Merciless Heir (Merciless Alphas #3)

Prologue

MAGNUS

The moon was full tonight. Huge, bright, giving off a cold light, with its stolen illumination. The moon's sole warmth came from the sun. Even then, it could only raise the temperature a fraction of a degree. Its warmth was negligible. Giving almost nothing.

"What is the price for treason?" My father's voice was full of warmth. Where the moon gave cold borrowed light, Fenrir Blackwood was fire.

As a boy, I had called for him in the dark when the monsters came.

He never told me that there were no monsters.

As Alpha of the Blackwood pack, he knew better than most what lived in the dark.

He would come to stand at the edge of my bed.

His voice would arrive first, warm as a fire. The monsters would go quiet.

Tonight, a man bound and kneeling on the snow-covered ground, did not go quiet. The dark hood over his head shuddered where his mouth would be as he took a deep breath to speak. "Alpha, I — I made a mistake. One mistake. I swear it won't happen again."

I breathed in the cold December air, realizing this task was going to take longer than expected.

We were going to miss the previews, which was Ingrid's favorite part of the movie.

At sixteen, my favorite part of going to a dark theater was seeing how long I had to wait after the lights went down to slip my hand up her skirt.

For me, the previews were foreplay. This traitor not answering my father's direct question was cutting into my make-out time.

"Magnus."

My attention snapped from beneath my girlfriend's skirt and back to my father. "Yes, sir."

"What is the price for treason?"

“Death, sir. And the forfeiture of all assets.”

My tone was devoid of warmth. I had been told the answer to that question once, years ago.

I had listened the first time. Having to repeat a lesson was an insult to the teacher.

Every wolf in the Blackwood pack knew the price of treason.

Hell, it was in the human constitution. This traitor had known pack law, and he had chosen, anyway.

Which meant he also chose the consequences of his actions.

Those actions being a claw to the throat.

Though with how much this guy was going on at the mouth, he'd likely take forever to croak, which would definitely make me miss the movie trailers.

Still, I knew my place. I stood three paces behind my father, my hands clasped behind my back, my spine a rigid line of Blackwood steel. I was his heir. This would be my job one day, though I would definitely make a kill such as this swift.

"You knew the consequences of your actions, Silas," my father was saying.

"Please, Fenrir. My wife. My little girl. Think of Ingrid."

My head came up from glancing at my watch. The full moon found my face. Its cold light fell on me with complete, unblinking attention. No shadows. Nowhere to look that wasn't illuminated.

My father ripped the hood off the man on the ground.

His face was a map of bruises. His breathing was a wet, ragged sound that made my own lungs ache.

Silas Vargas was the man who had taught me how to track a scent through a storm.

He was also the man whose daughter was currently in the back of a movie theater three towns over, waiting for a date who would not show up.

Silas looked up. His eyes darted past my father. They landed on me. There was a desperate, silent plea in them. He knew I was going to see her tonight. He thought that was his life insurance.

My father's eyes glowed with a faint, predatory amber. He reached out, his hand heavy and steady on my shoulder. It was a gesture of affection, a father’s pride. It felt like a lead weight. “You’ve been distracted lately, Silas. Wanting things that aren't on your path.”

In the black curtain of the night, the stars held their positions. Much like the wolves around the clearing, watching, waiting. The clearing felt like a darkened classroom. This wasn't Silas's lesson. It was mine.

"You stole from my family. From the mouths of my children. Did you think about that when you made your arrangement with the Volki?"

Silas made a sound that was not a word.

"You should have thought about your own family before you decided to betray mine.

Because that is what you have done, Silas.

You have condemned them. Your wife, your daughter.

The pack will not believe either of them ignorant of your actions.

I do nothing without my wife's knowledge.

Nothing. There is not a decision of consequence I have made in decades that Mei Ling did not know about before I made it.

Because she is my partner and my pack and my family.

A man who keeps secrets from his family is a man who has already betrayed them. "

My father turned back to Silas. He didn't shift fully—that would be too merciful, too quick. Instead, the bones in his hand cracked and elongated. Thick, black fur sprouted from his knuckles; claws as long as steak knives slid from his fingertips with a metallic schtick.

Silas opened his mouth to plea or scream. The sound was cut short. The strike was clinical, a horizontal sweep that tore through the soft tissue of his throat.

I didn't flinch. I watched the blood spray the white snow, steaming in the cold moonlight. I watched the life go out of Silas’s eyes while he was still looking at me.

My father wiped his claws on the grass. The shift receded until he was just a man in a Barbour jacket again. He clapped me on the back. The copper scent of blood clung to him like a second skin.

"Do you need me to tell the girl and her mother?" Fenrir asked.

"No, sir. I'll handle it."

He knew that I'd been sneaking off to see her. Of course, he knew. He was the alpha. And, like the good little heir that I was, I only had to be told once.

“Good boy,” he said, his voice genuinely kind.

Fenrir started walking back toward the SUV, then paused. “Your mother has been talking to the Lobo pack. Sorsha Lobo has a daughter—Rosalind. She’s young yet, but the contract has been signed. You’ll have years to sow your wild oats, Magnus. Play with whatever toys you find. But remember…”

He looked at me over his shoulder, the moon catching the early gray in his beard.

“Blackwood men are loyal to their wives. Family first.”

"Yes, sir."