Chapter 1 #2
He gives me a menacing smile. “Not this time, Kieran,” he says, taking a slow sip. “There’s no king to save you. No king to put me in my place. To choose you over me. To steal my birthright.”
“You go against our king?”
“My father was the real king.”
I step forward, squeezing my hand into a fist. “You wonder why you weren’t chosen?” I hiss. “You are not befitting of a crown. You surround yourself with hooligans and brutes. You have hate in your heart. You are a joke, cousin. Your father would be ashamed of you.”
The pretend pleasantness drains out of his face.
A malicious evil takes its place.
“That throne is rightly mine,” he says. “Just because your fool of a father overlooked me, does not mean I’ll walk away.”
“A fool?” I say, growling uncontrollably. “Is that what you call my father?”
“That’s what I call your entire bloodline,” he says, tossing his cup on the ground. “A bloodline that ends now.”
He draws his sword and thrusts it at my chest. I turn to the side, missing the blade by a hair. It slices the clasp of the traditional Wolf Prince cloak and it tumbles to the ground.
That’s a good thing. It’s wet and heavy and slows me down. And with five other homicidal wolf shifters attacking, I need every bit of strength and speed I have.
They all come at me at once. I dodge an incoming knife, grab the man’s arm, and crack it over my knee. Hands and arms grab me from all angles as he hollers in pain.
I spin, and punch, and push the men away. One falls onto his behind, another punches me in the stomach. I punch him back, staggering him.
I’ve trained in hand-to-hand combat with the best fighters in the realm since I was a young pup barely able to stand, but six on one is a tall order to fill. Especially when they fight dirty.
The big one thrusts his spear at my neck. I swat it to the side, the sharp blade barely missing my jugular.
My wolf wants to get out, but there’s no time to shift. Every split second is a matter of life or death.
I try to yank the spear out of his hands, but that’s when Lucan unleashes years of hostility and revenge. He steps up behind me and thrusts his knife into my back.
A blood-curdling scream rips out of my lungs as he twists it hard. I throw my elbow back, hoping to land it on his head, but he ducks out of the way and stabs me again. And again. And again.
The pain is white-hot and all-consuming. My back is soaked with blood. My head goes light. My legs buckle.
I drop to one knee on the wet soil as Lucan steps in front of me, the blade dripping with my blood. Lucan crouches so our eyes are level. He almost looks sad.
“Why couldn’t he have just picked me?” he says softly. “It didn’t have to be this way.”
My wolf growls savagely inside. I feel him tearing loose before I make the conscious decision to let him. The shift rips through me fast and violent—bones cracking, skin splitting, the wounds on my back tearing open even worse as my body remakes itself.
My wolf is weak from my injuries, but he’s madder than ever, snarling and growling at my cousin as Lucan backs away. Blood pours down our back from the open wounds, dripping and streaming into the mud.
“I never wanted this cousin,” Lucan says sadly. “I hope you know that.”
My wolf rears back to pounce, but from the blood loss, torn muscles, and open wounds, he’s a fraction too slow.
A spear drives into our left side, painful and deep, crushing through our ribcage and not stopping until the pointed tip slices through vital organs.
My wolf tosses his head back and lets a gurgling, broken howl loose. The pain is crippling. Our hind legs give out.
Lucan steps forward with the knife in his clenched hand.
“We’ll honor you in the Great Hall,” he says with a heavy sigh. “I’ll have a mural painted of you.”
He shoves the knife into my wolf’s chest with a savage grunt and yanks it out. Our front legs collapse. Our head hits the wet mud with a slap.
Run, I beg him. Into the river.
The shifter behind me steps on my back with his boot and pulls the spear out with a grunt. He raises it to finish me off.
Now. Please…
With our last bit of energy, my wolf jumps to his feet and lunges into the cold raging river. The strong current yanks us away, practically drowning us in the process. We spin and flip and somersault under the current, the icy water filling my wolf’s lungs as he desperately tries to breathe.
Let me out, I tell him. I can swim better.
He doesn’t fight me at all. My wolf has never liked water.
I pull myself out and fight to the surface, kicking and swimming, no matter how painful each movement is. My head breaks through the surface, and I take a deep breath.
Lucan and his hooligan friends are in their wolf forms, running along the riverbank.
I’m not even trying to fight the current. There's too much of it and too little of me. I just let it take me, trying only to keep my head above the churning surface.
But then I hear it.
Low at first. But it gets louder. It roars savagely, deadly, inevitably.
The waterfall.
It’s higher than two castle towers stacked on top of one another.
And I’m heading straight for it.
I force my eyes open and see it approaching. The river just disappears in a cloudy mist.
It’s where my father went this morning. Over the edge. Into Ulissa.
He’ll be surprised to see me so soon.
Surprised or let down?
I don’t want to find out.
I dig in with everything I have as I’m dragged to the waterfall. My legs are like unmovable weights. My sides are screaming. Every stroke sends white-hot agony through my ribs.
Maybe I can get to the shore in time. Lucan and his friends will descend on me to finish the job, but maybe I can fight them off. It’s a better chance than the waterfall, which will surely kill me.
But after three agonizing strokes, I know it’s hopeless. The current is too strong. My arms are too weak. And the spot where the river disappears into the sky is quickly approaching.
Then, I see the tree.
A fallen trunk is resting over the river, caught on some rocks near the right bank. If I can only reach it…
I grit my teeth, putting every last bit of will and determination I have into swimming toward it. It’s my last chance. I drive my shredded body through the current by sheer determination and bloody refusal to give up.
I reach out as I fly by it, grabbing a thick branch. My body yanks to a stop, seconds away from the waterfall’s deadly edge.
The wolves catch up on the shore, growling and snarling as they paw the mud, waiting to finish me off.
I pull myself toward the shore, but the fallen tree isn’t as determined as I am. The root structure on the bank tears loose with a low, horrible groan.
“No,” I gasp as I feel the tree shift and slowly rotate.
The current picks up right where it left off, taking me and the tree along with it.
The roar becomes deafening.
The water quickens.
The edge arrives.
And then…
The world ends.