Page 17 of Feral Creed (The Hounds Duet #2)

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I WAKE UP to the sound of voices.

“You got all that through the bond, huh?” comes Calix’s voice. “Even her name?”

I feel my omega in our bond, and it’s wonderful.

“You’re projecting it pretty intensely,” comes Lotus’s voice. “So, yeah.”

I need to go to her, because I can’t tell what’s being projected, but I can tell she’s reacting to alarm. I’m not dressed, so I pull on some clothes and join the others in the kitchen.

No one acknowledges me. They’re all just talking amongst themselves.

Lotus is insisting she can win some tournament, and Knight and Calix are saying they can’t risk that.

I amble over to pour myself some coffee.

“We need to leave,” says Knight. “I don’t care what you think. This isn’t up for debate. We are going.”

I turn around in the middle of putting creamer in my coffee. “Hold up, what’s going on?”

“We can’t leave,” says Lotus. “We will not all fit in one car, not with Acker to deal with.”

“Shoot her in the head,” says Knight. “While she’s passed out.”

“Well, to do that, we would need a gun,” says Lotus, glaring at him.

I finish doctoring up my coffee and go over to put my arm around Lotus. “Whatever you think,” I say to her. “But I’m really confused right now.”

“Besides,” says Lotus, “I don’t want her dead. I want her to fix you.”

“Not necessary,” says Knight. “I bit them, and that solved the entire problem.”

“We don’t know that,” says Lotus.

“We don’t,” says Calix quietly.

Striker appears in the doorway to the kitchen, only wearing a pair of boxers. He’s kind of delectable that way, hair still mussed from sleep, body on display. I feel a wave of pure lust go through me at the sight of him.

“Arrow, focus,” says Knight.

I smirk at him, wondering if that was my lust or his. He did get nailed by Striker last night and seemed to really enjoy it.

“Where’s the fire?” says Striker, scratching his flat stomach.

“Look,” says Lotus, “can’t you guys, like, train me or something?” She turns to Knight. “When is this Selene person coming?”

“I didn’t get that,” says Knight. “Maybe I can go and talk to Theodorus while he’s playing chess this morning or something. I don’t know if he does that every morning.”

“Who’s Selene?” I say.

No one answers me.

Striker yawns. “There’s coffee?”

No one answers him either.

“Anyway, I can do it,” says Lotus. “When I was in Cedar Falls, I got restrained by three big, burly guys on a regular basis. I’m stronger than you think I am.” Her voice lowers to a growl.

“We are not putting you in danger,” says Knight. “Not for the privilege of staying in this place. We don’t even want to be here.”

“It’s true,” says Calix. “Being here is not a great option. You really need a real nest, Lotus.”

I feel Lotus react in longing to the idea of a nest in the bond. I tighten my grip on her.

She looks up at me, smiling.

I smile back.

She turns to Calix and Knight. “Regardless, neither of you guys think I can do it.”

“Do what?” says Striker.

“Compete in a tournament with some other omega. Winner takes the other omega’s alphas,” says Calix.

“Shit,” I say.

“Would I get her alphas?” says Lotus. “Would she die?”

“We’re not doing it,” says Calix.

“But what I’m getting from you through the bond is that she’s practically abusive,” says Lotus. She looks at Knight. “You seem to feel like they’re all abusive.”

Knight shrugs. “Just things Theodorus said were not cool, is all.”

“So, I could do some good.” She looks up at me. “We’re the superhero cobra-teeth scent-match pack who’s going to fix the world, I thought. Now, we’re running with our tails between our legs at the first sign of trouble.”

“We can’t fix the fucking world, Lotus,” snaps Knight. “The world is huge and there are five of us.”

“You’re the one who said it,” she says, glaring at him.

“Yeah, I was post-orgasmic, post-bite, blissed out,” he says. “I would have said anything.”

striker

CALIX ENDS UP calling in to work, because we sit around arguing about this for hours and he misses the window when he could leave and drive there to get in on time.

He says that he doesn’t know what that means.

He doesn’t have saved up sick leave, so he thinks they could fire him.

He hopes that everything is too volatile right then, in the wake of Dr. Acker leaving, for that to happen, but he doesn’t know.

He and Lotus go down to check on Acker.

They don’t sedate her again.

No one has come to a decision about what we’re going to do with her.

I try to take charge a few times, but Knight pushes back against me, and I feel this thing between us, something that’s happened because I let him bite me, where we’ve done something to disrupt the natural way this pack is organized.

I’m supposed to be the dominant one and everyone’s supposed to listen to me.

We’re all supposed to listen to Lotus.

But none of these things are happening.

I find myself trying to explain to people, in a measured and even voice, that we can’t get anything done if we’re all just arguing amongst ourselves. We’re not going to come to a consensus by arguing, and that’s why someone has to be in charge.

I know this from working in the church.

You’d think that people who were all getting together to help others and do charitable work and to volunteer their time would be good at getting along and making decisions, but nothing could be further from the truth.

People, it seems, would much rather talk in circles than do anything. If allowed, they’ll discuss a thing to death. I think people just like to come up with objections to hear themselves speak. They’re like, “Oh, no one has mentioned this very unlikely eventuality, I bet I should say something.”

Anyway, I learned quickly that it was best to put rules down on everything.

I’d say that we’d discuss for twenty minutes and then we’d put things to a vote.

(Weirdly, once I did this, there was no discussion, which worried me that I’d made people think that I didn’t want to hear their voices and I was impatient. Except. I guess I was.)

I have to admit, in this situation, I agree with Knight, anyway. Not just because he’s bitten me and he has the tightest, sweetest little asshole either. But he’s right, we should probably leave.

Lotus can’t compete in some tournament against another omega.

Regardless of whether she could win or not, it’s barbarism.

So, even though I’m in favor of someone being in charge, if she’s going to decide she’s competing, I don’t know if I can agree with that.

How does this even work? How can five adult humans be in one romantic relationship together?

Admittedly, this is a pretty heated discussion we’re in the middle of, with very high stakes, so maybe it’ll be easier when we’re trying to figure out things like who does the laundry or how often to vacuum the house, I don’t know.

But I have to say I’m not looking forward to the rest of our lives together if this is how it works between us.

Someone needs to be in charge.

And I’m not just saying that because I’m the one who should be in charge.

I swear I’m not.

But hours drag on, and we’re not even getting close to any kind of agreement. We’re not even really on sides.

Lotus thinks we should stay and that she should fight in the tournament. Arrow is basically backing her up, but he’s also voiced agreement for just killing Acker.

Knight thinks we need to leave and we need to kill Acker.

I’m fine with leaving, but I don’t want to kill Acker, partly for reasons of my conscience, and partly because I think we might have a shot at getting some useful information out of her at some point.

Calix thinks we should leave, but he’s going back and forth on killing Acker.

One thing we’ve gotten nowhere with is where we would even go .

We still have some cash that we got from raiding Knight’s stash of ill-gotten gains from back when he was a mafia hitman, but it’s not enough for a longterm plan. We talk a little about contacting our families and loved ones, but no one wants to put them in danger.

Eventually, we’re all shouting at each other.

I bark at everyone, shutting down the discussion. “We will all go to separate places and calm the fuck down right now,” I inform everyone.

They all listen to me, sulkily, but they do it.

I go out on the porch, unsure of what to do or think.

Knight joins me. “You’ve got to do that and get us into a car,” he says to me. “I’ll take care of Acker.”

“You couldn’t take care of Acker before,” I say to him.

“It’s different now,” he says.

“It isn’t,” I say to him.

“It is,” he says. “I bit—”

“But no one bit you,” I point out.

He growls at me.

I growl back.

We face off on the porch, and the air feels charged. Are we going to fight, really fight, him and me?

I won’t let that happen. I will use every bit of my alpha power over him to shut down the aggression between us.

He feels that through our bond, feels my resolve and he rears against it, pushing at it through the bond, pushing hard .

I will not give way.

Finally, he pulls back.

I sag into a chair on the porch, panting, exhausted, spiritually depleted. If he pushes again, I don’t know if I can hold.

He sits down, too, similarly winded. “Shit, Striker,” he breathes.

“We’re no good to each other if we’re working at odds,” I gasp.

“But we have to protect her,” he says.

“I know,” I say, sighing.

“Where’s the line?” he says. “How do we know when to let her have her way and when to stop her?”

“I don’t know,” I say. “But sometimes, even if you don’t agree with something, if you’re part of a group, you have to go along with the group.”

His eyebrows shoot up. “That’s—”

“I know,” I say. “I didn’t say always go along with the group. I said sometimes .”

He considers.

“To keep the peace.”

“When it’s not important, maybe,” he says. “But this is important. We need to leave.”

“Yeah, maybe,” I say. “But we have nowhere to go.”

He sighs heavily.

We’re both quiet.

lotus

I END UP in the basement during the forced break that Striker makes us take.

I sit down in front of Acker, who is still groggy from the sedative we gave her. I rip the tape off her mouth, and she turns barely-focused eyes on me and laughs. “I can hear everything you’re saying up there, you know.”

I shrug at her.

“I hear you guys fucking, too,” she says with a sneer. “I hear you all begging each other for knots. I hear it all.”

“You want an apology?” I say. “Sorry that being kept captive is so noisy.”

She laughs again. “I’m touched that you don’t want me dead.”

“I do want you dead,” I tell her. “I do. But I want my mates to be safe and whole more than I want revenge against you.”

“Safe and whole,” she says in a sing-song voice. “What makes you think they weren’t safe and whole back in Cedar Falls? What makes you think you improved anything for my boys, my hounds?”

“Oh, you think that was good for them?” It’s my turn to laugh. “You’re losing your mind down here. What’s your first name, anyway?” I think. I remember I’ve heard it. “Debra, right?”

She grimaces.

“Anyone call you Debbie? You’re losing your mind down here, Debbie.”

“They’re mine,” she says to me in a low voice. “You know it and I know it. And you can all play little games. You can let them bite you, or you can let Knight bite them, or whatever it is you think you can do with all that designation shit, but I am inside them in a way you’ll never be.”

I shouldn’t respond. But I suppose some part of me fears she’s right, and so I do. “You are not inside my mates, my alphas.”

“Mine,” she counters, angry. “My boys. My good boys. My hounds.”

I slap her.

She laughs. “You know it’s true.”

I slap her again. Hard. But when I draw blood, I think it’s less because I’m hitting her real hard and more because she’s had her mouth taped shut for days and nothing to eat and only minimal water and her lips are pretty cracked anyway.

Still.

I make her bleed.

And she just laughs.

It…

Suddenly, something in me switches on. Or off?

I don’t know. But I remember being in that cube, the little space where I was trapped and I couldn’t think words, and I was trapped and alone, and just trying to bring home little soft things for my nest and they would take them from me, every night, while I slept.

And I lose it.

Like I used to lose it on the workers who’d try to make me use a fork or something. I just go at this woman.

I hit her, and she’s tied up, so she can’t do much.

I take her by the shoulders and I began slamming her head into the pole that she’s tied to.

At first, she’s screaming that it hurts, and then I see that there’s blood on the pole, because I’m really slamming her into it.

And then she’s not screaming anymore but I’m still doing it, I’m still slamming her stupid, stupid head into that pole over and over again.