****
Keira took slow, steady breaths, trying to slow down the rabbit-fast pounding of her heart. Knowing that in a matter of moments, she and Raul would stand against Harold and Reginald in a fight to the death, made her more anxious than she would have imagined even days before. If anyone tries to get between us… instinctive, animal anger boiled away inside of her as Keira took stock of all of the reasons for fighting: her mate, the destruction of her home, the child growing inside of her, the punishment that had been inflicted on both herself and Raul. More than enough reason to want them both dead.
Keira’s preternaturally acute hearing picked up the muffled, muted sounds of movement in the woods surrounding the clearing, and Keira glanced at Raul, looking to see if the wolf was as prepared as he claimed to be. The air was full of the scent of anger and fear—her own, Raul’s, and as more sounds of movement came to her, Keira realized that much of it was coming from the arriving panthers and wolves.
She could feel the transformation rippling along her bones, feel the animal nature rising, competing for dominance in her dual-natured brain. Keira stood absolutely still, with Raul beside her, both of them in an unquestionably challenging stance to confront their arriving groups. The elementals each led their delegations: Fintan the panthers and Tara the wolves; Keira saw the uncertainty, smelled the fear and the brittle gunpowder scent of impending rage on her own people. Half of them looked at her with contempt. She glanced at the wolves and noticed that both groups—wolf and panther—bore signs of the weeks-long battle that had raged between them: injuries made different members of the clan and the Pack limp, made them move less than silently. Scratches and gouges marked faces, arms, and legs.
The two Alphas separated themselves, following the elementals to the center of the clearing; Keira saw the loathing in both men’s faces, the determination and the bitterness. Maybe if the two of you hadn’t been such goddamn idiots, we wouldn’t all be here, Keira thought grimly. She knew—she couldn’t help but know—that she and Raul might both meet their death in a matter of mere moments.
“The elementals have decided,” Tara said, as soon as the milling, murmuring shifters fell silent.
“This war cannot go on,” Fintan added. “We are ending it tonight. Raul and Keira will face off against Harold and Reginald in challenge.”
“The battle will be to the death,” Tara said, her voice slightly sad to Keira’s ears. “If Raul and Keira win the challenge, they will assume leadership of the Clan and the Pack jointly.”
“If they die,” Fintan told the assembled group firmly, “Reginald and Harold will be held to account for their behavior separately.”
“Standard challenge rules apply, with one exception,” Tara said. “There will be no seconds—the Alphas will be each other’s seconds, just as Raul and Keira will be each other’s seconds.” The two elementals stepped back, and Keira felt a thrill of bitter amusement at the shock on the two Alphas’ faces; they hadn’t expected to have to work together, clearly.
“Let the challenge begin,” both elementals said at the same time. Keira went to her hands and knees immediately, willing the change that she had barely managed to restrain while she waited to work its way through her body. She groaned as her bones transformed and shifted inside of her, as her teeth sharpened and lengthened, and her fingers shortened, forming into paws, claws pushing through her skin. Next to her, she heard Raul’s moan of discomfort transform into a low, throaty howl.
In moments, they had both transformed; Raul’s wolfish form looked more gaunt, and hungrier, than his human shape, and Keira felt a surge of protectiveness for her mate. The two Alpha males announced the completion of their transformation, howling and snarling. Keira pushed back her fear and the sense of self-preservation that came with her pregnancy, and sidled closer to Raul.
For what seemed like an eternity, Keira and Raul circled Harold and Reginald, watching them. Keira could feel the pulse of her mate’s thoughts more strongly than she could the miasma of complicated emotions rippling through her clan, or the veiled, violent impulses in her Alpha’s mind. She felt the push of Raul’s mind, the subliminal hum breaking in a sudden jolt. Now.
As one, she and Raul launched themselves at the two Alphas; Keira lunged at Harold, growling low in her throat as she pressed the attack. She was both aware of and oblivious to Raul’s attack on Reginald; the connection between her mind and her mate’s lingered, a peripheral noise, important but not enough to distract.
Keira lost herself in the battle, biting and clawing, sidestepping and slinking, darting out of Harold’s range and pressing the attack again. She feinted, she parried, she lunged and clawed; a raking flash of pain lit along her side, but it was unimportant. More pressing was the sudden sharp prod at her hindquarters; Keira twisted and kicked out, breaking Harold’s cowardly hold on her.
Keira had no idea how long the battle raged; at some point, she and Raul switched positions—with her attacking Reginald and him going for Harold—and then they switched back. Searing, fiery pain cut through her animal thoughts, and in what felt at the same time like an instant and an hour, Keira knew she was becoming exhausted; the two Alphas had to be exhausted as well. Harold made one last, desperate lunge at her, coming in low. Keira ducked under his attack and upended him, knocking the older cat onto his back and pinning him by the throat, growling.
In the same moment, Raul finally brought Reginald down, and Keira reached out with her mind. We have to end this. She felt Raul’s agreement, but nonetheless, something inhibited her from biting down, from taking the deathblow and ending Harold’s life. For several long moments, she and Raul kept the two Alphas pinned; they both knew that they needed to finish the challenge—but neither of them was quite willing to kill the two Alphas.
Keira felt the impulse from Raul’s mind, and echoed it back to him. They each, at the same moment, disabled their opponents, and then pulled back. Exhausted, Keira let the change flow through her once more; claws retreated into her skin, fur disappeared, and her mouth took on human shape once more as she groaned. Unconscious, Reginald and Harold both slowly assumed their human forms, sprawled on the ground naked, and Keira and Raul slowly rose to their feet as the last parts of their animal forms melted away.
“There has been enough killing,” Raul said.
“Raul and I have proven our point,” Keira added, looking at the man she had come to love. Both of them turned to the elementals governing the fight; Fintan looked almost equally disappointed and intrigued, while Tara looked faintly hopeful.
“We’ve disabled both of them. We could have easily killed them,” Raul told the elementals, turning his gaze onto the Pack and the clan. “If that doesn’t prove our fitness to lead the groups, nothing will.”
“It was a challenge,” Fintan said firmly, crossing his arms over his chest. “You have not finished the challenge.” Keira glanced at Raul and felt his support in her mind.
“This whole mess between the clans erupted because of wolves and panthers killing each other,” Keira told the elemental.
“We agree on this: it is not the time to kill more of either of our kind,” Raul added.
“That’s all well and good,” Fintan said, his lips twitching with something that Keira thought might be amusement. “But our terms to you both were clear.” Keira looked at the two groups, holding each member’s gaze until they looked away. Next to her, she sensed Raul doing the same.
“Do any of you, in either group, want to challenge us?” Keira asked.
“The point of the challenge is to determine who is strongest,” Raul said—though Keira wasn’t sure whether he was speaking to the Elementals or the clans. “If a single one of you doubts that Keira and I are stronger than any member of either group, speak now or hold your peace.”
“Do any of you require the letter of the law to be followed?” Keira glanced at Fintan as he asked the question. No one in either her clan or Raul’s Pack spoke up. “Very well then. No challenge is forthcoming.” Fintan shrugged, looking disappointed.
“How will you handle the two disgraced Alphas?” Keira looked at Tara.
“They are exiled,” Keira said. She took Raul’s hand in her own and gave it a squeeze. “They will have exactly two days to leave town. A second past that deadline and they will be killed on sight without hesitation.”
“How are we supposed to bring the groups together?” Keira noticed that the question had come from a member of Raul’s Pack; Raul’s mind, mingled with hers, identified the source as his second, Cam.
“That is for Keira and Raul, the new leaders of the combined group, to decide,” the Elementals said, speaking as one.
“We’ve had too much distrust between us for too long,” Raul told the group. “Too many secrets, too much hatred. Keira and I are calling a new law right now: the next person to raid a panther or a wolf will be brought to justice.”
“If anyone kills or injures any member of the other clan, they will be challenged,” Keira said. She flashed her teeth in an expression that wasn’t quite a smile. “If you’re going to come up against us, you’d better find a damn good second to do it with.”
“Keira and Raul have proven that they are stronger than the strongest members of their respective clans,” Fintan told the two groups.
“If anyone goes against their rule without following the proper channels, they will be punished,” Tara added.
“We will hold the allegiance ceremony in three days’ time,” Raul told the two clans. “Keira and I both expect to see every one of you there. If you will not give us your allegiance, you will leave this town.”
The two groups looked uncertain, and unsettled, but Keira knew that she and Raul had made the right choice; she looked out over the assembled group of shifters, and held each gaze in turn, asserting herself over every member of the community that had come to the challenge. She knew that there would be more battles to come—that there would be unrest from both groups as she and Raul brought them together—but Keira knew that she and Raul could handle anything that either the clan or the pack could dish out. They had survived, and stayed bonded, in spite of such long odds that it seemed to Keira that nothing would ever separate them; in the back of her mind, she felt the pulse of Raul’s agreement.
That was all she needed.
THE END