Callyn
I groan. My head hurts. What happened? Where am I? I slowly open my eyes and blink at the harsh lights overhead. I’m lying on the ground. I move my hand feeling carpet beneath my fingers. Okay, I’m on the floor somewhere.
“Oh, good. You’re finally awake.”
Wait...I know that voice. I turn my head to the side to see Elders Greaves and Caine. It’s then that I recognize I’m in the Council chambers. I slowly lift myself into a sitting position. I take a moment for the dizziness to fade before I completely stand.
“Why am I here? What do you want?”
“Callyn, you really are such a stupid girl. Did you think that we would ever let you become queen?” Elder Greaves sneers.
Kelsey walks forward with a smirk on her face. “I’m going to be queen.” Elder Caine’s maniacal laughter cut her off before she could say anything else.
“We were never going to let you become queen either, Kelsey. We played you like the fool you are.” Kelsey's face drops, then contorted with rage. “You are so blinded by your hatred for Callyn that you didn’t even see what we were doing right under your nose. No, we were never going to give you any kind of power. You couldn’t have become queen anyways. There is not a drop of royal blood in your body,” Elder Caine says with a curl of his lip. Kelsey narrows her eyes at him then lets out a hiss.
“Get mad all you like, it doesn’t change the facts. We played you. You were just a pawn in our bigger plan. By happy circumstance you ended up with visions.” Elder Greaves turns and looks at me. “We got to her before Elder Harris did. We know he’s on your side, and we couldn’t let him convince her and her parents to keep her visions quiet. No, we wanted people to know what she is and what you are. These last couple of months everything that has happened to you is because we made it so.”
The more they talk, the angrier that I’m getting. “Why is the North Pack here?”
“We started hatching our plans the moment your boys came to us and said that they all shared one mate. We knew who you were from the very beginning. We tried to delay telling your boys anything because we were setting things into motion. See, there are some of us who don’t want to go back to the way things were. It wasn’t hard to convince others of the same. It also helped that we promised them the things that they wanted most out of life.”
I let out a gasp, knowing where he was going with this. “You never had any intention of paying them, because you don’t plan on them surviving.”
“Maybe you’re not as dumb as you look. The North Pack is here to aid in our plans.” He looks at the clock on the wall. “Right about now, your boys should be walking right into the trap we laid. I’m sure the North Pack is keeping them…” he flourishes his hand, “entertained, shall we say. You should also know I don’t plan on letting you leave this room. If by some chance those boys of yours survive, actually I hope they do, that way I can drop your lifeless form at their feet.”
I need to get out of here and warn the guys, but how? Wait.
Graydon.
Callie? Where are you? We’ve been trying for an hour to get ahold of you.
In the Council chambers. Listen, this is a trap. They brought the North Pack here to kill everyone. Kelsey got one over on me again. I was passed out until about five minutes ago.
A little late for that warning. We figured that out. There is a full blown fight going on out here.
What? Are you guys okay? Where are you?
We’re okay...for now. We need help. We’re out near the Michaelson's. Let the others know where you are.
Listen, if I don’t make it out of here… I just want you to know that I love you.
Don’t you fucking dare talk like that. You fight Callie. Do you hear me? You shift and you peck their god damn bodies apart if you have too. You can tell me that you love me in person.
I’ll try. I’ll fight until I can’t anymore. I love you.
I send each of the others the same message and got similar responses from them. I’ll fight or die trying. I turn my attention back to the Elders.
“See, that’s where you’re wrong. I have every intention of leaving this room.”
“Do you really think that you’re any match against us? You really are foolish.”
I shrug my shoulders. “Maybe, but I have something to fight for, and it will be over my dead body before I continue to let you rule over the shifters.”
“You have no way of surviving. It’s one against three.”
“Actually, I think you need to revise those numbers.” I look over at the door where the new voice comes from and there stands Cat and Elder Harris. When they step forward more people file into the room. Among them were each of the boys’ parents, some teachers at school, even some students. “You are now severely outnumbered. It’s a shame that you sent all of your followers elsewhere.”
Elder Greaves growls. There is no way they can win this fight, and they know it. “You might have won this round, but this is far from over.” Both, him and Elder Caine shift and take off like a bat out of hell.
“Callyn, are you alright?” Elder Harris questions.
“I will be. How did you know where I was?”
“Fortunately, someone saw Kelsey take you. They followed you here, and got ahold of Cat, who in turn told her parents. They told the person who followed you here, to keep an eye out and to not make a sound, and that help would be on the way. Your aunt noticed that you never came back in after answering the door. She got ahold of all the boys’ parents, and they got ahold of me. From there it just spiraled.”
“Speaking of Kelsey, where is she? She was just here,” I question.
“She took off the second she saw us standing here,” Cat answered.
“We can’t let her get away with this.”
“We won’t but it will be hard to get to her. The Taylors can buy their way out of almost everything. Getting back on track, as quickly as I could I called as many people as I could and in turn everyone did the same. I had suspected something was going on, it may have taken me a little bit at first, but then I saw the signs. You have a lot of people behind you Callyn. You will need more, but this is the first step. You know Greaves and Caine will be trying to gather more followers. We need to do the same.”
I nod my head, then I remembered I left the boys hanging. “Crap, we have to go and help the guys. They are being ambushed at the Michaelson's.” I rush out of room and through the building. I don’t waste any time before I shift, and I’m in the air. Flying is faster than going by car. I need to get to them now.
Hang-on guys I’m coming. I send to all of them.
Graydon
I knew something was off with having the North Pack in town. The second we pulled into the drive we were surrounded by its members, with Owen in the center. I knew he was trouble and no surprise Kelsey’s boyfriend is standing next to him. I feel stupid for not putting it together sooner. Callie isn’t the only one who got lured into a trap. Though to be fair, we knew this was more than likely what was going to happen.
When we got that message an hour ago telling us to meet them here or they would kill Callie, there was no other option for me. I was coming here whether the others wanted to or not. No way was I going to stand back and let my mate possibly be tortured, again. We tried calling her and each of us tried to talk to her telepathically. Nothing. We knew something was wrong. Callie would have answered us back by now, if she could. We need to find her, now! As soon as the truck is in park, none of us waste time getting out. I don’t see her.
Where is she? You would think they would be parading her out in front of us, gloating. Then it happens. I hear from her, and it’s to tell me that she might die and that she loves me. I growl. She’s not even here. She better make it out alive, or I’m tearing everyone who hurt her apart limb by limb. It’s game on now.
“I see you got our message,” Owen says as he steps forward.
“Where’s Callie?” Trying to play this off like we don’t know that she isn’t here.
“About that. She’s having a nice little visit with the Elders Greaves and Caine. Well, it might not be so nice. The poor thing is probably dead by now,” he says with smile.
“You better pray that she isn’t.”
“That’s all part of their plan. She dies, you all die, they completely take over and change the rules. No more hiding in the shadows. No, you see, the Elders want to take over and put the humans in their place. It’s about time shifters take over. The whole world is going to know about us and do our bidding.”
“And what did they promise you?” Lucian questions.
“Power and authority.”
I couldn’t help it, I laugh. Which only seemed to piss them off. Good, they’ll make a mistake.
“What do you find so funny?”
“That you actually believed what they told you. They sent you here to die. If you do make it out of here alive, the second the humans become aware of our existence, they will hunt us down and kill us.” This time they laugh.
“Have you taken a look around? There are more of us than there are of you. You don’t stand a chance. I’m not worried about the pathetic and weak humans. They’re no match against us.”
This guy is completely nuts. Does he not realize that humans have weapons? One shot and he’s dead. I don’t like my odds about that. I hear the whisper of Callie’s voice in my mind.
Hang-on guys, I’m coming.
I hope you’re bringing help.
I am. Just stall a little longer.
How the hell am I supposed to do that?
Maximus
I’m on my way with help. Help Graydon stall.
How?
I don’t know, anything will do. I just need a few more minutes.
You got it, angel.
“You guys are just puppets on a string to the Elders,” Graydon says. “They don’t give a shit about you.”
Okay, I don’t think making them angry is the best way to stall them, but maybe we can keep them talking.
“What did they say to convince you to take on the Alpha Queen and her mates in the first place? I mean not to toot my own horn but we’re like really powerful.”
“Didn’t you know, Max. It’s easy to manipulate the simple minded. There is no way they could have come up with this on their own,” Graydon says egging them on.
They growl. “Enough of this. It doesn’t matter what they told us because you’re not going to live long enough to care.” In the span of a blink of an eye, they shift.
Now, when I say I tried hard not to laugh, I actually mean I didn’t try, at all. It was comical. I didn’t realize how big my wolf looked next to others. We don’t shift that often. Their wolves are downright puny looking next to mine. Wait until they get a load of how big Graydon’s bear is, they’ll run with their tails tucked between their legs.
The only downside is, I’m laughing too much to notice that one of them has lunged at me. The wolf lands on top of me, and I barely manage to throw my arms up to protect my face and neck. Now, I’m pissed. I shove the wolf off of me and quickly shift. The dirt feels good under my paws. The wolf was quick to regain its balance.
I saw the slight hesitation before he lunges again. This time I was ready for him. I roll to my back and use my claws to rake down his belly, leaving deep gouges behind. I’m back on my paws in an instant. I turn to face him down, but he doesn’t move from where he lands. I make my way over and tower over him and he lets out a whimper. Like I would show him any mercy. No, instead I clamp my jaw around his neck and bite hard, tearing his throat out in the process.
I back away from his lifeless body and look around me. Graydon is in his bear form slinging animals around left and right. God, I almost feel bad for them, but hay, you want to be stupid enough to take on an animal four times your size, go for it. Zeke is in his wolf form currently trying to defend himself against a tag team of coyote shifters. Lucian is holding his own, in his fox form against a hyena shifter.
There doesn’t seem to be as many shifters here as when this first started. Since Graydon and Lucian are doing fine on their own, I’m making my way over to help Zeke when I hear the first squawk. The second was louder and closer. Callie just drops out of the sky and lands in the middle of all us. Swooping in like a red and yellow avenging angel. Have I mentioned how glorious her phoenix form is? Because she really is a sight to behold. Her phoenix isn’t some little bird either. She’s almost as big as Graydon’s bear.
She lets out this ear piercing screech and flaps her wings a couple of times before pulling them back to rest against her body. She causes just enough of a distraction that I hear cars pulling up the drive. It wasn’t long before there was enough shifters behind me to help take on those here. They were the first to move. One of the panther shifters dives right for Callie’s leg. Callie screeches before turning her head to the panther who was now clamped on her leg.
I don’t think I’ll ever get the sight of Callie pecking the shifter to death out of my head. By all means it didn’t bother me. I just never seen something like that, and I was not expecting that from my own mate. But, get it Callie. I would have whooped in my human form, but since I’m still in wolfy form, I howl. Zeke quickly follows, then a yipping noise from Lucian, and a roar from Graydon. The other shifters behind me follow suit, all of them standing up for their queen.