Mated to the Berserkers

Chapter 1-2

Much later I stood guard over our beloved while Samuel was gone. I watched her sleep, noting the fall of raven dark hair, the cheeks pale as moonlight.

Mine, said the wolf, and I wanted to agree. She was ours in every way we could make her. We’d bought her from her family a few moons ago, and kept her in our lair, away from the pack. She seemed to accept us. We brought her news of her remaining family--her three sisters thrived in the village. Two moons ago her mother died, we brought her the news. Samuel asked if she wanted to see the grave and Brenna shook her head no.

She’d left her old life, for us. And every time we claimed her, we felt we’d come home. But did she truly belong here?

She is ours. Samuel felt my uncertainty and spoke through the bond.

For as long as we keep her. I reminded him.

Why would we ever let her go?

I sent him the memory of hunting the buck earlier. It happened again. I almost lost control of the beast.

Silence. Samuel did not want to acknowledge that what we feared most might happen--the very beast Brenna soothed might rage again.

The Berserker rage was legendary on the battlefield. Many kings used it to gain power. In times of peace, the beast craved bloodshed. The magic that made us wolves carried a taint, and would drive us to madness. That was the price of our great power.

Brenna didn’t know any of this. She didn’t know several of the pack had succumbed to the beast and met their fate. When the beast took their mind, Samuel was waiting. More than a few had died, necks snapped and bodies flung off the mountain by the raging Alpha. Not because his control broke; because theirs did. Samuel protected the pack, even from its own members. But there was only so much he could do to keep the taint from spreading. We were warriors seasoned with many battles, but could not win the war for our minds. Before we’d consulted the witch to find Brenna, we were losing.

I remembered the nights when the beast howled for blood…

Tell me what happened, Samuel said finally. How did you regain control?

I caught our beloved’s scent.

Just as the runes foretold. She soothes the beast.

I reached out and ran a finger over our beloved’s smooth cheek. Her skin was so soft, so sweetly scented. Tonight she smelled like moonlight on the snow, and secrets kept deep in the earth…things no man had words for, things that only a wolf would understand.

My hand closed around her neck. Her pulse beat against my palm.

Both Samuel and I feared the day she’d wake and discover who we truly were. Not just werewolves, but Berserkers, cursed with tainted magic. We told Brenna not to fear the wolf, but never mentioned what she truly should fear: the beast.

She’d seen us in wolf form, but she hadn’t seen the beast. Not even close.

Did she know when we took her, hard and fast, without thought, what monster lurked in our minds? Did she sense how much the beast wanted to hurt her?

My fingers closed over her throat. Once I had almost lost control. It could never happen again.

We cannot keep hiding the beast from her, Samuel’s thought echoed across the bond. I snatched my hand away guiltily. She will meet it, one way or another.

Nay, it’s too dangerous. This was why we’d spent centuries alone.

If she is to be our mate, she needs to meet the pack, learn our ways. We can’t keep her inside forever.

But, I struggled to put my feelings into words. What if she meets the beast, and can no longer love us?

Can she truly love us, if she doesn’t know what we are?

The beast does not love. It will try to destroy her.

I held my breath until Samuel answered, Pray that it does not succeed.