Moon of Shadows

by H. D. Gordon

  We circled, snapping and snarling. I saw the power coil in his hind legs and slipped out of his way as he leaped toward me, snapping off another chunk of his fur as he sailed past. He spun around in clear frustration at my evasion.

  When I did this twice more, his voice echoed through my mind.

  “Fight, you coward.”

  “Cowards kill innocents,” I replied in a voice that surprised even me with its calm and cold collection.

  There were no more words after that, save for the chants and cheers of the crowd, which were merely peripheral in my current state.

  Cartier lunged forward, his massive body coming at me hard and fast, but this time I did not move. I’d gotten a taste of his blood on my tongue, and I wanted a flood of it.

  I met the collision head-on, ducking my head at the last moment to protect my neck and go after Cartier’s. I almost met my mark, but the bastard twisted at the last moment and avoided the powerful snap of my jaws.

  He whipped around faster than I expected, catching me on my rear flank before I was able to scramble out of the reach of his teeth. Pain exploded through me as he bit hard and deep, an electric shock of agony that shot straight down to the bone. Howls from the crowd rose up in a crescendo.

  Cartier had a good hold on my leg, but I was able to twist my body just enough to bite his long tail. It was the only thing within my reach, but I snapped my jaws closed hard enough to break the smaller bones within.

  Now it was the Alpha who howled up at the sky, releasing his hold on my leg so that I could limp a few paces away.

  A glance down at the grass revealed a trail of my own blood as I dragged the leg behind me, trying to put a bit of space between us if only for a heartbeat.

  His roar of agony ended as his massive head swung toward me, his eyes glowing brighter than the fires of Hades. The scarlet of my blood stained his teeth and the fur around his muzzle, dripping in ropes as he lowered his head and stalked forward.

  I backpedaled a step or two, glancing behind me and seeing that the ring of Wolves did not allow much further to go. I lowered my own head and stood my ground, sensing that the end was near, one way or another.

  I could see in his eyes that Cartier had not expected me to last so long, and that he’d been toying with me until this point, making a game out of things, prolonging the conclusion. He was stronger and larger, and he’d been wielding Alpha powers much longer than I had.

  But I had not tasted enough of his blood.

  Demarco’s face flashed through my mind, and along with it, the vivid memory of that arrow sticking out of his neck, of the light fading from his eyes.

  I launched forward, fangs bared and heart broken.

  Cartier danced away easily, whipping around and sinking his teeth deep into my shoulder. A howl of pain rose up into the night, and it took me a few blinding seconds to realize that the sound had come from me.

  Cartier shook his head back and forth rapidly, still keeping purchase on my shoulder, his fangs sinking deeper and deeper, shredding as he whipped his head this way and that. Blackness crept in around the edges of my vision as I tried to free myself and failed.

  Then I was flying through the air, having been tossed like a rag doll. I hit the ground hard enough to make stars burst behind my eyes.

  In the back of my mind, far away, as if from down a long tunnel, I heard the various voices of my family, screaming at me to get up. All of them at once, Ada and Ana, Devon and Delia and the others.

  I tried to push to my paws.

  My legs buckled beneath me.

  One of my family members screamed. I couldn’t be sure who it was. Maybe it was all of them.

  Maybe it was me.

  Carson Cartier stalked over to me, a massive Wolf with glowing eyes and bared teeth dripping ropes of scarlet.

  “You were a fool to think you could beat me,” he said into my head.

  I blinked, trying to clear the haze from my eyes. Tried to get up again. Failed.

  All around me, the Wolves shouted and hollered, eager to see the brutal defeat of another. Lightning flashed across the night sky, illuminating the scene for a brief moment, throwing it into sharp contrast.

  Cartier drew closer.

  Closer.

  I leapt up, going for his neck, but at that moment, Cartier shifted into his mortal form in an instant, no doubt aided by his Alpha magic. He backhanded me hard enough to make my teeth rattle, and again I went flying, and then crashing to the ground.

  This time, there would be no getting up.

  “This is your Alpha?” Cartier asked, his arms spread wide and his face bloody and smirking.

  From where I lay on the gravel drive, I lifted my head just enough to take in the horrified and heartbroken looks of my family.

  It was to them Cartier spoke.

  “This is who you have chosen as your Alpha?”

  The crowd fell silent while the sky finally split and cool droplets of rain began to fall, mingling with the blood on the ground.

  Through blurry eyes, I watched as my sisters and brother cringed back from him, saw the defeat on their faces. I rolled over, tried to get up, and caught a glimpse of Arsen Bain’s grinning mug as I did so.

  Cartier turned to me, fully naked in his mortal form, his body lean and muscled, large veins bulging in his thick neck. The rain began to fall in earnest, cooling my hot and aching body with fat drops.

  “Let them see your face,” Cartier said, and twisted his hand in the air. In the same instant, terrible agony ripped through my body. It was potent enough that it took several blinding moments before I realized he was using his Alpha magic to force me into a shift.

  It was not a feat just any Alpha would have managed, not one I could manage, but Cartier was more powerful than I’d given him credit for, and this was never more evident than when my body betrayed me to revert to its alternate form at the flick of his fingers.

  The magical ring Kyra had made me when we were children was the only reason I was not also naked in my skin, but I was battered to a degree that made my observing loved ones gasp with horror.

  Their terrified and anguished emotions shot through the Alpha bond and flooded over me, adding to the daze my various injuries had put me in.

  Then, Cartier was standing over me, insulting me by letting his manhood hang over my face. I swiped at him, but lost my balance before I could find my feet and fell back to the ground.

  He gripped me by the throat as quick as a striking snake, and lifted me until my feet dangled in the air, holding me up for all to see.

  Either the sky flashed with a bright bolt of lightening just then, or the lack of oxygen reaching my lungs and brain had made a bright light burst behind my eyes. I would never know which, but supposed it did not matter.

  I gasped, clawing at his unbreakable hold around my throat as the heavens spit down upon me, rain streaming like tears down my face. Someone screamed again. It didn’t matter who. It was a heart-wrenching sound that tore at the stormy night.

  Darkness began to close around the edges of my vision as I fought and failed to obtain some air. Cartier’s face loomed below mine, his glowing eyes brimming with triumph, his grip ever tightening on my throat. My feet kicked uselessly at the air, gaining no purchase.

  “Goodbye, Dita dearest,” he whispered.

  It was the moment I’d been waiting for. I stopped clawing at his hold on my neck even though every nerve in my body screamed to do otherwise.

  Flinging my arm out, the dagger tucked into my jacket sleeve slid down into my palm. I jabbed it deep into the bastard’s thick, bulging neck.

  His hold on me was freed in an instant, and I dropped to the ground as blood sprayed in a fountain out of the gaping wound. I gasped and coughed and sucked in air, blinking against the slowly clearing shadows.

  Now it was Cartier who was gripping at his throat, his fingers working pointlessly to contain the gushing blood.

  The same way I’d tried to stop Demarco’s bleeding and had
inevitably failed.

  As the sky flashed and thundered, I fought with every bit of energy I owned, and pushed to my feet with enormous effort. I stumbled as I made my way across the couple feet over to where Cartier now lay bleeding out on the gravel of his own drive.

  Every Wolf around me was utterly silent, the shock of it all palpable in the electrified air.

  I held his eyes, which were wide and still glowing Wolf-gold. I looked up at all the staring faces as I calmly tucked the bloody dagger back into my sleeve.

  Then I bent and snapped Carson Cartier’s neck, the sound louder than a clap of thunder.

  Chapter 30

  For all of ten seconds, there was utter and absolute silence. The only sound was that of the falling rain and the pounding of so many hearts.

  Then there was a roar, and every eye went to the balcony of the big house, where Arsen Bain looked as if he had gone totally mad.

  He leapt off the balcony in much the same manner as had his dead Alpha, and I was too busy trying to keep my feet beneath me and the darkness from claiming me to do much more than blink as he stalked toward me.

  “You little bitch,” Bain snarled, bald head gleaming under the flash of light from the angry sky. My heart jumped into my throat as I realized his murderous intent, and I knew that I was too weak now to stop him.

  There were only a handful of seconds in the space between when he leapt off the balcony and when he reached me. Bain gripped me by the front of my jacket, his fist rearing back, moving so fast that my brain could not keep up with the events.

  I tried to jerk free and block his strike but knew it would be of little use.

  But instead of the impact of his knuckles to my face, there was a magnificent explosion, and the top of Arsen Bain’s bald head exploded in a manner I’d only ever witnessed once before… back in a cathouse in Borden, after Ezra Ikers had threatened my family.

  I blinked, and Bain’s body thudded to the ground like a large sack of potatoes, his brains a mess on the gravel.

  Standing in front of me now was Devon, one of my revolvers still raised, still smoking in his hand.

  My older brother met my wide eyes and nodded once before lowering the weapon and stepping up beside me. He wrapped an arm around my waist, and I knew that if he had not, I might have fallen flat on my face.

  Zara came to my other side and gripped my forearm before thrusting it into the air.

  “Behold Dita Silvers,” the female Wolf proclaimed. “Your new and rightful Alpha.”

  Silence that was thick enough to slice fell over the gathered. Female Alphas were as rare as blue moons, and the shock of the turn of events still clearly kept hold over them.

  But Pack Law was unquestionable, and I had won the fight fair and square. Cartier should have just killed me, but he’d made us both take our mortal forms so that he could rub salt in the wounds.

  I didn’t have such pride. I was more of a kill at the first chance kind of girl.

  The moment of silence passed, and the first of the gathered Wolves tipped their head back and howled up at the moon. The others joined in.

  As I looked them over, they dropped their gazes, knowing that to meet my stare just then would be seen as a challenge. Then, they dropped to their knees, heads bowed and tails held low in submission.

  A female Wolf I did not know brought forth a blade, and I offered the same hand I’d sliced open earlier. She reopened the cut, tipped my blood into a goblet, and the goblet was passed around.

  Many of the male Wolves left, but every female Wolf present stayed and drank.

  In the aftermath of Cartier’s defeat, things seemed to move quickly, and the best I could do was to float through them, performing my functions automatically.

  My family and I returned to our own house, even though under Pack Law all of Cartier’s properties were now mine as well. If I had voluntarily shifted into my mortal form and used the blade while Cartier had been a Wolf, that would have been disqualifying, and I’d never have been accepted as the new Alpha, but since he had shifted voluntarily himself, I had won the fight fair and square as far as Pack Law was considered.

  In the course of one night, the size of my Pack had grown by more than a hundred. Though many of the males who’d followed Cartier had left, there were plenty that had stayed, and my responsibilities now were the same to them as they were to my family.

  This was a thought that was too much at the moment.

  And there were other things to handle.

  Demarco’s funeral, for one.

  I made the arrangements over the next couple of days, deciding to hold the ceremony on our own land. It only seemed right, as so much blood had spilled over it.

  All of the new Pack members showed up for the service, and as my siblings and I stood beside the pyre where our youngest brother’s body lay, a line of never-ending people came forward to offer condolences. I accepted each with a nod of my head.

  When Delia sang an old Wolf hymn, there were very few dry eyes among the gathered, but mine were some of them.

  To me, none of it seemed real. It was as though I was walking through a dream, present but not part of it.

  Afterward, as was the custom, the Wolves drank shine until they were stumbling around the yard and gardens drunk. I silently slipped up to the roof and watched them, my head resting between my paws as my broken body began to heal without any particular attention to the shattered state of my heart.

  When the Demon spoke beside me, I didn’t jump. Even he was not quiet enough to escape the notice of my Wolf ears when in this form.

  “I came to offer my condolences,” Eli said.

  I didn’t lift my head, just waited for him to leave.

  Instead, he sighed and took a seat beside me on the roof, hiking up his nice slacks to do so. When he rested a hand on my large furry back and stroked the fur there, I didn’t try to stop him.

  Below, the funeral party continued. Devon was sitting beneath a tree with Delia, the two of them holding onto one another and sobbing silently. Kyra and Zara were both sufficiently drunk, and the twins had gone off to bed hours ago. Other Wolves who had pledged their loyalty and whom I had never met until the night I’d killed Cartier, roamed about in both forms, more than I could count in a single sitting.

  “The pain will never fully go away,” Eli said quietly, rubbing at a spot on his chest, a habit of his I noticed when I suspected he was thinking about his lost family. “But it will get easier.”

  I wanted to believe him. I really did.

  I shifted into my human form without really knowing why, and Eli blinked as I sat beside him now as a girl. Just a girl in black clothes with a heart not cold enough to remain unbroken after all.

  “I’m not so sure it does,” I confessed, and couldn’t help the smallness of my voice. I shook my head, my eyes burning.

  Eli’s head tilted, his perfect face and lovely hazel eyes studying me closely. He opened his arms to me in silent invitation, and I nearly fell into them.

  I no longer had anything to fear from him, I realized, because no matter what, no one could hurt me any worse than I was already hurting.

  “I do know,” Eli whispered as he held me close. The clean and familiar scent of him surrounded me, the warmth of his fiery magic like a hearth to my cold and weary bones. His lips were right beside my ear when he added, “and it’s also okay to cry. It doesn’t make you any less an Alpha.”

  I looked over at him, taking in his beauty under the moonlight. “I doubt they would agree with you,” I said, nodding down at the Wolves below.

  Eli lifted my chin with his fingers, and a tear escaped my eye. The first I’d shed for my beloved brother. The only I’d dare to spare.

  Eli’s eyes followed its path down my cheek, and when it reached my chin, he leaned in gently and kissed it away.

  I shifted back into my Wolf form before more tears could betray me, knowing that any show of weakness from me so recently after my victory over Cartier would set a bad preced
ent, no matter what Eli had to say.

  Wolves were proud creatures, and a female Alpha had stretched the norm more than enough. A crying female Alpha just might break it. I didn’t like it, and it wasn’t right, but it was what it was.

  I rested my head between my paws again as Eli climbed to his feet, sensing my dismissal.

  He was turning to leave me be when a deep voice rang out across the plantation, the tone of it sending an instant shiver up my spine.

  “Dita!” the voice bellowed. “I know you’re here! No point in hiding! Come out, come out, wherever you are!”

  Eli came to the edge of the rooftop where I was now standing, peering down at the drive below, where a large male Wolf with a rugged beard was striding forward.

  “Who is that?” Eli asked.

  I shifted back into my mortal form to answer, my hands going down to the irons concealed around my hips.

  “There you are,” the male said, taking sight of me standing on the roof. He opened his muscled arms, a challenging smile lighting up his face. “I’ve been looking for you.”

  Instinctually, Elian shifted a little closer, still waiting for my answer to his question.

  I stepped off the roof and landed on my boots before the newcomer, straightening up as I met his familiar eyes.

  “Hello, father,” I said. “I guess you found me.”

  The End

  Moon of Curses, the final book in The Blood Pack Trilogy, coming soon.

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  About the Author

  H. D. Gordon is the author of several urban fantasy novels. She is the mother of two amazing daughters, and a lover of kick-ass females, beautiful things, and nerdy t-shirts.

  She believes our actions have ripple effects, and in the sacred mission of bringing love and light to the world.