Chapter 16 #2
The storm matches my rhythm. Lightning when I need it. Wind when it helps. Rain that blinds my enemies while my storm-enhanced senses cut through it like it's not even there.
Above me, thunder roars in time with my own wolf's snarl. Are we making that sound together? I can't tell anymore where I end and the storm begins.
One of Connor's wolves—a brown male with military precision—breaks past my guard and hits the inn's door. Wood splinters. I hear Nessa scream inside.
White-hot fury floods me. Not my human rage or my wolf's aggression. Something deeper. Primal. The Storm Alpha defending his territory, his pack, his mate, an innocent child.
I shift one last time.
But this shift is different. My form doesn't stabilize into wolf or human.
I'm something else, something in between and beyond.
My body crackles with electricity, fur standing on end as lightning plays across my skin.
My eyes glow with storm-light. Wind whips around me in a vortex that tears at clothing and fur alike.
I am not Declan in human form.
I am not the black wolf.
I am the living storm.
The brown wolf freezes, his eyes wide with primal fear. Every wolf here feels it—the presence of something greater, something wild and ancient and unstoppable.
I let the lightning strike through me.
It doesn't hurt. It feels right, like breathing. The bolt forks from the sky, channels through my body, and explodes outward in a wave of concussive force. Every enemy wolf within twenty feet is blown backward, stunned and smoking.
The rain falls harder, responding to my will. It's not random now. It's a weapon. Sheets of water slam into Connor's people with the force of a fire hose, driving them back, making them slip and stumble.
I advance on the inn, this storm-form moving with fluid grace. No one challenges me. No one dares.
Inside, I hear Eliza's voice: "Stay down, Nessa. Don't look."
My radio—somehow still functional despite everything—crackles with Tessa's voice: "Declan, we lost the western cove. Finn got Grayson out, but the earth-warden is dead. Connor succeeded there."
No!
"North?" I demand, my voice layered with thunder.
"Rafe couldn’t hold it. The druid-blood fell."
"South?"
"Kian's still engaged, but he's fighting a losing battle."
Five seals broken now. Connor needs just one more death plus Eliza—the Fae-blood in the south or Nessa here in the village.
And Eliza. Always Eliza, the keystone that holds everything together.
I turn to face the remaining wolves. They're regrouping, calculating. They know they're losing here, but Connor's probably promised them fortunes. Enough to risk a Storm Alpha who's stopped holding back his power.
One of them—a lean grey female with scars across her muzzle—takes a step forward. Tests my resolve.
I let the thunder roll, low and continuous. The ground trembles with it.
She backs down.
"Leave." My voice carries across the courtyard, human words wrapped in storm-sound. "Tell Connor he failed here. Tell him this village is under my protection, and any wolf who crosses that line again won't walk away."
For a long moment, nobody moves.
Then Tessa's voice explodes through the radio: "South fallen! Kian's down, I can't reach him. The fae-blood carrier...” Static. “...dead. Repeat, the fae-blood is dead. Six seals broken!"
Six seals. All Connor needs is Eliza..
The wolves in front of me hear it too. See my attention split. The grey female's eyes gleam with renewed determination. She's calculating whether she can reach Nessa before I can stop her.
I bare my teeth—not quite human, not quite wolf. "Don’t even try it."
A vehicle engine roars in the distance. Retreating. Connor's people at the southern peninsula are pulling out now that they've succeeded.
My radio crackles again: "Jax here. Docks secured. Some damage, but fires contained. Where do you need me?"
"Village," I snap. "Now."
But I can already feel the enemy wolves' resolution crumbling. They came for an easy target, not a Storm Alpha who can call lightning. Not whatever the hell I've become, standing here wreathed in rain and wind and power that makes the air itself bend.
One by one, they back away. Then turn. Then run.
I hold my ground until they're gone, until I can't sense any hostile presence within half a mile. Only then do I let the storm-form dissolve, shifting back to human. My legs nearly give out from exhaustion.
Jax arrives seconds later, human and covered in someone else's blood. He takes one look at me—naked, shaking, rain-soaked—and tosses me his jacket.
"You all right?"
"No." I pull the jacket on. "Connor won. Three locations—North, South and West. Six seals broken."
"But not here. Not the village."
Small comfort when people died today while I was splitting my focus, trying to be everywhere at once.
The inn's door opens. Eliza appears, Nessa clutched in her arms, the little girl's face buried against Eliza's shoulder. Moira Flynn stands behind them, her expression shell-shocked but grateful.
"You saved her," Eliza says quietly. Our bond thrums with her relief, her love, her terror at how close we came to losing.
I cross to her, to them. Cup Nessa's small head gently. "You're safe now. I promise."
But even as I say it, I know it's not true. Connor has broken six seals. He only needs one more death to complete his ritual—and then he'll come for the woman I love, the seal she strengthened, the final key.
My phone buzzes in Jax's discarded jacket. A text from an unknown number. I open it, and ice floods my veins.
A photo. The standing stones. And carved into the largest stone in letters still wet with blood:
One more to go, Storm Alpha.
I show it to Eliza. Watch her face go pale. Watch her jaw set with determination.
"Let him come," she says quietly. "We'll be waiting."
But as we head back to Clifftop House, the storm finally clearing overhead, one thought circles in my mind like a predator:
Connor’s forces just killed three people in a coordinated strike that we couldn't stop despite our best efforts.
And next time, he's coming for the woman I love.
How do I stop someone who's already proven he's faster, smarter, and more ruthless than I am?
How do I protect her when he's willing to sacrifice everything to win?
I don't have answers.
But I'm going to find them.
Before it's too late.