”
Which meant three hours at most. Gregor had spent the first hour after they’d arrived checking the cabin’s wards, walking the perimeter of the property, and introducing himself to the night-shift security team. Fergal had been too tired to argue with him about it and had fallen asleep to the sound of Gregor’s quiet conversation with a wolf guard named Bray, who had the build of a tank and the demeanor of a highly alert Rottweiler.
“What’s on the agenda today?” Fergal asked.
“Erwan wants to meet. Compare notes, share intelligence. He’s asked for his brothers and Emma to attend as well.”
