Page 22 of Never Tamed (Bad Wolves #3)

Mathis

T he fires. The Steel Claw building, gone. Our village in the woods, the neat cabins that have been under my family’s protection for generations—

Obliterated.

Icy winter cold bites deep into my skin. I barely notice. My breath comes out in ragged clouds as I sprint through the snow-laden forest away from the camp. The deepness of it doesn’t slow me; the wolf inside surges forward, pushing my body faster, faster.

It’s an escape as much as a liberation.

Farther, faster.

The camp is nothing but a memory now and my body, my spirit, knows exactly where we’re headed. It’s not an easy trek.

I don’t want it to be.

I’m breathless and panting, my lungs five sizes too small, by the time I crest the other side of Grey Mountain. Ice and snow obliterate landmarks but everything is familiar to me. How can it not be?

I’ve lived here my entire life.

This forest is in my blood.

It surges through me, but the heat isn’t enough to thaw the hard shell around my heart.

Gone . For good .

A small lick of flame flickers in the woods ahead, and my heart twists tight. I knew it… I knew deep in my gut Andras had come for us. Torin wasn’t the only one.

How could he be? Andras targeted my pack first.

Whining, I push myself faster, my limbs burning from the straining effort. My muscles protest but the wolf body moves sleekly through the snowy underbrush.

The smoke thickens overhead and the acrid sting of burned wood scalds my lungs. It’s no longer a small fire, like the radio broadcast claimed. It’s spread into a full-on inferno.

My territory—everything I grew up with—is devoured by flames.

I stop just past the treeline, breath ragged and chest heaving. The destruction is endless. Andras left no part of the property untouched.

The main house is gone, reduced to a pile of smoldering twigs. The tree trunks around it are black and cracked. Every house surrounding the main cabin is still burning.

A tremble starts at the base of my skull and runs all the way to the tip of my tail. The fine hairs lift along my spine.

This was my family’s land and the place where I learned to run with my pack under the moon. Where I would hunt, where we believed that family didn’t always mean shared blood.

A memory lifts from the ache in my head, something I’ll never forget. I was a boy at the cusp of puberty and sat on the porch steps with my father. Humid summer heat made the air heavy and his smile, his steady, unwavering smile, brought with it a sense of safety.

His smile was his signature.

He reached down to ruffle my hair that he thought was getting too shaggy and said, “Mathis, one day, you’re going to be alpha. A good alpha. Strong, wise, and fierce when your family needs you.”

It didn’t matter how many times he said those things. I always believed that maybe, just maybe, there was a chance I could fill his gigantic shoes and be the alpha the pack needed me to be. If I tried hard enough. There was no one I looked up to more. He was a man of the people and a true leader.

I wanted nothing more than to make him proud.

“You’ll protect us all. Your pack. Your family,” he told me.

I kept those words close to my heart. They became even more important when cancer stole him from us, his death sudden, leaving behind a hole in everyone’s lives.

Now, there’s no comfort in the memory. Instead, it slams into me like a physical blow. My father’s gone. Not just dead but his legacy; his dreams for me feel so distant and out of reach.

I failed him .

I’m a terrible alpha.

I’m supposed to be the strength my people need, the Grey Valley’s protector. But here I am, watching everything I love burning to the ground. I block the sensation traveling down the mate bond.

Like hell I’ll let the others see me this way.

And Torin, how he handled the loss of his own pack home…he went numb. He showed no outward emotion although through the bond, I got a clear and concise sense of his feelings.

He was barely keeping it together.

I blocked out too much. I barely felt when Ren and Torin stepped from the forest behind me, shifting back to their human forms at the same time. The grief is shared. I can’t hide it from them, even if I tried.

You didn’t have to follow me , I say to them internally. You should have stayed back .

“Mathis,” Torin says breathlessly. He stops when his eyes lock on the fire. “The firefighters already put it out. You can rebuild. You can—”

I shift into my own human form, knees soaked by the snow. “There’s no point.” My voice goes dead. “It’s gone. All of it. It’s gone.”

“Oh, Mathis.” Ren kneels down beside me and wraps her arm around my shoulders. “Andras is going to pay for this. We’re going to get him and make him suffer for what he’s done to your and Torin’s pack. We’ll all help you get this place back to how it was.”

She glances up at Torin. I know without looking that his eyes are locked on the destruction. His guilt and sorrow vibrate across the bond.

“Yeah,” he adds. “The Steel Claws will help.”

Once, I’d have called bullshit on the whole thing. Torin only acted when it was in his best interest. Now I know better.

It’s all wishful thinking.

Still, their kindness and support are welcomed. Especially Torin’s because now he finally understands. He's an ally in this fight instead of another enemy, and that’s a relief.

You guys good ? Noble asks.

We’re fine, Torin snaps. Handle things?

Noble snorts and says, Always .

My attention snags burnt, stick-like buildings. What’s left of them, at least. They’re black, charred, and crumbling. There, beyond the fallen structure of the main house, three shadowy pieces of cloth or flags hang by singed ropes and flap in the breeze.

I push to my feet and lope over, ignoring Ren’s calls. When I get close enough, what I see freezes me in place.

Not flags or cloth. Fur .

My heart blocks my throat and swells, nausea curdling my stomach as my fingers whisper across the charred pelts. My wolves.

Goddamit it !

The Blood Moons’ have hoisted up grisly trophies of their recent kills, and if I know Andras, they are from three of the stolen members of my pack, their hides strung up like warning signs.

It’s the cruelest thing possible and just what a monster like him would do. The bodies we heard about on the news…

Flora’s face pops into my head.

Could it be hers?

Tears burn the corners of my eyes. Because of the terrible shape they’re in, there’s no way to mark for sure who these furs belonged to. My stomach rolls.

Bile scalds a path to my mouth, and I swallow it down, barely.

Dax’s familiar earthy scent hits before I’m aware of footsteps. When I turn to face him, his eyes are wild, this face pale.

Like he’s seen a ghost.

Maybe he has. Maybe that’s all we are to him anymore.

I hold out a hand. “Dax?”

I’m willing to bet his moments of hysteria are due to memories of his past remerging. After he’d spoken about the song he keeps hearing, the gruesome glimpses of his family, it's the only logical explanation.

Those tragic moments in his life that he’d suppressed for so long are finally coming to the surface, and it’s something he can’t control.

This seems to have struck a chord in him, too. I’ve never seen him so rattled before these episodes. They haunt him. It’s an unnerving thing to witness.

His breath hitches. “No. No, not again.”

“Again?”

The pelts sway gently in the unfeeling wind. His eyes lock on them and he stumbles, reeling from an unseen strike. His hands shake.

“No, no.”

My bloodthirsty beta is gone. In his place is a terrified wolf pup.

“Dax,” I call to him.

He shakes his head. Hearing the song? Seeing the visions? My horror takes a back seat.

“Stay with me, man. Come on.”

The distant siren of more oncoming emergency vehicles means we can’t stay. The human authorities will corner us.

Dax digs in his heels and shakes his head violently enough to fling his hair in a wild halo.

“We have to go.”

He collapses into the snow, curling into himself, panic spilling over. My heart twists. This isn’t like his other fits where he went crazy and violent. This is him being in pain. Agony. Vulnerable. They’re all parts of him I’ve never seen before. And it rips me to shreds to witness.

“It’s them. My parents,” he says, barely audible.

I drop beside him. “Dax, you’re here. With me. With us.”

His gaze flicks over my face but doesn’t seem to really see anything at all. It’s like he’s looking right through me. “The blood… the screams… She’s crying! I can’t find her! Where’s Gracie?”

I want to help him, wish there was something to do, but how do you fight a monster you can’t see? It’s the same with Andras. Like Dax’s memories, he’s another phantom haunting me. I want to help him, but my own chest feels tight, like I’m drowning in the same hopelessness he is.

How can I help anyone when I’m barely holding myself together?

“I’m sorry,” I say. I hate the way my voice cracks. “I don’t know what to do.”

It’s a hard thing to admit, but it’s true.

I’m sorry, Father. You were wrong. I’m not made to be alpha. I’ve failed them all. That’s my legacy, I think, turning away from the pelts. Failure.

Dax’s trembling doesn’t ease, but he leans into me anyway and all I can do is whisper to him as he comes undone.

Then Ren appears at his other side. Touching his arm, she murmurs, “Dax. It’s Red. I’m here. You’re safe. There’s no blood. It’s only us. And you’re going to get through this.” Her eyes lift to me. “We’re going to get through this.”

It takes another heartbeat for him to settle and quiet. The wildness in his eyes dulls. His breathing slows. Ren continues to soothe him and rub his bare arm. Only her touch eases his shaking and settles the raging storm.

Pieces of me crack.

No matter how hard I try, even as his brother and alpha, this is for him to battle. But Ren, well, she’s become his only root in this world.

It’s not just Dax. She calms all our fears. She brings out the best in us. All of us.

Once Dax’s gruff murmurs quiet enough, and color returns to his face, she moves closer to the smoldering ruins of the house.

“Be careful,” Torin calls to her from behind us. “Don't get too close.”

With a glance over her shoulder, she nods and moves over to the pelts. Fuck. I don’t want her there. The picture of her, a bright spot of life surrounded by death and destruction and pain, it’s more than I can bear.

But this fearless woman only leans in with her nose inches from the coarse fur. She keeps her hand outstretched toward us, like she’s the one worried, and her nostrils flare while she draws in a scent.

“Sweetheart—” I start.

There’s no way she’s going to be able to get anything from it. They’re too damaged, too burned up to smell like anything but fire, charred wood, and blood.

“Those are the omegas,” I say quietly. “I know Andras is using their deaths and their pelts as a message to me. Just like he did with the explosion of Torin’s tower.”

Ren doesn’t look at me. She refuses to break her concentration and continues to sniff with her brow wrinkled in thought. Then, finally, she shifts away. “None of them smell familiar. None of these are Flora, at least.”

Her words hit me like cold water. “How do you know?”

“No wolf’s nose is that good,” Torin says as he walks over.

“Not even Dax’s,” I add, which is true. “And he’s the best tracker we have.”

Ren lifts her shoulders in a half-shrug. “I don’t know. But none of these are Flora. Actually, I don’t think any of them are from either of your pack. They’re older. The individual scents are too small to make out.”

I don’t know how she could know. She sounds so certain and confident. Hope is a terrible thing to flicker in my chest but I can’t erase it.

My fingers curl at my sides.

“There’s something else,” she says.

I glance at her. “What?”

“Yeah, something faint, but it’s there.” Her nostrils flare again, and she clicks her tongue, tasting the air, as she thinks. “And it’s familiar… Very familiar. I know that smell. I know…”

Torin snorts. “What the hell is she talk—”

“I know!” She shouts suddenly, eyes glowing liquid gold in the firelight. Her excitement buzzes through the mate bond and washes over me, making my heartrate speed up. “I know exactly where Andras is keeping the omegas.”