Bound by Fate (War of the Five Fangs Book 1)

by Asher North

  “Then what else could it mean?” Damon asked.

  “War,” Rhys answered and his heart sank when the Lunalis twins both looked down at their feet. Rhys had known the peace they'd grown accustomed to since arriving at the Gold Eye den wouldn't last forever but he didn't expect it to be this short. With a child on the way, he was more concerned than ever. He wouldn't be able to fight in his current condition and would have to depend on Damon for his and their child's safety. Though Damon had learned and grown stronger, Rhys doubted it would be enough.

  “When will they come?” Rhys asked.

  “We cannot be certain,” Knox said.

  “But they’re coming for us, are they not?” Rhys asked and Knox only nodded.

  “Rest assured we will be prepared when they do,” he said.

  “That isn’t much assurance,” Damon said, his hand reaching out to take Rhys’s.

  “It is only a prediction, not necessarily what will be,” Lux said, attempting to reassure the both of them. It didn’t work.

  “Then what good are your words?” Damon asked, his voice rising. Rhys squeezed his hand to try and calm him but Damon seemed almost unreachable.

  “The trouble with prophecy is that it is only an interpretation. Interpretations can sometimes be incorrect,” Knox said.

  “Then why should we bother paying them any attention at all?” Damon asked and no sooner had he finished asking the question than Kaster and Eleo came hurtling into the room, making them all jump.

  “I’m sorry to disturb you but we need to speak,” Eleo said.

  “What is it?” Lux asked.

  “They’ve come. They’re here,” Eleo said, heaving from the effort of his run.

  “Who is here?” Damon asked, looking from Eleo to Knox, Lux, and then to Rhys.

  “The Black Claws,” the twins said together and Rhys felt as if his heart had been ripped right from his chest.

  “The Blood Eye,” Rhys started, his head spinning as all of the pieces began to fall into place. It wasn’t war that was coming for them, it was bloodshed.

  “We need to leave at once,” Knox said.

  “Where would you have us go? We have no pack, no families left to call our own,” Damon said. He seemed frantic and though Rhys knew he should’ve been just as concerned, he felt disconnected from the world around him, as if this weren’t really happening or that it was happening to another wolf in another life in another place.

  “We planned for this eventuality. There’s no time to debate or talk, we must leave now,” Lux said, shifting into his wolf form, the snapping and popping of his bones filling their living quarters. Knox followed.

  “Are you able to shift, Rhys?” Knox asked. Rhys heard his words but they didn’t register. The Black Claws were at their heels and he could only imagine what they intended to do with he and Damon, much less with the child they’d created together when they discovered it, assuming they hadn’t already. He felt frozen in time and space, frightened and enraged and protective all at once. Let them come, he thought when at last the paralysis that had seized him broke. I will kill as many of them I can before they will take me or Damon or my child.

  “Rhys!” Damon’s voice shouted, his hands shaking Rhys by the shoulders and jarring him out of his thoughts. “Where did you go?”

  “I’m sorry. I don’t know where I went,” Rhys lied.

  “Can you shift?”

  “I can,” Rhys said, not knowing whether or not it was true. When he made to do it, however, it went as easily as it ever did, though he felt slightly off-kilter as a wolf, no doubt thank to the pup taking root inside of him.

  “Follow us,” Knox said and dashed off through the den. As they passed the entrance, the shouts, howls, and whimpers of the other wolves reached Rhys’s ears. Had the fighting already begun? He found it hard to believe. How had the Black Claws snuck up on them like this? Didn’t the Gold Eyes have scouts keeping watch, and more than that, how had their foresight failed to predict something like this?

  Maybe it did, Rhys thought as he gave chase to Knox and Lux, Damon never leaving his side. If they hadn’t known or at least suspected that the Black Claws might come after us, they would never have had a plan for evacuation, he thought. When Rhys’s lungs stung and he found it difficult to breathe, they rounded a corner and came to a tiny hole in the wall, covered with thick vines.

  “I will go first. Follow me and Lux will take the rear,” Knox said and without another word or waiting for acknowledgment from Rhys, Knox disappeared into the hole. Afraid of what might happen if he waited too long, Rhys followed and found that he only just fit within the hole. It was dark and claustrophobic, almost unbearably so, and the scent of musk and soil was so strong that Rhys wondered if he’d been buried alive so when he emerged on the other side and bathed in the moonlight and late night air he felt as if he’d been reborn. He drank down gulp after gulp of air as he tried to catch his breath and Damon appeared moments later.

  “Are you alright?” Damon asked and Rhys realized it was the first time he’d ever seen him in his wolf form. He had a beautiful, coal-black coat and he was much larger than Rhys would’ve guessed he would be. For a flash, he felt pride to call Damon his mate and father of his child, until he remembered that it was for their child they had fled. Eleo, Kaster, and Lux emerged then.

  “This way,” Knox said and set off at a brisk clip into the woods. Rhys had no idea where they were heading or what waited for them when they got there but he knew he couldn’t stay where he stood and he feared that the Gold Eye den would almost certainly cease to exist. They ran for nearly a mile before slowing their pace, which Rhys was thankful for because he felt as if his heart might stop beating if he ran another step. He collapsed to his side on the soil, the moon shining down on him through the fingers of the trees that grew around them and raked at the sky.

  “Where are we?” Damon asked Knox when they came to a stop.

  “The Whisperwood,” Rhys said. He would have recognized the forest even if he’d been blind.

  “Yes,” Knox said and Rhys saw orange and crimson lights dancing in his eyes. When he turned, he let out a gasp as he saw that the Gold Eye den, in its towering glory, was ablaze. He thought of all of the wolves who were inside, those who were good and pure and had never wished a single soul ill. They would all die, if not in the fire then from the smoke, and those who managed to escape would be slain by the waiting Black Claws.

  “We must go,” Lux said but Rhys was rooted to the spot. He couldn’t have moved even if he’d wanted to. The thought of all of the knowledge that was sure to be lost, the medicine, it was too much to bear.

  “Rhys,” Damon said and when he turned he found Damon’s eyes filled with tears.

  “I’m so sorry,” Rhys said to Knox and Lux but neither of them seemed phased.

  “It is done. There is nothing we can do but move forward,” Knox said. “Now please, we must move before we are found. We do not have much of a lead and the Black Claws will be searching for us.”

  With one final look at the burning tower, like a colossal funeral pyre in the night, Rhys turned and ran as fast as his legs would carry him. If the Black Claws were brazen enough to do something as horrible as this, he didn’t want to think about or find out what they might do to he and Damon if they were found.

  “We’ll have our revenge, I swear,” Damon said in Rhys’s ear as they ran so that only he could hear. “This won’t go unpunished, it can’t.”

  Rhys prayed, for the very first time in his life, that Damon was right.

  Damon

  They ran for what seemed like days, the trees so dark and similar that to Damon they seemed to blur together, losing all shape and definition. He’d never run so far nor so fast as he had after the Gold Eye den was set on fire to smoke he and Rhys out and he didn’t want to think about what his ex-pack mates might’ve done if they’d been found.

  Despite the stitch that had grown in his side, Damon charged on, taking special care
to ensure that Rhys was never left alone or vulnerable. Though Rhys hadn’t yet started to show any physical signs of his pregnancy, Damon knew it wouldn’t take more than a swift blow to his stomach to endanger their child and he had no plans of allowing that to happen. As the future days passed, he knew that Rhys would only grow more vulnerable and unable to protect himself. If ever Damon were to embrace his inner Alpha, it was now. Simply knowing that he had a child to protect, a being besides himself to care for, gave him courage and an inner fire the likes of which he’d previously thought impossible.

  I would give my life for either of them, he thought in awe as he watched Rhys run, his all-white fur a flash of lightning in the dark. His feelings for Rhys had only intensified since he’d learned Rhys was expecting, which he had never anticipated, and made him question whether he’d been blinded by this young Silver Fang. In the end, he’d decided it made no difference. He’d found love, formed a soul bond, and together they would raise a child that would deliver them all the kind of world they’d been denied, the kind of world that he and Rhys might belong in.

  That’s only possible with the Black Claws gone, he thought. A blood thirst seized him at the thought of repaying his half-brother for all of the anguish and death he’d doled out. Though he’d only spent a matter of days with the Gold Eye wolves, he felt as if he belonged with them, as if they were his true brothers. They’d accepted he and Rhys without question, treated them both and given them safe harbor, and now Thane had murdered most if not all of them in their own den. He’d always known that his half-brother was capable of terrible things but this was a shock.

  When Knox and Lux came to a halt before them, Damon had almost skidded past them thanks to the consumption of his own thoughts. When he came back into his body, he noticed his paws were cold, nearly frozen, and a thick layer of snow sat on the ground all around them. We’ve been running north, he thought, surprised by the choice of direction. There was nothing to the north other than The Badlands, the area where no pack member dared cross without a large escort, and beyond that the frozen tundra that was the land of the White Tail pack.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked Knox, who took worried glances east and west, north and south, no doubt trying to ensure they hadn’t been followed. Even if they had, Damon doubted any wolf would’ve been able to keep pace with them. When he noticed the sun just beginning to crest the sky to the east, Damon realized they’d run nearly all night long and the exhaustion that adrenaline had kept at bay came flooding through. Knox ignored his question and sniffed at the air.

  “This way,” Knox said and tensed, ready to run.

  “I can’t,” Rhys panted and Damon went to him almost instinctively, as if they were the same wolf, the same body. “I need to rest.”

  “We do not have the luxury,” Knox said.

  “Please,” Rhys begged.

  “We are nearly there,” Lux said.

  “And we’ll never get there if we aren’t allowed to rest,” Damon said, speaking up for Rhys when he knew Rhys couldn’t do it for himself. Their eyes met and Damon could’ve sworn he saw thanks there. It warmed his heart.

  “As you say. We will rest a few moments but not any longer,” Knox said. “Keep close together and keep your eyes in all directions. We cannot afford to be set upon.” Nodding, Damon joined the other wolves—Eleo, Kaster, and the twins—in forming a circle around Rhys, each of them monitoring a different direction.

  Rhys’s panting filled Damon’s ears and with each sharp intake of breath, Damon felt as if the stitch in his side were being removed. It was inexplicable but it seemed as if the more Rhys relaxed and recovered, so too did Damon. He’d heard of such things happening after a soul bond, a mating that went beyond the physical realm, where two wolves were quite literally bonded in body and mind but he’d never believed it to be true until now.

  “Where are we heading?” he asked Eleo. He knew he’d never get the truth from the Lunalis twins but Eleo was savvy enough to know.

  “To the White Tails, no doubt,” Eleo said.

  “As I feared,” Damon said.

  “Feared?”

  “They will be no friends of mine. You know the stories as well as I do, I’m sure,” Damon said.

  “It’s true that the White Tails have no love for the Black Claws but it’s also true that you are no more a Black Claw than Oberon Mooneye himself was,” Eleo said, bowling Damon over. He’d never been compared to any wolf of note, much less Oberon Mooneye.

  The Black Claws at large regarded Oberon as a traitor and the sole reason for their fall from power at the hands of the Silver Fangs but Damon had always thought that view was foolish and short-sighted. Oberon had saved them all. He was no traitor, he was a hero.

  “What will we do there?” Damon asked.

  “That I can’t say,” Eleo said. “If it were me, I’d try to treaty with the White Tails, try to get them to pledge their army to our cause, but the White Tails are fickle and reluctant to involve themselves in the conflicts of the rest of Moonvalley. Why else do you think they take refuge so far north?”

  “And with The Badlands between them and the rest of the world, it’s no wonder they’re rarely disturbed,” Damon said, which made him question their current path. It was said that The Badlands were full of savage wolves, wolves not even the Packless would accept into their ranks, who had grown so hardened and ruthless that only the tundra in the northern half of Moonvalley was suitable for them. He shuddered at the thought and of what untamed wolves might do with such a small and vulnerable party as theirs.

  “How are you?” he asked Rhys over his shoulder, who let out a chuckle.

  “I’ve never felt more alive,” he said. “I feel like every nerve in my body is burning,” Rhys continued, his sarcasm falling away, replaced with honesty.

  “How much more do we have to go?” Damon asked Knox, who stood to his right.

  “I cannot be sure but I think we are close,” Knox answered.

  “How close?”

  “Perhaps a league or so. It is almost impossible to say for certain with this snow clouding my vision,” Knox said and as if seeing it for the first time, Damon realized that it was snowing quite heavily. Giant, fluffy flakes blew this way and that in the wind.

  “Then we’ll set up camp here, at least for now,” Damon said, surprising even himself with his courage. He’d never been one to speak up, much less to set demands, but things had changed. Rhys wasn’t as capable as he normally might have been and Damon refused to risk the health of their child by forcing Rhys to do more than he could safely do.

  “I think that unwise,” Knox said.

  “If our child is truly as important as you claim then surely you’ll want to see it born. That won’t happen if Rhys is run to death in this cold,” Damon said.

  “He has the right of it, brother,” Lux said and relief flooded Damon’s insides, relaxing his tense shoulders and jaw. “We have been running for far longer than necessary and none of us has slept. In the snow and wind, the Black Claws will have a difficult time tracking our scent and prints.

  “It not the Black Claws I fear in this wretched place,” Knox said.

  “We are as safe to rest here as anywhere,” Lux argued.

  “I agree,” Eleo said and once he had, Damon knew the matter was settled.

  “I’ll take first watch,” Damon volunteered; he thought it only fair since he’d been the one to insist that they stop.

  “As you wish,” Knox said and as if by instinct, he and the other wolves all crowded in a tight circle around Rhys, keeping him as warm as was possible in the howling wind and blowing snow. Though he would have preferred to be among them should any wolf find stumble upon their group, he trusted the others to keep Rhys safe if necessary, specifically Eleo. Still, the wind had grown stronger than he liked and before the other wolves had had the chance to drift off to sleep Damon found his courage shrinking along with the visibility.

  He stepped back to be closer to his companions and
narrowed his eyes to see through the snow that now seemed to fall from left to right rather than top to bottom. His inability to see worried him. The wolves who were bold enough to call this wasteland their home would almost certainly blend in with their environment and the sound of their paws upon the snow would easily be masked by the whistle of the wind, which gave Damon no comfort.

  Far above, the Blood Eye watched them, its eerie crimson light appearing and disappearing so quickly that it was almost imperceptible. As if there weren’t enough bad omens around, Damon thought with a sigh to himself. Still, he refused to give in to his fear. There was no longer time nor space for that.

  I am a Mooneye and the great Oberon’s blood runs in my veins. I owe it to him and to everyone else in my lineage to become the leader and Alpha I was born to be, he thought.

  Thankfully, his watch passed without incident. Eleo stirred a few hours after they’d agreed to stop and relieved him of the post, so Damon made his way to Rhys’s side and when their bodies met again, Rhys let out a groan and turned to find Damon there. Damon smiled at him and nuzzled against him, his head resting beside Rhys’s. He listened to Rhys’s heart beat in tune with his own, a feeling that Damon struggled to put into words, and just as he’d been about to fall asleep, he felt something else, a sharp motion against his stomach. He jolted up and Rhys did too. Their eyes met and a look of concern on Rhys’s face quickly turned to one of joy.

  “What is it?” Damon whispered so as not to wake the others.

  “The baby kicked,” Rhys said, his voice cracking and no sooner had he finished speaking than the baby kicked again. “He knows you’re near, he likes your voice,” Rhys said. Damon was speechless.

  “How? He’s barely more than a stirring inside of you,” Damon said.

  “Instinct,” Rhys said. “The same as us.”

  “I will protect you both. You won’t ever need to fear again,” Damon said and Rhys smirked.

  “There was a time in my life when I might’ve bucked at the notion of being protected but that time feels further away from me now than that damnable red scar in the sky,” Rhys said and moved himself closer to Damon so that there was no space between his back and Damon’s stomach. The closeness and intimacy of the moment coupled with the warm wetness that spilled from Damon’s entrance stirred Damon’s groin to life and though he desperately wanted to mate with Rhys again, to bond with him in the way that only mating could provide and claim him once more, he knew it wouldn’t do with the others around.