Page 165 of Claimed By the Rival Alpha

NIGHT

I’d hoped to spend all day in bed with my mate and only get up to be crowned alpha of the Kings, but the moment the knock came at our door, that hope was dead.

Bryn stirred as I got out of bed. “Hmm?” Her voice was groggy and sweet. “Where are you going, Night?” Her sleepy concern touched my heart. I leaned over to kiss her, to get one more taste of her.

“Someone’s at the door,” I whispered.

“Ignore them. Come back to bed.”

I chuckled. “I wish I could, but I have a feeling I need to get up now. We’ll have plenty of time to be together tonight.”

Her lower lip stuck out as she pouted, but another kiss turned her disappointment into a smile. “All right, I’ll see you at the alpha ceremony.”

I left her in bed as I dressed in a long-sleeved shirt and jeans, then headed downstairs. When I opened the door, Dom raised an eyebrow. “Huh, I figured I’d have to go inside and drag you out.”

I snorted. “You wouldn’t dare.”

“On second thought, you might be right. I wouldn’t want to risk seeing too much of you. Or my sister.” He made a big show of shuddering at the thought.

“Shut up.” I pushed his shoulder with a chuckle. “What do you want?”

His easy smile leveled out to a more stoic expression. “The Wargs Council wants to talk to you before the ceremony.”

“Oh. Is that all?” I’d known it would be something like that. “When did they get here?”

“This morning.”

I nodded. Dom was great at setting up these sorts of things—he would have already had a large cabin set up for them. He’d probably ensured that the council members were settled in the moment they arrived.

“Do you have any idea what they want from me?”

“No, but I think we’ve both got a pretty good guess.”

I sighed. He was right, of course. They’d want to know whether my plans would continue to align with theirs—the handling of the Kings.

I’d have to have this conversation with them eventually, but I wasn’t excited to have it the day I was crowned alpha of the Kings.

I’d hoped they’d give me some time to settle in.

“Walk me there?” I asked.

“Of course. I’ll stay with you if you want. You know, for moral support.” He smiled.

“If you’ve got the time, then great. I think I’m gonna need it.”

Dom and I headed for the council’s temporary home. It was a spot close to the border, not far from the home that Bryn and I would be moving into. The five council members were waiting for us in the dining room. They all stood to show their respect as I entered, then sat again.

Wayne Hudson sat at the center of the round table; he had started walking with a cane since the last time I’d seen him.

Graham Hanks and Ellen Grousby sat on Wayne’s right, while Jasmine Howler and Ida Kells were on his left.

Graham, with his large size, took up a lot of Ellen’s elbow room, but if it bothered her, she didn’t let on. She was probably used to it by now.

“Alpha Shepherd,” Wayne Hudson greeted me with a smile, as if the subject on his mind wasn’t outright bloodshed. “And Dom. Glad to see you both here.”

“Likewise,” I said. “I’m told you all wanted to speak to me.”

“Yes,” Jasmine said, her tattooed arms and shoulders on display. “We want to hear what you’re planning to do with the Kings.” Her smile was bloodthirsty as she said, “We want to know your plans for total takeover of this land.”

“You must follow through on what you promised the Wargs,” Graham added. “To better our people.”

When they’d proposed this a few weeks ago, I didn’t feel I was in the best position to outright tell them I wouldn’t follow through on their bloody plans. But now, hours before I’d take control of the Kings, I felt more equipped to enlighten them on my feelings.

I closed my eyes briefly. “Let me not mince words about this: a hostile takeover is the absolute last thing I want to do here.”

The five stared at me as if I’d just spoken in a foreign language.

“You can’t be serious,” Graham said passionately, spittle flying from his mouth. “After everything these people took from us? After generations of them murdering our loved ones? Your own mate grew up under their constant torture!”

My temper flared, but before I could speak, Dom coolly cut in for me.

“I understand that your emotions run deep, but Graham, I’d be careful how you speak to your alpha.”

Graham glared at my beta, but Dom stood firm.

Because he and the rest of the council had grown up in an even tougher, more violent era of Wargs history, I could see Graham consider taking this argument with Dom to the mat.

In his younger years, Graham was as big as Dom and me, if not bigger.

He’d held on to a lot of that bulk, thanks to how often he worked out with younger wolves on the training grounds.

That said, Dom had youth and his own years of experience on his side.

Graham would never have been able to take Dom in a fight.

“That’s enough,” I said before Graham could make that mistake. “I’ve made my intentions clear.”

“But why, Alpha?” Jasmine demanded. “You should want this just as much as we do. Graham is right—you’ve seen firsthand the true depths of the Kings’ cruelty. The burnt cabins, the murdered families, the fear that so many of us lived with on a daily basis. You were there for all of that.”

“Because I’ve also seen the way the Kings have suffered after two generations of Redwolf control.

It’s true that they’ve done despicable, awful things to us—I would never deny that.

But I’m sure you all remember that before Gregor abandoned us to take control of them, our rivalry with them was just that: a rivalry.

There was mutual respect then, when Kings and Wargs would trade every generation for the spot of the most powerful pack in the panhandle.

It didn’t become so sadistic and cruel until Gregor came into the picture. ”

I waited for some pushback, but they couldn’t really argue my point.

“This pack isn’t any crueler than any other; it was their leadership.

From the outside, sure, they seem like they’ve got everything, but their lives have been miserable.

They have suffered under Gregor and Troy’s leadership.

Wargs have a much healthier, stronger pack than the Kings have had in over twenty years. ”

Wayne started to chuckle, but the sound was anything but happy. “Am I hearing you correctly, Alpha? Are you really trying to compare the atrocities our pack has endured to the Kings’? I can admit that Gregor and Troy were…neglectful, but that’s nothing in the face of what we have survived.”

“If things were so bad for them, they could have just challenged their alpha,” Ellen pointed out. “They were complicit in their suffering.”

“You say that because you don’t know, Ellen.

The Redwolfs murdered anyone who dissented.

They walked around under the constant protection of the strongest wolves in the pack, keeping the lower members of their pack poor and completely dependent on them.

There was no honor in the way they governed, and there was no chance for anyone to go against them. ”

There was a pause after my words. I took advantage of that pause to keep going.

“Now that I am the alpha of both packs, I want to build something new and better, something not rooted in the past. There are things that the Kings and Wargs can learn from each other, if you’d only open yourselves up to that.

I suggest you all make use of your time here to get to know the Kings, see the state of the homes that we’re helping them rebuild, hear the stories of their lost children, and watch how women and children have been taught to stay silent and out of the way, to flinch away from men. ”

I paused, letting those words sink in for a few seconds. And then Dom started speaking.

“I can vouch for all of this,” Dom said.

“I heard the stories while I constructed new cabins with them. I’ve seen how many of them changed when they were offered kindness and aid after Troy masterminded the plot to devastate them with ferals.

There’s more to them than we’ve thought.

And the wolves who were the most violent toward us left of their own volition to join Troy. ”

I looked from face to face to see if our words had gotten to any of the council members. I saw maybe a sliver of hesitation from Graham and Ellen, but before I could confirm it, Ida rose.

“Maybe the Kings have suffered,” she said gently, “but what do they know about pain? They felt powerless? Tough. Our loved ones were slaughtered before our eyes, and we still had to work the next day. The women flinch from men? They should have learned to use their claws and teeth to fight them. They had abusive alphas? They should have slit their throats in their sleep to better their pack.” She sat again, her eyes a clear, sharp blue.

Her voice was flat as she said, “All this proves to me is that we need to cull them from our ranks. We have no room for such weakness in our pack.”

Wayne struck the floor with his cane as if calling us all to order.

“Ida, I couldn’t have said it better myself.

Maybe the younger generation has forgotten their trauma, but us old folks, well, we can’t do that.

Unfortunately, Alpha, we need someone strong to lead the Wargs, and it looks like that might not be you.

If you prove to be weak-hearted, we will find a replacement. ”

A deep growl reverberated from Dom’s chest. “Wayne, I would think twice about lobbing threats—”

I raised my hand, and Dom immediately quieted. I couldn’t blame him for getting so pissed off—after all, it was his job to watch out for me—but his fury would get us nowhere, and if the council refused to listen even to well-reasoned arguments, that was their fucking prerogative.