The tavern's lantern glowed like a false dawn in the distance. I passed the butcher's shop, its windows shattered, and the millhouse, still smoldering.
The tavern's sign—The Staggering Hart—groaned on its hinges, its weathered wood swaying like a hanged man in the bitter wind. Inside, the air hung thick with the stench of stale ale and charred meat, the usual clamor of fiddles and raucous laughter smothered to a dirge. Patrons slumped over tables like broken puppets, their tankards clutched in hands still trembling from the night's horrors. A woman in the corner traced the rim of her cup with a cracked fingernail, her gaze vacant, while men muttered into their drinks, voices rasping like blades dragged over stone. The hearth spat feeble flames, their light clawing weakly at the walls, casting jaundiced shadows that writhed like dying things.
Mary stood behind the bar, her apron a canvas of soot and old wine stains. Her hands moved with the stiff precision of a clockwork doll, scrubbing a tankard raw until the pewter gleamed. When the door creaked, she froze. Her eyes, red-rimmed and swollen, locked onto the burlap sack in my arms. "In whose name?" she asked, the question fraying at the edges.
"Kisa."
The tankard slipped from her grip, clattering against the counter. A single tear cut through the grime on her cheek, carving a glistening trail down to her quivering chin. For a heartbeat, her composure cracked—a raw, guttural sound escaped her throat, swallowed quickly. She filled a shot glass with amber liquid that reeked of burnt honey, her knuckles bone-white as she slid it toward me. "To Kisa Weles," she rasped.
The toast spread through the room like a contagion. Tankards lifted, their clinks hollow, voices murmuring the words as if reciting a funeral rite. I threw back the drink, the liquor searing my throat—a fleeting inferno against the ice in my veins. From the shadowed corner, Alpha Zion's riders raised their glasses, their leathers creaking, eyes sharp as flint. Zion himself leaned against the wall, helm tucked under one arm. His gaze—black as a starless void, pupils swallowing the dim light—pinned me in place. His lips curved faintly, as he brought his drink up and tipped it in my direction, eyes never leaving mine as he downed it in one go.
The riders' laughter bubbled up, sharp and mirthless. One slammed his glass down, amber liquid sloshing over his scarred knuckles. Drinking while Sundra's children rot in the square, perhaps that's why they failed to protect us. I thought bitterly. Their wolves were absent, but their stench lingered, feral, clinging to their armor like a second skin.
"Iris!" I heard that familiar telltale slur of my name and I knew instantly who it was. Definitely not someone I wanted to entertain tonight.
The tavern's heavy silence shattered as Marco's voice cut through the haze again. "Iris! Don't ignore me, love."
Every head turned. Heat crawled up my neck—not from the liquor, but from the dozen eyes now pinned to me. Marco lounged at his usual table, boots propped arrogantly on a stool, his smirk sharp enough to draw blood. His hunting cronies leered, their laughter stale and humorless. I could leave. Should leave. But the weight of the room's attention anchored me in place.
"What?" I snapped, striding over.
Marco's hand shot out, yanking me onto his lap before I could react. The stool creaked under our combined weight. My cheeks burned with embarrassment, as his arm snaked around my waist, fingers splayed possessively over my hip. A grotesque parody of the nights, two nights, I'd let him touch me there, willingly. When loneliness outweighed sense. Now the bastard had spread it all over the town, that I was his. Disgusting.
"Missed me?" he purred, breath reeking of juniper berries. He used to be much better two years back, more calm, composed and decent, when he was my Tor's best friend. But my brother's death tore him just the way it did us. Flynn had me and I had him, but Mrco had no one and he spiralled.
I shoved against his chest. "Let go—"
"Easy, its Flynn."
My muscles locked. Marco's grip tightened, holding me in place. "What do you mean?"
He traced the rim of his tankard, slowly. "Have a drink first."
"I'm not playing—"
"Flynn's playing." His voice dropped, sharpening. "With fire."
The words slithered under my skin. I glanced at the drink, then at his face, for however stupid his personality might be, he was a decent looking man. Handsome even, as woman here called him. Reluctantly, I snatched the tankard and downed it in one searing gulp.
Marco leaned in, his lips brushing the shell of my ear. "Your brother came sniffing around Old Pat here—" He jerked his chin toward a grizzled man at the corner of the table, his face half-hidden under a moth-eaten hood. Pat avoided my gaze, knuckling a scar that split his brow. "Asking when the recruitment post opens. Where to sign his pretty little name."
Ice flooded my veins. "You're lying."
Marco's grin widened. "Grabbed him by the collar, didn't you, Pat? Thought he was some sucker spy."
Pat grunted, staring into his ale.
"Boy swore it was you wanting to enlist." Marco's thumb dug into my hip. "But we both know that's horse shit."
The room tilted. Flynn's fevered stare at Zion flashed in my mind—the reverence, the hunger. No. Was he going to get the military experience required for the bonding?
"So?" Marco pressed, his breath hot against my jaw. "Which of you's the liar?"
I shoved off his lap, my boots hitting the floor with a thud. "What did you tell him?"
Marco leaned back, smirking. "Told him the post shuts in a week. Nearest one's two towns east—past the Blackridge Pass."
Two towns. My mind raced. Two days' hard ride. Flynn turned eighteen in four. Time enough.
I turned to leave, but Marco caught my wrist. "Thank me later, love."
I wrenched free, shoving through the tavern's swollen door. The cold air slapped my face, sharp with pine and decay. Behind me, the warning bells erupted, a metallic scream split the night.
Again.
The suckers were back.
The warning bells clanged like a death knell, their echoes threading through the streets as I sprinted. Shadows writhed at the edges of my vision—suckers darting between buildings, their guttural snarls harmonizing with screams. Ahead, a child's wail pierced the chaos. A sucker dragged a boy by the arm, his small boots kicking uselessly at the mud.
Flynn first. Flynn first.
But the boy's scream curdled into a shriek. I skidded to a halt, nocking an arrow. The sucker turned, its eyes glinting like oil slicks, just as my arrow punched through its throat. Black blood sprayed the boy's face. He stared at me, trembling.
"Hide. Now," I hissed, yanking the arrow free. He scrambled under a cart, knees to his chest.
I ran faster.
The woods loomed, the oak's twisted silhouette a sentinel in the moonlight. Lorraine's body lay sprawled across Kisa's grave, her hand still clutching the spade she'd used to bury her daughter. Flynn was gone.
A choked sound escaped me—half-relief, half-dread—until I saw them.
Two suckers hauled Flynn's limp body toward the town square, his arms dragging like broken wings. Another hoisted Lorraine over its shoulder, her braid swinging like a pendulum. They moved swiftly, purposefully. No snarling. No feeding.
They're taking them into the heart of Sundra.
I crouched behind a crumbling wall, bile rising in my throat. Suckers didn't take prisoners. But these moved with eerie coordination, their taloned hands careful, almost reverent. They weren't hunting.
But the Wolves weren't here. No howls, no thundering paws. Just the suckers' ragged breaths and the creak of Flynn's boots scraping stone.
Negotiation. The word struck me. The suckers had never bargained before—they devoured, they infected, they left ash. But now they marched prisoners toward the square, where the gallows stood half-built. Where Zion had promised a traitor's execution at dawn.
They weren't here to feast. They were here to trade.
Lorraine stirred, her head lolling. One sucker clamped a clawed hand over her mouth, silencing her. Flynn's face was pale, blood trickling from his temple. Alive, at least for now.
I trailed them, arrow nocked, my pulse a frantic drumbeat. The square swarmed with suckers, their gaunt forms silhouetted against torches they'd lit themselves. At the center, a figure stood atop the gallows platform—tall, emaciated, its skin mottled gray. A sucker lord.
Its voice slithered across the square, gravelly and mangled, yet unmistakably human in its cunning, "We don't want a fight now, just give us what we want and have your people back."
Lorraine and Flynn were thrown at the base of the gallows, with countless others. The sucker lord's hollow eyes scanned the crowd—no, not the crowd. The rooftops. The shadows and alleys, where people like me hid.
The Wolves materialized like specters from the gloom—silent, lethal, their volanema wolves' eyes glowing like embers. Alpha Zion strode ahead, his sword a sliver of moonlight forged into steel. The sucker lord's lips peeled back in a grotesque grin, blackened gums glistening.
"How lovely," it crooned, voice rasping like a saw through bone. "The mighty Wolves finally slink from their dens. Where were you when the blood ran? When the children screamed?" Its head swiveled toward the crowd, pupils dilating hungrily. "Drinking. Always drinking. Feasting on your failures."
Murmurs rippled through the survivors. A man near the millhouse spat, his glare slicing toward Zion.
No. My nails bit into my palms. The suckers weren't just negotiating—they were sowing rot. Turning desperation into revolt.
The sucker lord raised a clawed hand, and the square fell silent. "Give us one of yours," it hissed, talon pointing at Zion. "A Wolf. And we return these… trinkets." Its foot nudged Flynn's limp form. "Or keep your beasts. Let Sundra's last breaths choke on their loyalty."
The crowd erupted.
"Take him!" a woman shrieked, clutching a bloodied shawl.
"They left us to die!" another roared.
Zion didn't flinch. His gaze locked onto the sucker lord, blade steady. But the survivors edged closer, faces twisted with grief and rage.
They'll hand him over. The realization iced my veins. The Wolves had failed Sundra. And now Sundra would sacrifice them.
The sucker lord's grin widened, fangs dripping. It knew. Knew the Wolves' pride would chain them here. Knew the crowd's love had curdled to venom.
"Choose, Alpha," it taunted. "Your pack? Or your prey?"
Zion's sword lifted, a silver arc in the torchlight. "We don't bargain with bloodsuckers."
But the crowd surged forward, their cries a tempest.
"Give them what they want!"
"You owe us!"
I pressed against the wall, breath shallow. The suckers didn't want a corpse—they wanted a Wolf alive.
And Sundra, bleeding and broken, was about to deliver one.