Alpha's Fate (Black Moon Saga Book 2)

Chapter 23-2: The Mating Ceremony

Don’t make the first move, Kylie projects to as many of her allies’ minds as she can reach in that moment. She worries that this is a trap meant to start the war before they’re ready. Many of their supply caches and medical supplies haven’t even arrived yet. Despite the threatening appearance of so many of Black Moon’s troops and allies arriving here all at once, technically they haven’t done anything wrong unless they start hurting people. This is, after all, a public gathering. At best, they can be apprehended and forced through proper vetting procedures.

Most of her allies are used to her connecting with their minds or at least aware that it is something that she can do, but Eramund is startled to suddenly hear her voice in his head. It’s not something he has ever experienced before with anyone.

Among the enemy intruders, Kylie spots a man who looks like her father, though she immediately realizes he doesn’t feel like her father. He spies her only seconds after she first sees him and begins to make his way to her. Kylie can sense her companions gathering protectively around her and feels Adam’s hold on her tighten.

A smile stretches across the man’s face as he approaches, but then it morphs into an expression of confusion.

“Regina?” he questions, stepping nearer to get a better look. “No, you’re not, are you. You’re her daughter. And you look … oh, it all makes sense now,” he rambles as he realizes who the girl before him truly is.

“Patrick,” Alpha Clayton greets him with a curt nod. “I appreciate your interest in my mating ceremony, though I must say, I’m not a fan of your chosen means of entrance. You and your companions will need to make your way through proper channels before you’re permitted to roam freely here.”

Patrick grins at Alpha Clayton as though he has figured out the punchline to a joke no one else understands.

“I couldn’t care less about your mating ceremony, and my companions will be doing no such thing. You see, I heard a rumor that some of my brother’s men intend to betray him today, and I came to witness it firsthand. No Black Moon warriors have been granted permission to be here, that is, other than these fine gentlemen who I have brought as my protective detail.”

He gestures to the dozens of Black Moon soldiers who have accompanied him, plus their vampiric escorts.

One in particular stands out from the rest, the vampire who seems to be his favored sidekick. Where he moves, she follows. Her eyes are gray, not red, a sign that she is a more powerful vampire with greater control over her abilities, much like the groups of Tian’s progenies who have been wandering around here since the day before.

 “My orders were to come and herd our lost sheep home,” Patrick continues. “And then I saw her,” he gestures to Kylie, eliciting a growl from Adam, “and I thought I’d finally found my missing mate, but no. I’ve found something even better. I’ve found my brother’s dirty little secret, and she looks so much like my Regina that now I’m thinking, ah what the heck. Kill two birds with one stone. Come, girl,” he commands as he begins stepping toward Kylie. “I’ll need you to bring your mother home.”

It becomes apparent that he brazenly intends to take her, right here in the midst of her protective supporters, aided by the vampire glued to his side. She seems powerful, but even so, it crosses Kylie’s mind that the man may be completely mad. Nevertheless, she has her claws out and her incisors bared just waiting for him to try it, eager to have a reason to hurt the man who made her mother suffer.

Stay back, but be ready. He’s mine, she silently alerts the companions with her.

“Oh boy,” Alpha Clayton mutters under his breath, knowing things are about to get out of hand the instant either Patrick or Kylie makes a move. He braces himself to move out of the way and try to intercept whatever fallout comes their way so that Kylie can focus on her uncle.

Their warriors are already making their way to the area, but Alphas begin telepathically giving orders and preparing for a fight, while many others continue fleeing the area to find shelter. Though Eramund is with Tian and Kylie, Lizaine decides she will be most useful protecting and defending the innocent, particularly since there are non-combatant Alpha females among them who are likely to lure vampires.

As Patrick comes close enough to Kylie that she can smell the mint on his breath, his companion begins making quick movements that seem to be meant to confuse and distract. Patrick is hoping to inspire one of them, any of them, to make the first move, but is frustrated to see that none of them are falling for it, even though he is threatening their golden girl. He doesn’t actually intend to take her but wants them to perceive the threat as real and react impulsively.

Kylie can feel Tian’s hand grasp her shoulder protectively and knows that he won’t let the other vampire get away with whatever she intends to do to her. Patrick’s smirk morphs into a sneer as his companion draws closer, but before she can make contact with Kylie, a scythe suddenly appears and lobs the vampire’s head right off her shoulders.

Kylie watches in shock as the scene unfolds before her, seemingly in slow motion. She hears Eramund stammer out, “I … I didn’t mean to … it … I can’t even … don’t know how,” just as Patrick notices that his companion has been slain.

He gives Kylie a sinister leer and begins to laugh. “I do hope you’ll live to regret that,” he taunts, opening his arms to draw attention to the action happening behind him. “She was the only one who could control them. Now … well, good luck.”

It seems that all the other vampires are now off their leashes, shifting from the mindless drones that were just following orders into hissing, skulking terrors who are chasing down werewolves, seemingly not caring whose side they’re on.

This was not at all the result Patrick intended or anticipated even being possible. The whole reason he chose a vampire as his lieutenant is because vampires are basically indestructible. She gets weak and hungry sometimes, but she never stops fighting no matter what the enemy throws at her and controls a legion of her own creation that has proven quite useful to him over the years. But this ruins everything, and he knows that now everyone is in danger.

Alpha Clayton springs to action, dashing off to assist his men. Patrick turns on his heel and begins making his way through the fighting now going on behind him, heading off in the direction of the Dark Woods border looking for an opening where he can shift into his wolf and run away. He knows that without his companion to control them, the remaining vampires will not be willing to transport him anywhere and he needs to get himself to friendly soil. Kylie sees that he intends to flee, but she doesn’t intend to let him.

“I could use a boost,” she requests from Tian, knowing that she needs to get past the scuffles going on in front of them so she can shift. But he is preoccupied with what he considers to be the most important detail currently.

He picks up the scythe that had appeared seemingly from nowhere and then clamored to the ground. It has an unsettling aura to it, but he knows that is because it is a vampiric scythe, specially forged from the ashes of the heart of a vampire and his true mate. It is the only weapon guaranteed to slay a vampire, and only four of them still exist in the world. He knows this one belongs to Bria, but he also knows that the deep gray mist that had surrounded it when it appeared out of thin air means that it was called here by Eramund. He doesn’t want to lose track of it in the chaos and allow it to fall into the wrong hands.

“I can do that,” Eramund offers when he notices that Tian is distracted. He grabs ahold of Kylie and Adam and closes his eyes, saying the words that will transport them just far enough to put Kylie in Patrick’s path.

Bria appears next to Tian to reclaim her weapon. “I don’t know what just happened but one second I was holding it, and the next it disappeared from my hand. I worry about what has the power to do that.”

“Eramund,” Tian explains. “Unintentionally, I believe. His power is growing faster than he knows what to do with it.”

“Kylie?” Bria wonders, assuming that the girl’s influence is responsible. Bria was there when this happened before and recognizes the similarities.

“I believe so,” Tian agrees, handing her weapon back to her. He knows he won’t need it anyway. His connection to Kylie has restored his own enhanced abilities.

Eramund releases Kylie and Adam just ahead of Patrick and busies himself with knocking back two enemy werewolves who have spotted them.

Brace yourself. Mir will probably force a shift, Kylie warns Adam as she gets a running start and then shifts into her wolf, shredding through her clothing.

As predicted, the first thing Mirabella does is throw her head back and howl her call to her pack. Kieran answers her call, shredding through Adam’s clothing and rushing to her side, and Jonah is near enough for Milo to respond to the call as well. Together they pursue Patrick, who seemed to shift at the same time they did and has already assumed the form of his hulking gray wolf. He’s faster than any of them expected, but Mirabella is able to cut across his path and leap at his wolf, knocking him down when he attempts to jump away from Kieran who nips at his heels.

Mirabella and Patrick’s wolf tumble together until Mirabella comes out on top, pinning the other wolf down.

Submit, she demands, causing the other wolf to whimper as he struggles to fight her power. He is determined to make it away from here alive, so he pushes through, shaking his head of the temporary hold she has over him.

Seeing that Mirabella seems to have the upper hand and knowing that her mate will not leave her side, Milo turns and lunges for one of the vampires closing in on his sister, knocking the creature over. Eramund faces off with two of the skulking creatures, no longer questioning his sudden surge of power giving him the ability to push the creatures back or lift them high into the air. Whatever keeps them at bay. He is thankful when Tian catches up to them, evening the odds for the moment.

Patrick’s wolf manages to squirm his way from beneath the larger, stronger female wolf, using his targeted bite to her front leg to cause her to flinch just long enough to allow him room to flip over and push her back. She slams into him, knocking him to his side, and lunges for his front leg, the force of her chomp breaking it with a sickening crunch. She is satisfied that at least if he somehow manages to escape, he won’t get far.

Kieran has held back, growling and salivating at the sight of the ragged-looking gray wolf wrestling with his mate. His instinct is to jump in and save her, but he knows she wants this opportunity to deal with her uncle herself. Instead, he works to keep the wolves who accompanied Patrick away from the fight. He leaps toward the wolf he intends to be his second kill, lunging for his neck and clamping down, shaking his head back and forth. He releases the now lifeless wolf once he hears the tell-tale snapping sound that means he has broken his neck, then turns around to check on Mirabella.

She has managed to get her uncle’s wolf on his back, belly up as a sign of submission. Kieran can see and feel the conflict surging through her. She wants to end the man who hurt her mother but knows that she shouldn’t now that he is surrendering. Her jaws are clenched around his neck, but she has yet to sink her teeth in any further than just to restrain him.

You know that isn’t who you are, she hears Tian’s voice echoing through her head. Don’t allow his evil to corrupt your pure heart.

Patrick’s wolf begins trembling in an effort to shift back, and Mirabella releases her hold on him but stays right with him in case he tries to escape. Instead, his body shifts back into his human form, sporting a large bleeding gash across his belly with his arm bent at an unnatural angle.

“Please,” he pleads, breathless and in pain, “I surrender. It’s your father you should be going after, not me. I was just following his orders, like I always do.”

Mirabella sits back on her haunches, eyeing her uncle warily. His pain and distress seem genuine, for obvious reasons, but his mind is conflicted in the way that one’s mind gets when being dishonest. Even if he is here on his brother’s orders, she knows he isn’t the innocent he claims to be. She knew that going into this, though. An innocent man doesn’t kidnap a woman and brainwash her into a twenty-year relationship.

She hears a yelp as Kieran slams into a wolf that had been closing in on their location, but is careful not to let her attention stray from the naked man before her. A jet-black wolf with blazing golden eyes joins them and prowls a perimeter around her and her uncle, but she can sense from his mind that it’s Magnus’s wolf.

He shifts and Magnus the man stands naked before them, glaring down at Patrick where he lies pathetically on the ground.

“Beware the faithless and the deceivers,” he growls out as a reminder of the prophecies that warn of double-crossers and betrayers that will switch loyalties whenever it benefits them.

Mirabella catches his implication, already thinking along those same lines. She can sense the murderous intent pouring out of Magnus and returns control to Kylie, allowing her to shift back despite sensing that there are still threats nearby.

“I don’t disagree,” Kylie tells Magnus as she rises to her feet on the opposite side of Patrick, “but lawfully, this man has surrendered and is now our prisoner.”

“That is not the old way,” Magnus argues. “He has threatened you, harmed your family, trespassed where he doesn’t belong, and is nothing but a deceiver on top of all that. You have every right to end his life as payment for all his transgressions against you.”

“I’m not saying I believe him or even feel an ounce of pity for him, because I don’t. But we will not murder him, Magnus,” Kylie insists. “Can I trust you to obey me?”

“Of course, your Grace. If this is your wish, then consider me your humble servant. I will secure the prisoner,” Magnus promises, lowering his head respectfully.

He sends for reinforcements over mind-link, then crouches down to take physical possession of his prisoner. Patrick winces and cries out as Magnus forces him to his feet, but does not try to fight him. Soon, three of the Luna’s Grace enforcers arrive at their location, securing Patrick in shackles and marching him off to the dungeons.

Kylie turns her attention to where Eramund and Tian fight one of the last remaining vampires together, Eramund seeming to immobilize the creature while Tian uses his blade-like claws to decapitate it. She notices that most of the fighting has subsided, and the wounded are being carried off to the infirmary. Adam joins her after chasing off some of the last hostile werewolves.

“They seem to be retreating to Dark Woods, the few that remained,” he informs her, “though I think the vamps have been dealt with. They didn’t seem to be able to think about anything other than chasing down their next meals, making it easier for Tian’s crew to have their way with them. That's not to say that they didn't put up a hell of a fight, though.”

Tian catches sight of his friends approaching and attempts to quickly suppress his vampiric form, retracting his claws and fangs and focusing on withdrawing the metallic sheen of his skin, returning it to its usual soft, cold, and pale state.

“Eramund needs medical attention,” he informs them, and Kylie looks closer and notices a bloody gash in the warlock’s shirt.

“Are you too tired to take him?” she asks Tian, hoping he can just teleport Eramund to where he needs to go.

“I can do it, but you should come with. He will need you,” Tian responds, reaching for her as well as Eramund. “We’ll be at the infirmary, Adam. Please join.”

Adam can tell by the flatness of his tone that he is quite drained, which would explain why he’s not offering to take him as well. He hates the idea of being separated from Kylie right now but trusts that Tian knows what he’s doing and will look out for her. Even a drained vampire is a threat to anyone who would dare try to harm his mate, so he nods, already shifting into his wolf and dashing off in the direction of the infirmary.

A medic hands Kylie a baggy t-shirt and some shorts when she arrives at the infirmary with Tian and Eramund. Eramund is led to one of the portable cots that have been set up behind the building as all available medical personnel scramble to ready the area for the wounded.

He leans back on the cot, finally feeling the searing pain from the wound in his side. The adrenaline that had been coursing through his body and his singular focus on not letting enemies anywhere near Kylie as she fought with her uncle prevented him from fully acknowledging the severity of his predicament before now.

She tears through his shirt so she can get a look at his wound, and gasps when she sees the oozing blackness of it. There are still trails of dried blood around the wound, but the area directly around it has darkened and the fluid oozing out of it now is an eerie black and no longer resembles blood.

“What is this?” she asks Tian, and then realizes that he isn’t in great shape himself. He has slumped over in a nearby chair and his eyes are closed, his body trembling.

“Poison,” a female medic answers her, coming over to take Eramund’s vitals and clean up his wound some. “He is one of five with such a wound, though his looks the worst. It seems that some of the vampires’ claws were tipped with this poison, which is a sort of vampiric poison according to the shaman. He said he doesn’t have the equipment to be able to tell whether it is the sort that will turn a werewolf, though. It might just make them sick and weak for a few days.”

“He’s a warlock, though,” Kylie protests the news feebly, hoping that since he isn’t a werewolf it won’t affect him as much, but she knows from the look of it and from how pale he has turned that it’s only wishful thinking.

“I know, which has me wondering if, since he seems more affected than the others, this might be the sort of poison meant to turn casters, not werewolves,” the medic offers as explanation. “Either way, all our antidotes are still in transit. Should be here within the hour, and then we can treat him more effectively. In the meantime, we just have to keep him clean and comfortable. The shaman will be over to look at him as soon as he gets a chance because he seems to be the poison expert.”

Kylie hopes the shaman she speaks of is her Papa but doesn’t see him as she glances around, and decides she has something more important to focus on at the moment.

“Tian,” she says softly, making her way over to where he sits. “Where are your rations?”

“I’ve used my portable supply,” he responds quietly, still not opening his eyes. “More should be arriving with the medical supplies. I’ll be alright. I just need to focus my energy away from my hunger until Adam gets here. Whatever blood they have here they probably need for the wounded.”

She holds her wrist under his nose and knows he can smell it when she sees him tense, his nostrils flaring.

Tian is in bad shape, and I’m going to let him feed from me, she warns Adam so that he won’t freak out once he arrives.

“No,” Tian refuses her flatly. “You’re wounded anyway. I can smell it.”

I hate it, but I won’t argue because I saw the shape he was in, Adam gives his begrudging consent.

“Superficial wounds. Scratches. Open your eyes and see,” she demands of her stubborn friend.

He does as she requests and sees that the wrist she holds in front of him only has minor surface wounds. He motions to her other wrist, wanting to see if she is hiding her wounds from him. She holds them both out to him, and he sees she is telling the truth. His shaking intensifies as he fights back the urge to take what she is offering him.

She pulls her wrist back and sinks her own elongated incisors into it, then offers it to him again. He is powerless to resist it this time and eagerly grabs her wrist, bringing it to his mouth and sinking his fangs deep into her flesh. He moans at the divine flavor that fills his mouth, awakening all his senses as surges of what feel like electric impulses wash over him. Despite quickly being overcome with an urge to keep drinking until he is fully sated, thankfully, her scent filling his nostrils helps him keep his wits about him so that he is able to pull back with only slight reluctance once he has had what he needs.

He retracts his incisors and places a soft kiss on the tender spot where he has wounded her, gently lowering her wrist to his lap and reaching out to her. She embraces him tightly for a moment before pulling away.

“Thank you, Kylie,” he tells her gratefully, reaching out to stroke her cheek with his thumb.

“No, thank you, and Eramund,” she protests. “I know that I only came away with mere scratches because of the two of you and Adam shielding me from the worst of it.”

He smiles at her fondly, and then nods toward the cot where Eramund struggles to stay conscious. “He needs you now. It’s a longshot, but you’re probably the only chance he has of not succumbing to the poison before the antidotes arrive. Give him something better to focus on.”

Micah was pretty seriously wounded, and David is tending to him, Adam reports in with Kylie. I’ll be there shortly, and hopefully with your Papa and good news about Micah.

Kylie sends back her acknowledgement, assuring him that she and Tian are fine, and updates him about Eramund.

Then she gives Tian a questioning look but does as he says. Lifting Eramund’s arm and making enough room for her to sit on the edge of the cot, she replaces his arm in her lap and grasps his hand.

“It does feel nice, but it won’t make a difference,” Eramund tells her weakly. “I can already feel the darkness creeping over me. I can only hope that the she-vamp comes for me with her magic scythe and puts an end to me before it gets to that.”

“Come now, Eramund. I know you better than that. You never give up that easily,” Tian scolds him. “And the scythe isn’t magical, it’s vampiric. The magic was yours.”

“I still don’t understand it,” Eramund admits. A terrible coughing fit overcomes him, but finally he is able to take in a breath and continue. “I was just standing there worrying about how close that vampire was getting to Kylie and wishing I had one of those special scythes so I could just chop off her head, and the next thing I knew, the scythe appeared, and it had been done. It makes no sense. That’s no spell I’ve ever known. I didn’t even speak any words.”

“That began happening to Dorian once he had started getting close to Ramona,” Tian tells them. “Especially when it came to protecting her. You can’t expect to always have that power, or perhaps you’ll never have it again, but I’m sure you noticed that the more you focused on defending and protecting Kylie, the deeper your pool of magic seemed to be getting. I know I noticed.”

"Ramona?" Eramund questions, confused about what the vampire is even talking about now. "Wait, Dorian?"

He recognizes the name of perhaps the most renowned warlock to ever live, but still fails to connect the meaning of it to what is happening now. Tian doesn't get a chance to explain.

“Tian?” Bria cuts in, asking for his attention as she approaches. “The Alphas are wanting to meet and report in and are asking for you and Kylie.” Then she catches a glimpse of the warlock and senses the same thing Tian has been. “Oh, that’s not good. What do you plan to do about him?”