Chapter Seven
I burst into the mess hall the next morning—dressed to kill.
That was the phrase for you when you wore six-inch knife heels, an asymmetrical black silk skirt, a tight leather bodice woven with chains, and a diamond-crusted crown.
Marching right on either side of me were Edric and Paxton, looking their usual brand of sinfully gorgeous with no shirts anywhere to be found, and ripped jeans that strained to contain all of their assets.
I marched straight up to the dais and beamed my smile straight into Orion’s gloating eyes. “Good morning, everyone. I want to thank you for keeping my place warm for me, but you can get the fuck out now.”
Orion and Badr laughed out loud, jiggling all four of the girls draped across their laps. The half a dozen alphas and betas sharing the table joined in—Megan loudest of all.
Orion kicked back, propping his feet on the table. “And just how exactly are you going to make us?”
My smile widened. “I’m so glad you asked that.”
A blast of wind roared through the windows, blowing them off the hinges. Orion, Badr, and their lap ornaments didn’t have time to shout before they were swept—chairs, table, and all—off the dais and sent flying across the room.
Before they hit the floor, metal chains appeared from everywhere and nowhere—lashing around ankles, securing wrists, snaking around torsos—and lifted them up into the air.
“Arghgh!”
Bellowing their rage, Orion, Badr, and all of their misguided cronies were slammed against the ceiling. Metal spikes appeared over them all, and shot straight toward them.
“No!”
“Wait!”
“Don’t kill us!”
One after the other, the spikes drove through the chains, securing the bastards to the ceiling—unharmed and unmoving.
“Let us down!” Badr bellowed. “Let us down now!”
I made a show of yawning, already bored of his bleating. “Ahem. My throne, if you please.”
In an instant, my metal wolf ally rebuilt my throne taller, grander, and bigger than it was before. Paxton took my hand, ever the gentleman, he helped me to my seat. I smiled on the dozens of gaping faces looking back at me, because it covered my grimace.
That morning, I woke up feeling worse than I ever had before. I was stiff, achy, queasy, and dizzy. My morning shower sex with Edric was interrupted by me losing my balance and falling flat on my face. The truth was Paxton had to help me onto the throne because that one single step onto the dais was going to defeat me.
Why am I worse? I asked my wolf as though she could answer me. As though she hadn’t been all but comatose for the last two days. How do I save you?
I refocused. “Consider this your first, last, and only warning with a demonstration included. I am not just your headmistress, I am your queen, and disrespect will not be tolerated. Not just toward me, but toward the omega wolves.
“The old ways are over. Luame demands a new, fair, and equal society, and she will have that if I have to raze Wolf Nation to the ground and build it on the ashes.” My gaze swept over them. “It’s your choice if you want to be a part of this new society, or if you want to keep rolling in the filth of the past.
“If you choose the former, stay,” I said, nodding to Tracy. “Corvin Academy will be a safe place for you—alpha, beta, epsilon, and omega alike. But if you choose the filth and fleas of inequality and oppression, you can get up right now, pack your shit, and go.” I pointed up. “Starting with the bastards on the ceiling. Everyone except Badr and Orion is expelled.”
“What?!”
“You can’t do that!”
“This is wrong!”
“Let that be a lesson to the rest of you,” I called, raising my voice over their noise. “Badr and Orion are strutting around here bold as shit, egging you all on, because they know they won’t be punished for it. But you will.” I winked up at a red-faced, fuming Orion. “Next time, choose your vendetta-driven, hate-filled leaders better.”
Reaching out, I took Edric’s hand, then Paxton’s. I warmed under the winks they sent me. I didn’t know if I believed in that whole “fate brought us together” nonsense, but I did know this was much more fun with them by my side.
“So?” I quirked a single brow. “What’s your decision?”
Nia rose to her feet. “Queen Daciana promised that she’d change Wolf Nation and the academy for the better, and she kept that promise. Thanks to her, the clan alphas of Wolf Nation are listening to omega issues for the first time since... ever.
“Just this morning, my cousin sent me a link to the new draft law proposal that will abolish the alpha-only custody laws in the water wolf clan.” Nia leveled a finger at me. “That’s because of Daciana... and all of us. Because we finally stopped swallowing our tongue, and stood up for ourselves. Because we finally quit all that mouse shit, and acted like wolves.”
She smiled at me. “We used to believe that Wolf Nation didn’t need kings or queens, and maybe it doesn’t, but what it does need is Daciana. She’s not only the only epsilon wolf to ever fight for us, she’s the first to encourage us to fight for ourselves. For that reason, I pledge to the pack of Daciana.”
I stilled, freezing to the spot. What? I didn’t know she was going to do this. I didn’t ask for this.
Nia looked around. “Will the forest omega wolves pledge with me?”
You could hear a mouse fart from the storeroom five doors down. Everyone fell silent in shock, even Badr and Orion.
This was a big deal. There were fewer deals bigger in Wolf Nation! The one thing we were founded on is that there is only one pack, and that pack is Wolf Nation. Didn’t matter that there were different clans. All of those clans fell under the power of the Wolf Nation pack.
The best way to describe it is that even though there were fifty states in the US, all of those states were beholden to the one and only US government. To withdraw from the authority of the government was to secede and declare yourself your own country.
And to name yourself your own pack was to do the same. But of course, if our pack wasn’t a part of Wolf Nation, its laws, or its protections that meant... we were fair game.
A chair pushed back. “I pledge,” said Devin—a friend of Nia’s.
“I pledge.”
“I pledge.”
“I pledge too.”
My jaw dropped further and further as one after the other, the forest omegas stood up and pledged their loyalty to a pack I didn’t even create.
“I, Tracy, pledge myself to Queen Daciana’s pack.” Tracy shot up, beaming away. “Will the sun omega wolves join me?”
“I will,” Brian announced, getting to his feet. “I pledge.”
And thus started the sun wolf omega dominoes falling. They weren’t even done calling out before the metal omegas, water omegas, wind omegas, and fire omegas all stood up—pledging to me.
I asked Nia to help me get the loyalty of the omegas so that together we could fight the slaughter and atrocities in our future, and she delivered.
It was a small army, yes, but Corvin Academy was the only place in Wolf Nation where wolves from every tribe gathered. When you had less than three months to win a war, you didn’t waste precious time trekking all across the country—talking to wolves from every different clan.
No. The fight had to happen here because this place was the epicenter. The revolution would ignite within these halls, and spread through the pack. And going by a certain new law change, it already had.
Bindi stood up. “I, Bindi, of the wind beta wolves—”
“Bindi, you have to be kidding me,” one of her friends shrieked.
“I’m not kidding. I haven’t seen my mom in years. I didn’t even know if she was alive. Until two days ago, when she saw the video of me speaking at the forum, called the school, and finally got in contact with me.” Bindi inclined her head at me. “None of that would’ve happened without Daciana, so yeah, I’m with her.” Bindi looked around. “Will any other wind beta wolves stand with me?”
You could stab the tension with a knife. Getting the omegas on my side was one thing, and having the alliance of the epsilons was a given, but it was different with betas. Betas never attained the full power or privilege of the alphas, but they still had a fuck ton more of it than omegas or epsilons did.
At least a beta wolf could leave all this shit behind and pack their bags for a ten-year-long backpacking trip around the world. The only place an epsilon could travel to was from the temple to the toilet.
Betas had a lot of freedom to choose their own path in our world. Some would say even more than alphas, so why would they turn their backs on the wolves who gave them said freedom?
They wouldn’t. Which is why they hadn’t for centuries. Instead they stood by, watched, participated, and cheered alphas on while they stomped on others’ throats.
“I pledge,” Davis said, shooting me a wink. “Daciana’s gotten me one step closer to mating a harem of beautiful ladies. I’d vote for her any day.”
I barked a laugh. I wasn’t expecting that, but I loved it all the same.
It seemed Davis taking the second step prompted more betas to do the same. They didn’t all stand up. Actually, less than half did, but that even more than two did bowled me over.
“Thank you, everyone, I—”
A noise cut me off, crumpling my brow. All eyes moved up the ceiling.
“What? That’s it?” Orion asked, howling away. “Aren’t you going to ask the alphas if they want to join your psycho killer pack? No? Well, I’ll do it for you, then. Hey, alphas! Interested in throwing your fate in with the woman who murders people as easy as she breathes?”
The laughs that came back at me blew my ears back, with no one laughing harder than the bruised-up fool on the ceiling—Johnson.
“Want to know why they’re laughing at you, Volana?” Orion’s taunting voice worked hard to crack my stoic mask. “Want to know why they’re always laughing at you? Because you’re fake. All you do is put on a show of strength, and power, and authority all to hide the fact that you’re a useless waste of space.”
I blinked lazily at him. “Uh-huh, that’s nice, dear, now pipe down. The adults are talking.”
“You—” A small metal band stuffed past his teeth and gagged him. “Hphmf!”
“Oooh, fair enough,” said Badr. “That was harsh. Mostly because you’re not putting on this performance to distract us from what trash you are. You’re doing it to distract us from the fact—”
I snapped my fingers. “Gag him too.”
“—that tonight’s a full moon.”
I froze. “Wha—”
“Now!”
The shout rang through the mess hall, propelling all the alphas to their feet. Whipping something out of their pockets, they shoved black skull masks over their heads—sending every student in their vicinity shooting away from them.
“What the hell are you doing?” Nia shouted.
“This. Kill the high priestess. ”
“What?!” I barely got out the scream before more commands came—from everywhere.
“ Attack the metal wolves. ”
“ Put down Edric. ”
“ Take back the school. ”
“ Kill the high priestess! ”
“ Kill. Kill. KILL! ”
The omegas who just committed high treason to pledge their loyalty to me, turned on me with yellowing eyes, sprouting fur, and vicious claws.
“Stop,” I screamed.
They charged.
I jumped up. “Alphas, stop this—!”
Something moved out of the corner of my eye. I pitched onto the floor, narrowly flying out of the way as Paxton’s fist sailed through the spot my head had been in, and dented my metal throne.
“Paxton!”
Turning on me, our eyes connected. I looked deep into the cold, dead eyes of a wolf under command and shuddered—nearly throwing up. These eyes didn’t belong to the man who gazed at me adoringly as he peppered kisses on my face, chest, and breasts.
He raised his hands.
“Paxton, stop,” I cried. “This isn’t you! You can fight this. You can—” I choked, hands flying to my throat.
Water dribbled down my chin, flowing free from my filling throat—flooding out the very idea of air.
“ Paxton, please, don’t. Paxton! ” The scream resounded through my mind.
Paxton jerked, hands dropping and eyes clear. “ Daze? ”
Paxton ripped off his feet, sailing over my head. “Ahhh!”
Edric’s wind blast carried him off as Edric ran to me, reaching—
A large, heavy, wooden wrecking ball slammed into Edric, crushing him between it and the unforgiving stone wall. He crumpled into a bloody heap, leaving nothing but his imprint in the crumbling stone.
He didn’t get up.
“Edric!”
“ Kill the high priestess. ”
“ Put down the metal wolves. ”
“ Attack the epsilons. ”
“ Obey the alphas now and forever. ”
“ Alphas on top. ”
“ Alphas rule! ”
I pushed myself up on shaky hands and knees, spewing the remains of the water on the floor. All around me, the world plunged into a nightmare.
Friends turned on friends. Allies attacked allies.
Tracy and Nia tackled Ava, pummeling the girl within an inch of her life when just the night before, they stayed up late watching movies and drinking margaritas.
The betas on my side tried to help but were quickly overwhelmed by the betas on Orion’s and Badr’s side. Their powers of persuasion didn’t work on each other, but their claws did.
Davis bellowed as Lucy opened deep, weeping wounds across his chest.
“How about me for your harem?” Lucy taunted, fangs piercing her bottom lip. “Traitor.”
“Please. An ugly bitch like you? I’ve got standards.”
“Argh!” Lucy kicked in his chest, throwing him off his feet.
I cried out as he crashed onto the dining table, and flipped it, the plates, foods, and utensils onto himself. Good comeback, but Davis paid for it dearly.
Metal wolves incased their skin in steel, protecting themselves as they fled for the jam-packed exit. All of them including Zarina Bankole, my metal wolf ally and secret friend who asked me to protect her identity so she wouldn’t become a target and get thrown out of the pack like both her parents were.
I promised her that protection—
A sun wolf skidded in front of her, blasting her full in the face before she could blink.
Zarina went down screaming, clutching the ruined, burnt-out eye sockets where her eyes used to be.
— and I failed.
Chains rattled.
Snapping my head up, I got out a single shout in time for Orion to fall on my head—crashing down on top of me and pinning me to the floor.
“Look what we have here.”
“Get off of me!”
Orion laughed out loud as he hauled me to my feet, his grip like iron around my arm and neck.
“Get off!”
He spun me around as Badr hit the deck, falling gracefully on his shifted hindlegs, and not breaking a single bone in his rotten, worthless body.
“Bring her.”
Orion obeyed.
My fated mate, chosen by the goddess herself to be my soulmate, dragged me off the dais and through the baying mob. Every solid, unphasing inch of me.
They tore at me.
Ripped my braids off my head. Spit on me. Doused me in scalding hot coffee. Punched me in the face, stomach, nose, mouth. Burned me with flames. Blinded me with sun. Forced water down my throat. Stabbed sharpened bamboo shoots through my stomach. And laughed.
The worst part as they beat me so easily and so quickly... was how loud and vilely they laughed.
Deep down, I screamed at my wolf to come out, wake up, take over, protect us, FIGHT!
She didn’t even stir.
I was a bloody, broken doll by the time we closed the short distance to Badr. Orion long since stopped holding me up and just clamped my wrist, wrenching it as he dragged me across the floor—collecting vicious kicks.
“Lift her.”
Orion propped me on my knees, then grabbed me under the chin—holding me and my head up.
Because I couldn’t do either.
“Daciana Volana, queen of nothing and no one, you’ve escaped justice not once, not twice, but three times.”
A shadow fell over me, looming large through my blurry, swollen eyes.
Badr shifted into a magnificent, tawny alpha wolf, bearing both unique and pretty black markings between his eyes. Lifting his massive head high, it was Badr who looked the king right then—as naturally as if Luame herself came down and placed a crown on his head.
Badr grunted and barked. Wolf speak, but I knew it better than English.
“ This is for my brother. ”
I knew even before Orion tipped my head all the way back. Before Badr opened his maw and roared. So many times I threatened to rip a throat out, and one horrible day, I did so.
That day, I would find out what it felt like... before I joined Castor.
“ Edric, Paxton, ” I whispered through any bonds that remained. “ Take care of her. ”
Badr lunged, fangs sinking into my neck and—
“Ungh!”
—and nothing.
I cracked my eye open, peering through the blood.
Badr’s eyes rolled in their sockets—bugged and panicking as writhing, green snakes wound through his open mouth, between his fangs, around his jaw and priiiiied it open, wrenching it further than it was supposed to go.
I gasped when I heard it snap.
Badr yelped, whimpering piteously as the snakes lashed around his stomach and limbs... and squeezed.
“Wait! No— Aghhh!” Orion’s grip suddenly disappeared, dropping me flat on my face.
Screams and shouts sounded all around me, battering my burnt ears. I strained to lift my head and managed only to shift it to one side. The cool hardwood soothed my ruined left ear while I struggled to make sense of a sideways world. All around me, the snakes were everywhere.
No... not snakes.
Vines. Thick, rope-like vines slithered across the floor, through the windows, and down the walls—going after every alpha in sight.
Johnson shifted as four heavy vines wrapped around his limbs. His wolf snapped at the threat, chomping through a vine, until the vines snapped back.
They slammed him against the wall once—twice—five—eight times until he stopped moving for good.
Megan ran screaming past me, tearing for the door much like the metal wolves she terrorized. A vine swept her leg out from under her. Her head bounced off the floor as it yanked her into the air, suspending her screeching from the ceiling.
“Help me! Get me down! Put me down now! ”
“Sorry, darling.” Nyx. My handsome, strong, bare-chested, devilishly grinning Nyx stepped into view. “That’s not going to work on me.”
Nyx held a hand out to me. I couldn’t move— Couldn’t think about moving—as a shower of palm fronds surrounded, then slipped under me. Gently, they cradled and lifted me into the air.
Nyx floated me to his side. Up close, I made out the thick black bandana wrapped around his forehead. “Now”—his charming, jovial tone vanished in an instant—“which one of you soon-to-be dead fuckers laid a finger on my mate?”
“You think you’re tough, mud boy!?” someone roared.
“Yes.”
“Let me down from here and we’ll see who’s tough!”
“It’ll still be me.” Nyx lazily swept the space as his vines choked, attacked, and suspended wolf after wolf—shifted and human. “No one’s going to fess up?”
“Argh!” A figure charged Nyx from the back.
I gagged, choking on the blood in my mouth to warn him.
Boom!
The floor exploded under the attacker’s feet, propelling him like a canon blast through the open window.
Of course... I’d have smiled if my mouth would’ve responded. Hardwood. Wood.
“Well, if no one’s going to admit it... I’ll just have to punish you all.”
The hardwood ripped off its subflooring, finding new life as vines, twigs, and thigh-sized branches sprouted from its polished surface.
“Attack.”
The living wood surged forward—punching, pummeling, stampeding every being breathing and non-breathing that came into their path.
I lifted high above it all, carried away from Nyx.
“Wait for me outside, won’t you, darling?” Nyx blew me a kiss. “I won’t be long.”
I didn’t get a chance to see if I could voice the “ no, let me stay with you, ” that sprung to my lips.
Darkness had already come for me. Roughly, it dragged me under.
***