Hundreds of beasts sprinted out from the forest, all running directly toward Aurora. I licked my lips, thirsty for blood and ready to kill. Not only were we fighting on my property now, but we were also at my home—the battlefield. I knew every tree, every hill, and every cave in this part of Sanguine Wilds. They wouldn’t win.
But even without the element of surprise, the hounds were stronger than they had been last time. And I couldn’t make sense of it. They were rogues. They were mayhem. They should never be this strong.
Something wasn’t right with them … it never had been.
I sank my teeth and claws into as many of them as I could, trying to get rid of them before even more showed up. But they kept closing in on us.
Wolves were howling to the sky with their final breath. My pack was falling, my people dying.
Marcel let out a piercing howl and shifted almost immediately back into his human form. A hound ran right at him to kill him, but Elijah sprinted at the beast and knocked him down. Marcel swiped his claws across the hound’s neck and killed him instantly.
In the distance, I heard more paws hitting the forest floor.
Fuck … fuck, there couldn’t be more. We couldn’t fucking die here today to these things, not before I healed Charolette and got my revenge for Mom. And Aurora … I couldn’t let Aurora die either. She had been through so much … and for what? To die here and now? No. Fuck no.
Elijah’s pack showed up in the woods, ready to fight these savage, ruthless beasts with us. A wall of warriors formed around me and my mate. My pack pushed the hounds deeper into the woods until they were on the outskirts of my property.
From across the forest, I locked eyes with one of the many men I had hunted for my entire life. Two scars ran diagonally across his face like an X, dragon-like tattoos covered one side of his head, and those hollow black eyes that I’d stared at when Mom was raped seemed to cut right through me.
He had almost killed Aurora the other day after I chased her into Hound Territory, but I’d refused to chase after him then and leave her alone. I couldn’t lose her to the hounds too. But now that he was here …
My Goddess had given me a second chance to kill his ass.
I growled viciously and bared my teeth at the man. The only thing I could feel was rage, rattling my insides, begging me to end his life and my misery right now. All I wanted to do was chase after him, rip out his throat, and finally feel closure for everything he had taken from me—Mom’s sanity, Mom’s happiness, Mom’s life. She deserved to be avenged for her rape. She deserved more than fourteen years of misery in the ground. I had to kill him, to shred him to pieces with my teeth, to let rogues feast on his rotting flesh.
I wouldn’t have another chance.
He wouldn’t get to terrorize me anymore.
“Aurora,” I said through the mind link, hoping that she’d be okay with me chasing after him.
There was pain in my heart. I was torn between chasing our life’s passion and staying with our entire life. I glanced over at my mate, who was doubled over her brother. Her naked body was heaving back and forth, her head was on his chest, and tears streamed down her cheeks.
If I stayed, I might never see him again. But if I chased after him, then I might never see Aurora again. The hounds would try to kill her to get the stone. They would try to take her from me.
And nobody would take away my Aurora again.
I let out another warning growl, standing in front of my pack and killing any and all of the hounds who got past my wall of warriors. My claws dug into fur like it was fabric. My teeth latched into throat after throat, tearing them out like it was nothing. All while I watched that hound run deeper into the forest like the coward he was.
When our pack had either killed the hounds or chased them off the property, I gazed at my mate, trying so damn hard to ignore the betrayal Mom must’ve felt because I’d chosen my mate over revenge for her.
Completely lost in all her grief, Aurora clutched on to Jeremy’s dead body. The strong and unyielding expression that she had given me the first night I met her was gone, and I could feel every ounce of her pain. I prayed to the Moon Goddess that this wouldn’t break her. I didn’t want her to feel the way I felt every day, and I didn’t want her to feel bad about what she’d had to do.
I slowly approached her with my head down and brushed my forehead against hers, wanting her to know that I was here for her. She lifted a trembling hand and pushed me away, trying to hold back her cries.
Both Mars and I felt hurt, but she was the one hurting right now. It couldn’t be about us. She had killed her own brother to save him from the hounds.
The stone glistened in her hand, falling from her open palm to the grass beside her. I backed away from her and stared at the Malavite Stone, the thing that had caused this whole mess. And in that moment, I made the second hardest decision of my entire life.
After what Aurora had done, if she wanted to use that stone on herself, I would let her.
I knew I could save Charolette with it, but Aurora had made a sacrifice that I would never have been able to make. She was stronger than I ever hoped to be, and she deserved to be able to shift without pain.
So, I lay on my stomach, rested
