Wolf Bargain (Wolfish 3)

“I understand things perfectly,” Remus hissed. “It is you who are deceived by what is right in front of your face. You learned nothing from our past. You just try to incite it again by turning more humans and letting them breed, as if you don’t know what will happen.”

Romulus pauses for a moment. I know that whatever he’s getting ready to say will be the last thing he would ever say to his brother. One way or the other, blows come next.

I can just tell by the heaviness in his expression and the weighty breath that he’s carefully taking to put behind his words.

“Remus, you are very wrong. You are so wrong that there is no fixing you, that much I have finally come to realize.” He takes another, even heavier, breath.

“I’m sorry that the path you took was not the path I chose to take. I wish that I could have helped you more, but I am done trying now. You have attacked my family. You’ve tried to hurt my children and poison the woman who carried their pups.”

“Pups?” Remus asks. “There’s more than one child?”

“There are three,” Romulus says.

The flare of outrage in Remus’ eyes flashes brilliantly and violently against the night sky. Not only did he fail to prevent my turning and fail to kill me; he failed to kill our pups and now there are three more “abominations” that have become a part of Romulus’ ever-growing and ever-strengthening pack.

Remus’ fury is palpable.

“Now,” Romulus says to him calmly. “I suggest that you turn around with your pack and walk away from this needless confrontation. You and I have no further need to ever speak or see each other again.”

As vehemently angry as Remus is, there is nothing he can do. He has been humiliated and outmatched in front of his pack and they can all sense his emotions. Now he will have to walk away with his tail between his legs. Not only did his mission fail, but it has cost him the respect of his pack.

It’s already palpable in the air—this loss.

Remus stares at Romulus for a long minute. When he breaks his gaze, he looks at all of the other packs behind us … all shifters that have mixed packs with turned humans.

All packs that he hates.

He looks lastly at the boys and then finally at me. He has saved his most p

otent hatred for me, the human girl who was the spark that lit the flame now threatening to burn him to the ground.

He has been outdone by what he considers to be a repugnant and lesser species—a human woman. Or what once was. I’m far too aware of the wolf inside me ready to burst forth for me to consider myself a human any longer.

Knowing that there’s nothing left to do but retreat, Remus turns slowly to walk away.

But something in his pack seems off. Something feels like it’s still charged with an impulsive energy—like the moment just before you see lightning strike the ground. Something isn’t right in that split moment when he turns his back to us.

It is only the smallest fraction of a second that in which Remus pretends to withdraw that the chaotic energy is there.

As soon as he lunges back around, heading straight for me with his jaw widened and his canines showing, Romulus reaches forward and grabs his brother by the neck with both hands.

There’s no time for me to react.

No time for the silvery moon just peeking out of the clouds above to trigger my first shift early.

It all happens so fast that it is hard to see everything at once.

The boys immediately form a barrier around me as Kaleb pulls me backward into the other packs with him and Rory and Marlowe jump in front of us to block Remus from reaching me. I watch in suspended shock as Romulus holds his brother by the neck, gripping his throat with both of his massive hands as his claws extend outward.

Romulus is shifting, but he’s controlling his shift as he balances on the precipice between man and wolf. He holds Remus with his feet off the ground as he looks ahead over the side of his brother’s shoulder at us.

“Goodbye brother,” Romulus says sadly, so quietly that only those closest to him can overhear. Or maybe he doesn’t say it at all. Maybe I feel it, sense it, through the bond of my new pack.

I watch as Romulus’ hands strengthen into the powerful claws of a wolf-shifter, crushing Remus’ throat and puncturing his neck with his long, sharp claws. It takes only a few seconds before Remus’ head slumps forward and his thrashing arms and legs stop moving.

Romulus retracts his claws and drops his brother’s bloodied and motionless body to the ground. Then he calms himself back out of his shift before turning around to face Remus’ pack.

I stand here up against Kaleb’s chest and I can feel his heart pounding as fast as mine. Romulus has just killed his brother in front of all of the packs, Remus’ pack included.