by Haley Weir
“I honestly just want to kill her and be done with it,” I said to Peyton.
Peyton laughed.
“I thought you were the one who wanted to keep her. You thought she might be useful, remember?”
“Well, not anymore,” I huffed. “She’s a pain in the ass and she’s not useful for anything other than getting us caught with all her loud squawking.”
“I can hear you, you know,” Cerise said from her position still tied up to the wooden support beam in the barn.
“Good,” I growled. “Then you’ll know you need to tread carefully.”
She glared at me as I sat back down across the barn from her and tried to figure out what we were supposed to do now. I wanted to leave and get as far away from here as possible so that I could keep Peyton safe. But she was hell-bent on staying and taking this battle on head-first. So now I needed to figure out how to do it. This idea of hers to “create our own pack” was a bad one. But there was no way that the two of us (three if you counted to obstinate vamp) were going to be able to survive on our own against any of them.
“Let me try to get through to her and bring her to our side of things,” Peyton whispered in my ear as we both stared over at Cerise.
“Yeah, good luck with that,” I whispered back. “Vampires are selfish, arrogant beings. You won’t get her to do anything other than think about how to save her own ass.”
Cerise stared back at us in curiosity as she tried to hear what our whispers were about. Fortunately vampires didn’t have the acute hearing that shifters did. Overall, they seemed like a pretty weak species to me. I knew they considered themselves to be at the top of the predator list with their bloodsucking fangs and enhanced agility and strength. But they had so many weaknesses and they just looked frail and delicate.
“Here,” Peyton said as she walked over to Cerise and offered her a cup of hot tea that we had managed to muster up thanks to the iron kettle we found in the barn and a host of herbs nearby.
She untied one of the vampire’s hands to hold the cup.
“I wouldn’t do that,” I warned.
Peyton shot me a look that told me to be quiet.
It was stupid to loosen the restraints on Cerise. That girl was just going to run and cause trouble.
“Thanks,” Cerise said as she took the cup from her and gobbled up the tea.
“I thought that vamps only drank blood,” I said from across the way.”
“You don’t know anything about me,” Cerise shot back as she glared at me from over the top of her cup.
“Clearly.”
I could see Peyton looking her over, and even I hadn’t noticed the bruise marks that ran up and down the course of Cerise’s arms and legs.
“Are those from the struggle at the pub?” Peyton asked her. “Or from when I dragged you here?”
“No,” Cerise answered. “Neither.”
“Then what are the bruises from?”
I tried to warn Peyton again to stop pushing it with this vamp, but I she just turned her head and shushed me.
“Let’s just say the shadow beings don’t treat their own kind very compassionately,” Cerise said.
I rolled my eyes. She was just looking for pity in the hope that we would free her out of some misguided compassion.
“Then why do you stay with them?” Peyton asked. “Why not join us?”
“Join you?” Cerise laughed. “Why in the world would I do that? You’re our enemy.”
“Sounds like you have the wrong people as friends, and the wrong ones as enemies,” Peyton mused.
“Says the girl who is holding me captive and has me tied up,” Cerise protested.
She had a point. Peyton was trying to bring her over to our side, which wasn’t a good idea to begin with, but why would Cerise even consider joining with the people who had captured her? It was counterintuitive.
“You’re only tied up because we don’t trust you yet,” Peyton said.
“That makes two of us,” Cerise shot back.
“Understood. But maybe we can reach a mutual trust and then you can be untied.”
“No,” I said sternly. “Look, I don’t care if you want to talk to it, but we aren’t untying the other hand.”
“I am not an it,” Cerise hissed.
“Both of you stop,” Peyton frowned. “Look, Cerise, I’m trying to offer you a chance here—a new life, one in which you don’t need to walk around bruised and battered by your own people. At least think about it.”
Peyton stood up and walked back over to sit beside me.
“I think it’s working,” she whispered to me as we watched Cerise finish her tea.
I didn’t have the heart to tell her that it wasn’t.
When we had finally decided on a course of action, I didn’t trust Cerise enough to keep even one hand unbound. We were heading to Winchelsea, a nearby town just a couple of miles away, and I was going to keep a very close eye on the vampire during our walk there.
Winchelsea didn’t have an alpha, which meant that the shifters there had no allegiance to anyone in particular. It was the best chance that I could think of to get Peyton’s plan to work—which I still didn’t think had even a small chance in hell of being viable. But we couldn’t stay in the barn forever without starving to death or being found eventually. It was time to make a move, even if it wasn’t likely to work.
When we got to Winchelsea, Cerise had surprisingly calmed down and seemed much more docile. She was talking with Peyton openly about the possibility of joining us after we were successful in assembling a small pack. I was certain that it was all just a trick for her to try and execute her escape here. I wasn’t about to let my guard down for even a moment.
The shifters here were a rather scattered bunch of wolves with absolutely no leadership at all. We went from place to place, even stopping some of them in the middle of the streets to rally them all together in one spot at the edge of town, outside of the watchful eyes of the humans that lived there alongside them.
“Welcome,” I said in a deeply commanding voice to the small crowd of men and women that we had been able to gather. “I am Jasper, an alpha, and I have come to see offer you the chance to join my pack.”
“If you are an alpha,” one of the men from the crowd called out. “Then where is the rest of your pack?”
“And why do you carry an enslaved vampire around with you?” another man shouted.
“I am forming a new pack,” I said, trying hard to rally them to our cause so that I could at least feel confident that I put forth a solid effort into making Peyton’s idea work. “The vampire girl is a prisoner from our victory over our last battle with the shadow beings.”
I could see rustling and unease in the crowd and hear murmurs of confusion and disbelief.
“Please,” Peyton said as she interjected to address the shifters of Winchelsea. “When the battle against the shadow world comes here to your town—which it will—you will all be more able to defend yourselves and your families if you have an alpha to lead you. We will all be stronger if we work together.”
I looked at her in a slight amazement. For having just found out about being a shifter, she was a natural leader. If she were stronger, she might make a good alpha herself. I didn’t know of any female alphas since the old ways still presided over shifter laws. But like Peyton enjoyed saying, perhaps it was time for a change.
“Okay,” one of the stronger and more outspoken shifters said above the muttering of the crowd. “My friends and I will join your new pack—if you can defeat me in a fight.”
“What?
“It’s pack law. Surely as an alpha yourself, you know this.”
“It’s pack law to take over a pack if you defeat its current alpha. But you have no alpha here in Winchelsea,” I said.
“That is true, but that doesn’t negate the need for you to prove your strength to us if you want to be our leader. If you can defeat me in a fight, then we will follow you. If not, then you need to
leave here and take your mate and vampire hostage with you.”
“Fine,” I growled. It was a waste of time, and a ridiculous demonstration since I was much stronger than anyone here. It would be quick and humiliating for him, and I didn’t see the point in it. But if that is what it took in order to get a dozen shifters to join with us, then so be it.
Everyone took a few steps backward and formed a semi-circle around the space where I would engage in a fight with this overly confident shifter. Peyton gave me a worried look, but I assured her this was nothing more than a silly scuffle that I would end almost as soon as it began.
Except when the fight began, the shifter rules of engagement were immediately broken. Instead of it being a one-on-one fight to establish dominance, several of the other shifters surrounding us, ambushed me at once.
“Now we’ll see how strong you really are,” the man who challenged me laughed as he joined in on the fight.
I saw Peyton try to run to help me out of the corner of my eye, but some of the other shifters quickly grabbed her and held her back as she watched in horror. Cerise stood there with hands still bound and affixed to Peyton. She laughed in amusement while she watched the situation unfold. But, although the fight was harrowing, and again I found myself pretty roughed-up; I emerged victorious.
“Taking down all of your friends instead of just you, was a tough trick to pull,” I snarled at the man who stood before me with a bloodied face as his fellow shifters were scattered around on the ground in a halo shape near my feet. “But I suppose the point you were seeking has been proven now, has it not?”
The man’s jaw was hanging open as he looked at me. I could feel my muscles still taut and flexing from the fight. I spit the metallic taste of blood from my mouth and stared at him as salty streaks of sweat ran off my brow and into my stinging eyes.
The man knelt down on one knee and lowered his head. Slowly, as the other shifters peeled themselves up off the ground; they all followed suit and did the same.
“We’ll join you,” the man said without lifting his eyes to me. “You have our allegiance as our new alpha.”
I looked around at all of the men and women who were surrounding me on their knees with bowed heads, and then I looked at Peyton. The shifters who had been holding her had let her go, and she came to stand beside me as she put her hand in mine.
“It worked,” she whispered.
Even Cerise was silent at her side and her dark black vampire eyes glistened in shock at the spectacle before us. Suddenly, Peyton’s idea of a makeshift pack didn’t seem so crazy after all.
Chapter Thirteen
Peyton
I was bound and determined to get through to Cerise. Jasper hadn’t thought my idea of making our own pack would work—and it did. Now, I wanted to get Cerise to join it. Yeah, I knew that getting a vampire to join a wolf shifter pack was previously unheard of, but so was the feat that we just accomplished. Well, that Jasper just accomplished. I kind of just watched. It was my idea though.
While we stayed in Winchelsea for a few days so that Jasper could train and talk with the new shifters in his pack, I made it my mission to get closer to Cerise. I wanted to understand what it was like to be a shadow being. It didn’t look like she was treated well, and I couldn’t figure out why she would want to stay loyal to a group of people that were mean to her.
“Do you have any family?” I asked her as we sat inside the Winchelsea Inn and waited on some food to be brought.
“No.”
“How about close friends?”
“No.”
“So you’re all alone then,” I said with sympathy.
“Why are you doing this?” she asked me. “Why are you trying so hard to sway me. It’s not like you need me; you have all of these other shifters now. Besides your mate totally hates me.”
“He doesn’t hate you,” I said, not sure that even I believed that.
“Yes, he does,” she laughed. “He doesn’t trust me, which is smart. You shouldn’t trust me either.”
I was not going to let her dissuade me.
“I wonder if there’s a way that the shadow world and the human world could live together in peace,” I said pensively.
“Not a chance,” Cerise shook her head.
“Why not?”
“Because we are all too different and we want different things,” she answered. “Even now as we sit here, you want peace, and my people want only power and control. There is no way to make those two ends meet.”
Perhaps she was right. Historically, even just within the human world alone, those that want peace and those that want power don’t usually tend to see eye-to-eye. Still, I wasn’t ready to give up just yet.
“But Jasper told me that there are many different kinds of beings within your shadow world, and that the various sects are at war with each other, all battling for dominion. It doesn’t sound like the shadow world is unified, so perhaps there is hope to bring some of you to our cause for peace.”
The waitress brough food and set it down on the table in front of us. Cerise was hungry and started to toss chunks of bread and eggs into her mouth. I, like Jasper, had thought that vampire only fed on blood, but it was clear that Cerise enjoyed a good breakfast of bread and eggs. She was right—there was a lot that we didn’t know about them. After she chewed and swallowed, she answered me.
“We are no different than humans in that aspect,” she said. “You humans are constantly at war with each other. You all have different agendas, and most of them are driven by the desire for power over others.”
“You’re right,” I nodded as I scooped up a soft boiled egg on my spoon. “See? I guess we aren’t so different after all.”
She puffed her cheeks out at the fact that I was able to use her own words against her to make the point I had been trying to make all along. There was no reason that she couldn’t join us.
“Come on, Cerise,” I pleaded. “Don’t you think it’s time to break with some of the stagnant old ways, and start something new? Think of it; a pack made of both shifters, shadow beings, hell maybe we can even get a few humans involved.”
“No,” Jasper said as he walked up behind us. “That is a crazy idea.”
“That’s what you said about making our own pack,” I smirked as he sat down and stole one of the eggs from my plate and sipped my black coffee with a satiated sigh.
“You’re so headstrong and difficult,” he remarked.
“That’s why you love me,” I grinned at him.
Jasper’s eyes sparked with a wild desire, and Cerise looked up from her plate at the both of us with her mouth hanging slightly open enough for me to see the crust of bread that she hadn’t yet finished chewing,
“You guys are really something,” she said.
Before I could ask her what she meant by that, there was a loud crash that rang throughout the building as shadow beings tried yet another invasion in their attempt to take over all the towns in east Sussex. Our new pack was about to be put to the test.
Jasper jumped up and within a matter of moments, the shifters that he’d been working with all flanked his sides to fight alongside him. I went to join them too, but no sooner had I taken my eyes off Cerise, then another vampire managed to get to her and free her restraints. For a second, I debated whether to keep fighting alongside Jasper, or to run back and grab Cerise. But much to my surprise, I didn’t need to make that decision. Instead of running away with the vampire that had just set her free and was extending his hand out to lead her to safety, Cerise surprised everyone by knocking the other vampire down and coming to stand beside us.
“What are you doing?” I asked her in shock.
“I’m choosing to stay with you guys,” she said with a smirk. “Just don’t get too excited. I still might change my mind.”
Even amidst the chaos of the fight, I glanced over at Jasper with a satisfied smile. He rolled his eyes at me.
“Don’t let it go to your head,” he said.
I let out a laugh as we engaged the other shadow beings. This solidified the idea in my head that we might be able to reach some of the other discontented shadow beings too and unite people in unity against those that sought only power and destruction. I knew it was a lofty goal, but I also now knew that there was hope.
Chapter Fourteen
Jasper
Although I was impressed by Cerise’s new loyalty, and I would like to entertain the idea that a peace between all people would be possible, I knew that the idea just wasn’t feasible. As great and loyal as our new little pack of misfits was, we were still the minority, and the majority wanted power and dominion. That being said, our new little pack had proven to be successful and allegiant, so I thought it was time for us to try and go back to Rye to take the town back from my former pack or whoever now had its clutches on Peyton’s hometown. If Addicus and his pack were in control of Rye currently, then at least we would be able to eliminate one of the threats chasing after us. Then we could just deal solely with the problem of focusing on the shadow world. But if the shadow world was already in control of Rye, that would be an entirely bigger problem.
As I led the pack out of Winchelsea, I was increasingly more and more worried about bringing Peyton into this battle. I knew that there was no way that I could talk her into sitting this one out, especially since it was her home that we were going back for. But I also knew that Addicus was well aware of how important she was to me. I knew my old alpha well. And I knew that he would use whatever means possible to take me down, including my mate. I was worried that he would see that Peyton was my weakness and try to use it against me. And I couldn’t shake the feeling that we were walking right into a trap.
