Rogue Rage

Chapter 11

Samuel huffed once we were down the mountain. Maddock and Keith were nowhere in sight, though I was sure Samuel would be able to sniff them out. I shouted for him to go north, edging toward the base of the mountain. I didn’t need to find Keith so much as I needed to show Samuel where Damian was located. I couldn’t speak to him, but I had a suspicion that Samuel and I were thinking the same thing. He rushed on, and after an hour of running, we were within sight. I hopped off when Samuel stopped. Night had fallen. The entire day was gone.

“There is a small field. They’ll be in the trees watching,” I whispered to Samuel. “I doubt Keith has made it here yet. Do you smell him?” Samuel sniffed the air and looked back at me. I assumed that was a “no”; otherwise, he would have growled or given me some kind of sign.

If I had gotten here before Keith, I could simply walk in. The only questions would be about my rapid return.

“We really didn’t think this through,” I said, peeking at the camp from behind a tree. I looked back at Samuel. “We can’t take on the camp. All we can do is try to stop Keith before he gets too close.”

Samuel shifted and turned to me. “Do you know where the watchmen are?”

“Yeah. Why?”

“Get as close as you can to Damian’s tent without being spotted. If Keith comes in from another direction, you can get the intel on where they plan to move next.”

A knot bunched in my stomach. I looked back at the camp. “You want me to go in there and wait for them to decide they want to hunt me?”

“Just get the information and get out. We’ll cover you in mud, so they won’t catch your scent.” He said it with so much confidence. I couldn’t tell if he was sure I would get caught or sure I wouldn’t. I swallowed the bile rising in the back of my throat. Maybe this was the least I could do. I had done this a million times to other packs. This was no different.

I didn’t have the nerve to speak, so I simply nodded and crouched low. Running from tree to tree, I had never been happier to have such strong eyesight in the dark. I was able to evade the guards in the trees. Most of them didn’t take their jobs too seriously anyway. My scent here wouldn’t faze them until Keith attached my name to it. I made my way to the bathing creek. No one would be there at this time of night. I put my hand into the mud at the edge of the creek and scooped up handfuls, smearing it all over my body. I made sure I was completely covered before moving on.

Once I reached the huts, I shuffled through the narrow back paths behind them. Finally, I came across Damian’s. His hut was the hardest to get around. It sat facing the rest of the camp. Paranoia would be putting it mildly—although, I supposed it was no longer paranoia, considering I was spying on him now.

There was almost no one out tonight. A few males lay drunk around a fire pit. I still didn’t want to get caught by any of them. A drunk wolf was still a wolf I couldn’t fight off. The usual mix of scents was almost nonexistent tonight. I was grateful for that. With so few people about, I was able to sneak around the back without detection. Flattening myself against the ground, with my ear pressed against the thick material of Damian’s hut, I heard a female moaning and was almost grateful that he was too occupied to pay attention to anything happening around him.

It didn’t take long before the camp shifted. At first, it was only a distant snap of branches beyond the outer ring of trees, so faint I might have imagined it. Then came the unmistakable thunder of paws tearing through dry leaves. A wolf was charging hard, fast enough that the watchmen hissed warnings from their perches but too late to stop him. My stomach dropped. Keith. It had to be Keith, and from the sound of it, he had come in from the wrong side. Not from the path Samuel guarded. Not from the direction I had risked everything to cover. I pressed myself flatter against the dirt behind Damian’s hut, mud drying tight across my skin, my ear pinned to the thick hide wall.

The scent of smoke, sweat, stale wine, and incense crawled through the seams and turned my stomach. Inside, the female went silent. Damian cursed under his breath. Keith’s steps slowed, then changed—claws scraping earth one moment, bare feet the next. He had shifted. Usually, Keith would announce himself before entering Damian’s hut, but whatever courtesy he still possessed had died somewhere on the mountain. The flap opened. Closed. A sharp feminine gasp cut through the air, then vanished as if someone had swallowed it whole. I waited for Keith to spill everything, to say my name, to point Damian’s rage toward me. Instead, the only sound was movement outside the hut—more footsteps gathering, more bodies drawing close, the quiet pull of weapons being lifted from the dirt. No one spoke. That was what scared me most.

Nearly a full five seconds passed before the hut came down. I was half covered by the hut hide and the other half watched Keith and Damian hashing it out in wolf form. Then I saw a Jace covering herself with a sheet. s**t. Keith charged Damian over and over again. Damian’s skill would have helped if Keith wasn’t in a complete rage. Damian had the upper hand for a moment but lost in a moment when Keith got a clean shot at Damian’s throat and went for it.

“No! Stop! Don’t hurt him!” Jace ran up and punched Keith in the snout. He released Damian’s throat. Three other wolves shifted and surrounded Keith. He was having a brutal night. In that moment, I could only imagine the betrayal tearing through him—from me, from Damian, and now from Jace. He stepped toward her, but Damian moved in front of him, cutting him off and only enraging him further.

Damian then shifted and faced Keith. “You will not go near my unborn child.”

Keith snarled, the sound raw enough to scrape against my bones. It was not the mindless fury of a rabid wolf. It was grief. Betrayal. A mate watching the woman he loved hide behind the very monster he had sacrificed everything to serve. Jace clutched her full belly and half disappeared behind Damian’s shoulder, her face pale, her eyes wet and wide with terror—but not only terror of Keith. I saw it then, the awful fracture inside her. Part of her still knew Keith. Part of her still loved him. But the larger part, the part Damian had fed and praised and poisoned since she was young, reached for safety in the wrong direction. Keith stepped back as if the sight of her behind Damian had struck harder than any claw could. Then Damian lifted his chin and gave the order to attack. Keith hesitated for one broken heartbeat before survival won. He turned and ran. Every wolf but Damian lunged after him.

Damian did not even watch them disappear into the trees. His attention shifted to Jace with a tenderness so practiced it made my stomach turn. He cupped her cheek as if rewarding a frightened child, brushing his thumb beneath her eye where a tear had gathered. “You did well recruiting him,” he said softly, almost lovingly. “But his heart was never truly in the cause. He loved you more than he loved what we’re building, and weakness like that spreads if we allow it to live.”

Jace caught his hand before he could lower it and pressed it against her cheek, clinging to him like he was the only solid thing left in the world. The devotion in her face was cracked at the edges, but still there—desperate, hungry, and terrible to witness. She kissed his palm, then nodded as if she could force herself to believe the words if she said them clearly enough. “I know. I choose you, Damian.” Her voice trembled on Keith’s name, though she never spoke it.

Damian’s grin widened, slow and satisfied. He turned her toward the hut she had shared with Keith, his hand settling possessively at the small of her back. “Good girl,” he murmured. “Now come show me how grateful you are for my love.” Jace obeyed, one hand still curled protectively over her belly, and I stayed trapped beneath the fallen hide, barely breathing, with the sick certainty that Keith had not been the only one Damian had broken beyond recognition.

I crawled out the moment I heard movement inside the hut. My name had not come up, but that did little to calm me. Once Damian emerged, he would start questioning Keith’s sudden arrival. Then he would notice I was missing. Getting out would be harder than getting in. Before, I had known where everyone was. Now they were scattered through the forest, and the only thing I could be sure of was that none of them had gone toward Samuel.

My heartbeat pounded in my ears, too loud, too fast, like it might give me away before my feet did. Fear crawled up my throat and nearly choked me. If anyone saw me now—covered in mud, shaking, sneaking away from Damian’s collapsed hut—I was dead. No explanation would save me. No lie would be quick enough. The place where I had left Samuel felt impossibly far, like the forest had stretched itself just to trap me in the dark. Every snap of a twig made me freeze. Every shift of leaves sounded like paws turning in my direction. Breathe. Just breathe. It only feels farther because you’re scared. He’s there. He has to be there. Almost there.