Chapter 36 Nightfang Ambush
The scream ripped through the trees before Tiara could even fully shift her weight.
“Alpha! Incoming—!”
A SilverShield patrol Omega burst out of the brush, blood streaking down his arm as he stumbled toward her. Behind him, wolves moved fast, coordinated, deadly.
NightFang wolves.
Tiara didn’t hesitate. “Formation Delta!” she barked, lunging forward.
Her team, six elite wolves fell into position instantly. Her wolf senses sharpened, hearing every heartbeat, every snapped twig, every breath the ambushers took.
The first NightFang wolf leaped from the dark, claws outstretched.
Tiara met him midair.
She twisted, slammed him to the ground, and pinned him with a knee to his throat. “My territory,” she growled, voice half-wolf, half-Alpha flame. “You should’ve stayed out.”
Before she could finish him, two more wolves flanked her. The SilverShield warriors clashed with them, steel against claws, growls mixing with the wet thud of impact.
“Alpha! Behind you!” one of her warriors yelled.
Tiara spun, blocked a strike with her forearm, and drove an elbow into her attacker’s ribs. Her wolf pulsed under her skin, it was hot, fierce, protective. Her movements sharpened, her instincts heightening beyond normal Alpha levels.
Her bond with Damien flared at the same time. Both of them interacting with the mind link
“Tiara. I feel an attack.”
Tiara dodged another strike. NightFang ambush. North border.
I’m sending intercept routes. Don’t lose control. I need you alive!.” Damien shouted
She almost smiled. “I’ll do my best,” she murmured aloud, ducking under a blow and ramming her knee into a wolf’s gut.
Her team regained formation. The NightFang wolves expected chaos.
Instead, Tiara gave them strategy.
“Push left!” she ordered. “Their flank is exposed!”
Her warriors shifted, forcing the NightFang attackers back into the narrow channel between two massive boulders. Exactly where Tiara wanted them.
“Alpha, you’re herding us?” one ambusher snarled.
“Smart boy,” she hissed, catching him by the jaw and slamming him into stone. The impact echoed across the treeline.
Her wolf relished the fight, relished protecting her territory, her people.
But something felt wrong.
The NightFang wolves weren’t retreating.
They were stalling.
Tiara’s instincts prickled. “Eyes up,” she growled. “This isn’t their full force.”
A whistle cut through the night.
Then darkness moved.
A pack of new wolves emerged from the shadows, but these… these were wrong.
Eyes pitch-black.
Veins glowing faintly purple.
Their scent were corrupted, thick with something unnatural.
“What the hell…” a SilverShield warrior whispered.
The first corrupted wolf snarled and the sound vibrated like two voices layered over one another.
Damien’s voice surged through the bond, sharp and alarmed. Tiara, what is that? Your heartbeat, your energy spiked
Later, she shot back. We have company.
The corrupted wolves lunged all at once.
Two SilverShield warriors were knocked off their feet instantly, flying backward like ragdolls.
Tiara reacted on instinct, throwing up a barrier of raw Alpha aura. The energy blasted outward, sending three attackers skidding back.
But the effort cost her, power ripped through her veins like fire.
Her wolf howled inside her. More power. More. MORE.
“No,” she hissed through clenched teeth. “Not now.”
A corrupted wolf charged her, moving at unnatural speed. She caught its throat mid-air, shocked at the strength vibrating in its muscles.
“What did NightFang do to you?” she growled.
The wolf’s eyes flickered black, then purple, then black again before it snapped at her face.
She threw it to the ground and stomped its chest, knocking the breath out of it.
Her warriors regained their footing, forming a circle. “Alpha,” one panted, “these wolves are… not normal.”
“Enhanced,” Tiara muttered. “Dark energy. Someone altered them.”
Damien’s presence tightened in her chest. “ I’m intercepting the Council. Blocking their reinforcements. But Tiara this enhancement don’t engage it alone.”
I’m not alone, she thought fiercely, watching her warriors regroup behind her. I have them.
Another wave hit.
Tiara moved faster, her wolf blending instinct with battle memory. She darted behind a corrupted wolf, seized its spine, and forced it to the ground. When it snapped its head back unnaturally far, trying to bite her, she realized.
“They don’t feel pain,” she said aloud.
Her team hesitated.
“Then we don’t waste time,” she commanded. “Pin them. Disable joints. Break structure. Do NOT wait for them to tire—they won’t.”
“Yes, Alpha!”
The battlefield shifted.
SilverShield wolves moved with precision again, bolstered by Tiara’s presence. Her aura wove through them, strengthening their confidence, sharpening their focus.
A young wolf, Mira, dodged a claw swipe and looked toward Tiara. “You’re glowing,” she gasped.
Tiara glanced down, realizing her arms pulsed with faint silver lines. Alpha power awakening deeper.
Damien felt it instantly. Tiara—your aura is unstable. Stop drawing too much.
I don’t have a choice!
The corrupted wolves surged again.
One nearly reached Mira.
But Tiara blurred forward, grabbing the wolf by the throat and slamming it down hard enough to shake the earth. Her growl rolled across the battlefield, Alpha dominance radiating in waves.
Every SilverShield wolf lifted their head empowered.
Every NightFang wolf paused fearful.
Except the corrupted ones.
They only trembled… like something was controlling them.
Tiara narrowed her eyes. “Who’s commanding you?”
One wolf’s eyes flickered with recognition.
Then its body convulsed.
Dark smoke burst from its wounds, swallowing its form.
“What the—!?” her warrior yelled, stumbling back.
The wolf’s body dissolved into shadow, evaporating like steam against moonlight.
Tiara’s heart dropped. “They’re not enhanced.” She stepped closer, horrified. “They’re possessed.”
Damien inhaled sharply across their bond. “Dark magic. Ancient magic. Someone resurrected forbidden techniques.”
Tiara clenched her fists. “NightFang shouldn’t even have access to this.”
“Unless someone inside the Council is helping them,” Damien growled mentally.
The last corrupted wolf collapsed, its veins flickering out like dying embers.
Silence fell.
Bodies littered the forest floor. SilverShield had won but nobody celebrated.
Tiara wiped blood from her cheek, breathing hard.
Her warriors gathered slowly, eyes wide with dread.
“Alpha,” Mira whispered, “if NightFang has… creatures like this… how do we fight them?”
Tiara looked at the blackened residue staining the earth.
Her stomach twisted.
Dark energy still pulsed faintly in the soil.
“We adapt,” she said softly. “We learn. We find the source.”
Damien’s voice returned, low and urgent. “Tiara. I delayed the Council troops. But the political pressure is increasing. Magnus won’t wait long.”
“Then neither will I.”
She crouched beside the dissolving remains of the corrupted wolf.
Something glinted inside the ash. A small metal shard etched with runes.
Her blood turned cold.
“Alpha?” one warrior asked. “What is that?”
Tiara held it up.The marking on it…She recognized it.
“It belonged to one wolf and only one wolf.”
“NightFang’s Alpha.”
Her mother’s former mate, the one who should have been dead.
Her voice came out a whisper. “This isn’t just NightFang.”
She turned the shard over. “This is the mark of the Shadowborn.”
Her warriors stiffened in horror.
Damien’s bond pulsed violently. “Tiara….what did you find?”
She swallowed.
And then she spoke the truth that would ignite war.
“They have a secret weapon,” she said. “Dark-energy wolves created through forbidden Shadowborn rituals.”
The forest wind went dead still.
And then—A deep voice echoed from the shadows.
“Correct, Alpha Tiara.”
She jerked up, eyes widening.
A tall figu
re emerged from behind the treeline, shadows dripping from his form like smoke.
NightFang’s true leader.
And the monster who once tried to kill her mother.
“War,” he growled, eyes glowing dark purple, “has only just begun.”