Page 64 of Pack Rage
One of the Enforcers who’d been escorting us snarled, “They’re all supposed to be outside,” and barged through the kitchen door, ordering whoever was still in there to go to the ring. I wasn’t sure what that was about, but it couldn’t be good.
“Gotta pee,” I announced, and Finn stopped in his tracks ahead of us. I wasn’t lying.
“This way,” he said, pointing to a door.
Niall snarled at him, but Luke lifted an eyebrow. “Even at Southern, we don’t want shifters pissing on our floors.”
“I mean, I could just go in the corner…” I gestured to a plant.
Luke stifled a laugh. “It’s a hell of a lot cleaner than our latrines.”
Finn ran a gentle hand over my arm as he opened the door for me. “Take your time.”
“We don’t have fuckingtime,” Niall bitched, but my mates stared him down, while Bradley and Margarette snuck juice and handfuls of fruit and cheese behind his back. I slipped into the bathroom and peed, then washed my hands and face, giving the Hilliers and Mama enough time to gather strength, I hoped.
When I came back out, Margarette and Bradley each took turns in the bathroom. Margarette whispered, “We’re just delaying the battle.”
I half-smiled, though my nerves were making me feel a little sick, but Brand answered for me. “Good. The moon should be high in the sky for what’s ahead.” He gripped my hand, though for some reason, that made the Enforcers around us tense up.
Still, no one shot a gun or attacked us in any way as we exited the Mansion and started walking down a wide, crushed-granite path to the area a quarter mile away, where Glen had told me there was a ring for fighting like we had at Southern. Well, he’d described it as more of a giant circle, hundreds of feet across, with edges that sloped slightly higher, almost like an amphitheater, and a fighting ring in the very center. So like Southern, but bigger and fancier.
Brand stopped walking for a long second, his nostrils flared. “What is it?” My breath made a cloud when I spoke, and I suppressed a shiver. It had to be close to freezing, and nightfall wasn’t even here.
“Blood,” he replied, but started walking again. I tried to smell it, but the stink of silver had seared my nostrils.
Over the hill ahead of us, an eerie glow shone along the upraised lip of the Council area, from a ring of electric torches planted in a giant circle, like miniature streetlights set low to the ground. I couldn’t see down into the ring yet, but I could hear a constant murmur, and see the backs of an enormous crowd.There were hundreds of Eastern shifters gathered inside the circle, most of them in human form, engaged in hushed conversations.
When we crested the low hill and a few of them spotted us, something odd began to happen. Almost all together, the crowd turned.The shifters in human form faced us on their feet, their expressions growing angry. Ugly. They didn’t smell feral, but they looked it, like there was something twisted inside them.
The shifters who wore fur, though, reacted very differently. Almost as one, the wolves dropped to their bellies. I wasn’t surewhat was happening, but Brand seemed to know. His bright gaze fell on the closest wolves, and they began whimpering and whining, backing away.
“Eastern! Make way,” Aidan shouted from the center of the ring, and the lines of troops parted, opening up a path for us to approach.
I spotted a few groups of women, dressed in the black and white uniforms of Eastern’s maids, and lifted my chin to Becca and Vanya, whose chests heaved like they were out of breath, and scared out of their wits. What were they doing here?I supposed a Council meeting could be open to any shifter, right? But every single one of the Mansion’s maids was out here, shivering in their thin uniforms, and shooting wary glances at the Enforcers that hemmed them in.
As I stepped over the rim of the hill, I noted something else odd: a thick double stripe of something white on the ground, or in it. A ring of chalk or stone, buried in the dirt an inch down? I wasn’t sure, but there wasn’t time to examine it.
“Bring them here, Niall.” The Eastern Alpha was dressed in a black suit, like he was about to run a board meeting for humans, rather than a shifter Council. Almost all the others closest to him, the ones in clothing at least, wore Eastern Enforcers’ uniforms, black on black.
There were a few shifters standing beside him dressed in odd uniforms, though. Without looking at me or Brand, Luke muttered, “A true High Council meeting. He’s called in the smaller packs,” before he broke off with Niall and went ahead.
I peered at them curiously. Had they been at the Southern Conclave? Would they recognize me? At least one of them did, from his reaction, and he began whispering to the shifter on his right. The whispers rushed around the pack, until all of the oddly-clothed shifters were staring at me… until they noticedBrand, and his eyes. Then they fell silent, their faces shining with awe and fear, one or two of them even bowing slightly.
Brand walked just ahead of me on my left, and Finn on my right. Bradley and Margarette were behind us, one on each side of Mama to help her if she needed it, but we all entered the ring within a few steps of each other, and over another line of chalk, though it was gritty when my boot scuffed against it, and pinkish. Salt, maybe, though this one had been mixed with blood. That couldn’t be good news.
I peered around, taking in the groups just in front of a huddle of maids. It looked like there were far more foreign pack members here than there ought to be. I counted heads the best I could, and thought it could be a solid third of the crowd. Where had they all come from?
My ears popped just as I stepped onto the packed earth. For a split second, all I could smell was blood. Then, I couldn’t smell anything but silver and sweat, along with the hundreds of shifters who milled nearby. Something was wrong, and the hairs on my neck stood up.
It felt like I’d entered a bubble, and I was cut off from the bonds that connected me to Grigor and Glen. No, not cut off. They were muted, like they were on the other side of a canyon, and so was the power I’d felt buzzing in my veins up until now.
As I stared at Aidan in the ring’s center, Niall at his left and Luke taking up position on his right, I reached for my missing mates. They didn’t answer, though I could sense their presence at the end of the cords that bound us.
I didn’t like it. The foreboding got stronger as the moon began to peek over the trees to the east. Brand was feeling it, too, I could tell. His unease was almost overwhelming, until he realized I was starting to panic.
I went still, a whisper echoing in my mind.Grigor?It seemed like he’d tried to speak to me… No, to one of the others. Eventhough I didn’t think he was hurt, he was raging. Struggling, somehow, or exerting himself in some way. Was he fighting Elina?
I glanced up at Brand, whose brow was furrowed as his gaze jerked from the ground to the sky and back again, like he was trying to figure out what was going on. Listening to something, though no one around was speaking, at least not to him.
