Chapter 20

"Wolfie isn't going to do anything about it. But I am."

The new voice came from behind my back and was entirely unexpected by my human brain. But my wolf had apparently been monitoring our surroundings more carefully than I had, and she quickly caught me up on why my human brother thought he was capable of saving the day single-handedly against an alpha werewolf with a big, sharp sword.

Ethan and Fen have a plan, she told me succinctly. Before Wolfie's infusion of power, my wolf and I had never been able to share our senses so seamlessly, but now my lupine half had apparently developed the ability to look and listen to features of our landscape that were beyond my conscious focus. So the ever-alert wolf had no problem running back through what she'd seen and heard while my human half had been focused intently on the danger in front of us.

Apparently, Fen had taken advantage of Wolfie's and Justin's chat by stepping outside the bedroom long enough to gather up my brother. And, together, the two must have cooked up some course of action before reentering the room. Or so my wolf assumed when Ethan strode empty-handed but full of bantering words toward the danger poised to behead a small child atop my great grandmother's hand-stitched quilt.

"For threatening a pack member who can't defend herself, I plan to claw out your eyes and rip off your fingernails," Ethan said coolly as he paced forward. His human pupils almost certainly couldn't make out the features of his surroundings, so I held my breath, hoping the teenager wouldn't trip as he advanced upon our enemy. Good thing I'd picked my shoes up off the floor earlier that afternoon.

"And for kicking your own daughter across the floor on the day she was born, I'll break every bone in your fingers and use hot pokers to singe off your eyebrows," my brother continued. Despite my appreciation of his efforts, my stomach was becoming queasy at Ethan's mere words. Still, the threats appeared to be providing the desired effect. Because Justin sat frozen in place, Lantana having crawled off his lap as his arms relaxed their hold in surprise at the verbal attack.

"Then for treating your mate like a pawn instead of like a person, I'm going to open up your belly and tease out your intestines one by one just to see how far they'll stretch," Ethan said as he neared the bed, step by forceful step.

Even as I watched, frozen in place, I spared a thought to hope that my brother was getting these words from scary TV shows. Note to self: remove all television sets from the Barn in the near future, my human brain rambled aimlessly.

Why? my wolf demanded. He's doing a fine job. And look at Fen.

My lupine half was right...and was far more attuned to the relevant facets of this strange scene. Because Justin's attention remained trained upon the human teenager who walked into the mouth of danger as if he were the world's strongest wolf. Meanwhile, the female yahoo was drifting unnoticed around the other side of the room, hugging the wall as she neared our opponent from behind his back.

I slid a questioning glance toward my mate, and it was almost as if we were able to speak within each other's minds. We don't know exactly what they're planning, Wolfie appeared to be thinking. But they're doing an excellent job of it. So let's not do anything to rock the boat.

So even though I itched to change into lupine form and assist either my brother—whose job I was assuming was to be a red herring—or Fen—who I hoped was planning on sweeping away Lantana as soon as the opportunity presented itself—I instead waited and watched.

Meanwhile, my wolf expanded our senses out yet further, so we could now hear and smell the other werewolves hovering on the other side of our bedroom door. Fen had apparently alerted the entire village when she went out to collect Ethan, but the female yahoo must have figured that fewer shifters in the room was better during a hostage situation. So the remainder of our pack held themselves in poised anticipation, their nervous tension roiling through the air.

Fen's decision was evidently a good one. Because Justin's inner wolf was becoming more and more agitated with each step and word that Ethan took, and I half expected our intruder to rip through his clothes at any moment and rush my brother with fangs and claws. Instead, with an effort of will that likely wouldn't have been possible before twenty doses of F2F increased his animal half's dominance, my brother-in-law merely responded verbally to Ethan's taunting.

"You're going to do all this?" Justin asked, the words mocking but his tone not quite mirroring the disbelief he was trying to convey. "You? A half-blood werewolf who can't shift into lupine form at all without the help of drugs? I knew my brother had given his pack of misfits unrealistic visions of their self-worth, but this takes the cake."

By now, Ethan was nearly close enough to extend his arm and touch his opponent on the shoulder, and Fen was not much more distant on the other side of the bed. But before my own pack members could make their move, an eddy of air currents must have finally brought Fen's scent to Justin's nostrils. Because he whirled in place, alert to the lurking danger at last.

As the intruder spun, the family sword clattered forgotten to the floor at the foot of the bed. And for a moment, I thought the threat was finally over.

But then my brother-in-law exploded into lupine form, shreds of cloth pushed away from his body so forcefully by the near-uber-alpha speed of his shift that they rained down across the entire room like confetti. Growling menacingly, Justin's wolf stilled us all again with a single gesture. He placed one huge paw atop Lantana's back, pushing the infant deep into the covers so her angry cries were muffled by the quilt.

And then, before anyone could move against the shifter's effort to smother a baby, I smelled yet another danger wafting in on the breeze.

***

The uber-alpha padded ghost-like into the room. Both his scent and his bearing had changed since the previous morning, the aroma of sassafras less spicy now that our visitor was being called upon to serve the will of the Tribunal in a punitary setting. Instead, the bone-chilling flavor of frigid spring water seemed to fill my mouth, like a scent so strong it had turned into a taste.

Evidently, the nameless Tribunal member was annoyed at being forced to return to Haven to deal with our piddling dramas. Or so it seemed as his eyes swept across the room, taking in each participant's actions. Wolfie and I were still frozen in place, unsure whether our addition to the drama would help or hinder our pack mates. Ethan was injecting himself with F2F, his clothes falling to the floor beneath the body of a wolf I'd seen only twice before. And Fen was rushing toward our foe in human form, having snatched up the sword that had been passed down through the male lineage of Wolfie's family for generations and now holding the weapon two-handed above her head as she moved in for the kill.

Grandfather's sword is meant to be used to protect our pack, Wolfie had told me eighteen hours earlier when I asked him how an object—albeit a historical one—could be important enough to risk inflaming his brother's well-documented malicious streak. The rest of my mate's explanation had been equally simple and powerful: The sword is a symbol of my duties as an alpha. How could I relinquish that symbol?

Like her pack leader, Fen had clearly taken up the challenge along with the weapon and had proven my own assessment of the situation wrong in the process. Because when my brother first walked into the room, I'd assumed the female yahoo simply planned to yank Lantana away from the half-crazed shifter while my brother distracted Justin's attention. But I saw now that Fen had a more deadly goal in mind. Ethan was the one who had been set in charge of rescuing the defenseless infant. Meanwhile, the Barn rats' unanimously elected leader had taken upon herself the lofty goal of saving our entire pack and all of werewolf-kind in one fell swoop.

And how did Fen plan to defeat our enemy once and for all? Through the simple action of skewering Justin with his ancestral sword and then watching him cough out his life's breath.

The plan was simple and brave. And five minutes earlier I would have cheered my young friend on.

But now, with the nameless uber-alpha breathing down my neck, I understood that there would be no wiggle room if we broke shifter law a second time. If our pack killed a supposedly harmless guest within plain view of a Tribunal member, then someone would have to pay the price.

Those thoughts roiling through my mind, I called out a sharp "No!" just as Ethan sprang and Fen lunged. There had to be another way to protect Lantana and neutralize the threat that my brother-in-law represented, one that didn't put us all in danger at the teeth of the uber-alpha standing at my back.

Wolfie apparently disagreed with my assessment. In the seconds I'd spent looking away from my mate, he'd shifted into lupine form, and even now he was racing toward the melee as quickly as four paws would take him. So, ignoring the uber-alpha and my own misgivings, I ran two-legged to join my mate.

But I could see that both Wolfie and I were much too distant to impact the resolution of this drama. Because it seemed that there really wasn't any way to save Lantana other than to follow the plan that the female yahoo had set into motion. The infant's cries had become more frantic while I wavered in the doorway. But now they abruptly quieted, causing my throat to swell with anticipated sorrow.

No! It can't be too late!

Tribunal be damned, I was glad now that I hadn't thought to push alpha compulsion into my voice while yelling negation. Instead, I vowed that, if Fen could save the infant's defenseless life before the hostage suffocated against the soft fabric, then I'd accept whatever punishment the uber-alpha doled out.

The only question was—could Ethan and Fen take Justin down while Lantana's heart still beat? Or would they also be too late?

The uber-alpha, I realized even as I sprinted forward, could have stopped us all in our tracks. Even under the influence of his drug-induced haze of power, Justin's wolf would have stilled in a second at a command from Mr. Sassafras. But, instead of intruding, the Tribunal member simply waited and watched, his odor softening against my teeth as I ran in the opposite direction. It appeared that Mr. Sassafras, like Justin, didn't care about the life of one halfie girl child.

Or maybe he knows there will be no one to punish if we don't break the rules, my wolf thought sardonically, and I had to agree. From what I'd seen of the werewolf world to date, most strong shifters got quite a charge out of lording their power over others. So why would this uber-alpha be any different? Why save the life of a half-blood infant and of my own pack members when he could simply munch on metaphorical popcorn and enjoy the drama before slapping us all back into place?

But soon I had no attention left to spare for the Tribunal member. Because Wolfie and I had reached the bed at last. The bed that had turned into a site of carnage that made last winter's battle resemble a jovial game of touch football.

Lantana, I was relieved to see, had fallen to the floor during the struggle and was now screaming at the top of her lungs. But none of the combatants had a moment to spare for soothing her inflamed temper or checking her presumably bruised noggin.

Because Ethan's wolf teeth were fastened onto Justin's foreleg. And Wolfie's grandfather's sword—in Fen's firm, strong arms—was being pushed upwards through Justin's belly and into his lungs and heart.

Then as I watched in horrified fixation, my brother-in-law gasped once. And blood gurgled out of his muzzle as the light snuffed out of his eyes.