Rise of the Underdogs: JACOB

Ritual Kill

I growled, deep and throaty, as he spilled everything they had done to hurt my Mate. “Good guys? We’re the monsters under your bed and in your closet. We’re the darkness that threatens all when our people are in danger. We are the ones who hold the line when others falter. Make no mistake, Rogue, I’m pissed beyond all reasoning. See, I’m not the good guy you think I am.”

“Then what?” He asked, trying to inch away.

I held his collar, keeping him close as I ran a claw down his face. A line of red welled up, slowly trailing the line of his jaw. “You really don’t know?”

“I just enjoyed a stupid orphan of that blasted Arctic pack! No laws broken,” he wheezed.

“You raped my Mate! You desecrated her body, and that’s not all,” I said, my nails shifting into claws as I circled him like a Vulture hovers over a carcass. I rested a fully transformed hand on his shoulder, “You took what wasn’t yours, and we call that theft of agency. But what you don’t know? That’s the fun part, because hero’s would burn one person to save the world, but I’ll burn the world for my Mate.”

He shook his head, gasping as my grip tightened. “No! She doesn’t even have a pack!”

Anger gave way to calculation as I paused. Then, “No, but her kin are listed under the protection of the royal Werewolf family. They are scared to our world, but I won’t be telling you why. All you need to know is that you’ve confessed in front of one of the four Prince’s of the Werewolf realm: Alpha Logan Pierce. You’re also facing a ticked off Mate that happens to be equally as rare as my Mate’s heritage. I’m Delta Jacob Steven Grey, and you? You’re going to die for what you did to Ruby.”

“One of…”

“Actually, make that two of them,” I heard Logan mutter as Maria snickered. “Valik and I both represent House Dane of the Royal family.

Checkers gave way to Chess, and I was about to make my final play. An idea struck as I turned to glance at Maria. “Checkmate.”

Kaden took a step closer to the Gamma, his eyes wide as he understood the implications of my words. “Jake, no. Think of what Hunter would say if she got hurt.”

“Jake, yes,” Maria countered. “Think of how absolutely and divinely right it would be for him to die at the hands of one he perceives as weak. I hear your plan, and I accept, Delta Jacob. Let your elder pack-sister offer his life as sacrifice to the Great Mother and the Goddess’s Nix and Artemis. I invoke the deities who guard and guide us on the paths of shadows.”

I couldn’t help it. I smiled with predatory darkness as I released him and stepped back. “Alpha, I relent my claim to the kill.”

“And in your place?”

My smile turned twisted, dark. “I yield to a rank higher than my own. To a woman whose power holds sway over three realms. One who’s spells work in tandem with her wolf, sealed together by equally powerful Vampire blood, freely given and freely taken. She who stands with the grace and protection of all female deities previously invoked. Gamma Maria, Lady of the Sovereign Valencia family, I offer you the final kill.”

“You yield to the power of three? To the invocation of the Maid, Mother, and Crone?” She asked.

The ceremony of the handoff we were drilled on by our magically inclined mothers had already begun the moment Logan asked who I would chose to take my place. It was already unstoppable.

“I do.”

“Do you sanction this kill knowing that I, who walks between three worlds, will be the avenger of your Mates stolen virtue?” She asked, the third layer of the handoff settling.

Closing my eyes, I said, “I do.”

Kaden took a step toward us as Maria grasped both my hands in hers. “Guys, this is dangerous.”

“It was lethal before we got here,” I heard Valik snort. “They’re not about to make a stupid mistake, though. Jake and Maria are both of Witch and Werewolf blood, and she’s female. It makes sense to give her the kill seeing as he took advantage of a girl. Hurt a female, face a stronger one in battle. That’s the way of the Howlers.”

Kaden paled, his normally dark skin turning ashen. “I see. Jacob, as one born of Druid and Werewolf blood, I will stand as witness to this handoff of rights.”

Thunder rumbled overhead, flashes of lightening streaking the sky as rain once again threatened to pour from clouds so dark they hid the heavens.

“As one born of Werewolf and Vampire blood, I also stand as witness,” Logan stated, his voice like soft velvet covering the blades of Truth and Justice.

The wind picked up, ghostly howls through hallowed trees that made everything feel that much more ominous. Leaves rustled around us, tree trunks groaning and bending with the will of the elements.

Another rumble of thunder. Another streak of blue-white light as the wind picked up even more. The magic of the handoff ritual echoing in the night as the spirits that bound us to our magic recognized and blessed the ritual.

Maria inhaled deeply, “Do you, Delta Jacob Grey, agree to step into the role of observer without interference? To provide me the kill meant for you in honour of your fated Mate?”

“With all that I am, I do.” My response was the final line of the ritual.

Magic swirled, spiralling around me and Maria in shades of gray. Muted but powerful. Visually dull, but spiritually colourful. It was an unravelling and a binding all in one.

Together, facing each other as equals in power, we recited the last of the ritual as one voice. “We accept and honour this ritual binding and all it entails. As one steps back another steps up, and the journey of Justice shall still ring true. As we speak, so must we do. True honour bestowed to you. We end this ritual, so we say, so must it be.”

As the wind calmed, so did the magic. Not in a way that was shocking, but in a way that established peace deep in my bones. I felt my urge to kill transfer to Maria, saw the moment she understood the depth of the situation as it settled in her dark eyes.

“Now I understand the full extent of your pain, Jake,” she said, pressing her head to mine. “Be at peace, my pack-brother. I will see your Mate avenged.”

As I walked away, I smiled. I had just given the Rogue over to a woman who had yet to lose a fight. You see, our beloved Gamma was, by all accounts, the most unpredictable Witch-Wolf hybrid in the Howler pack. Even moreso than my sister Wynter.

I know. Crazy, right?

Then again, Maria was the only one able to keep Triple Trouble on a leash. One move, one word from her, and they were on their knees begging for mercy. A raised brow, the set of her mouth, a twitch of her hand – that’s all it took to make Wynter, Devon, and Samuel stand straight and stay out of trouble.

Well, for the most part.

While I helped dispatch the rest of the Rogues in a shower of blood, agonizing screams, and detached limbs, Maria released the bindings on the one who hurt Ruby the most. They circled each other in wolf form, two fighters aiming for something – one for freedom, the other ready to deliver a death blow. The splatter from my brother’s claws left bloody arcs across the sodden ground as he shredded the last one limb from limb.

Finally, the Rogue moved; leaping into the air as soon as the last of his companions fell in a broken heap. His foamed maw stretching wide as he already moved in for the kill.

Across from him, sitting calmly in all her regality, Maria remained still. Her eyes took in everything and nothing, wielding a power I hadn’t yet mastered—the kind that moved like water. She breathed like Gaia, the Great Mother herself: grounded, ancient, and unshakable. Her silence carried the weight of Nox, Goddess of Darkness, sharp and sovereign, the kind that made even vampires tread lightly. And when she moved, it was Artemis—pure instinct, lethal grace, the Hunt incarnate. Maria didn’t just invoke them. She was them. Cutting and brutal when it counted, gentle and healing when warranted, but otherwise still.

That’s what made her dangerous.

It was also why her position would never be removed. In the pack, she was Gamma. Within her home coven, the Breakwater coven, she was a Priestess. And inside her marital home in the mansion on Ruby Fang Vampire territory, she was Lady Maria. Someone who no one would dare to provoke.

The air shimmered as he landed, getting nothing but a mouthful of dirt. Shaking it off, he got back on his feet… paws. Whatever.

He whirled, searching for her. His eyes landed on me, on my smile of contented confirmation. He bolted toward me, only to be grabbed by his tail by the midnight black wolf that was Maria.

She dragged him back into the ring of firelight, chomping down and tearing his tail clean off as he yowled in agonizing pain. He limped away as she spat the appendage on the ground. Her eyes following every move, then, with a speed borne from a decade of training, she vanished from his sight.

The Rogue snarled as he searched frantically for her.

Me and the others watched in horrified awe as Maria left the shadows once again, striking with precision as she clamped down on the Rogue’s neck. Her grip was strong as she bore down on the back of his neck instead of the front. Bones shattered under the pressure while blood started seeping from his maw and the light began to dim in his eyes.

It was over. Ruby and Saffron were safe now.