Page 4 of His Claim
Out here, fancy didn’t matter.
Out here, only teeth and claws, speed and instinct kept you alive.
Perfect for me.
I walked the long hall with a trail of wolves behind me, the heavy cart wheels rattling over the uneven floor as we pushed the tarp-covered body of a Nyktos toward the research wing. The stench of it bled through the wrapping, all rot and rancid sulfur, worse than anything I’d ever smelled before. Even dead, it made the hair rise on the back of my neck.
A few of the younger guards gagged, one muttering a curse under his breath.
“Hold your damn breath,” I snapped, my voice echoing off the steel walls. “It’s dead. It won’t bite you now.”
They straightened up quick. Good. Fear kept them sharp, but weakness would get them killed out here. We walked a razor’s edge.
We reached the reinforced door, its keypad glowing red in the dark. I slapped my palm against the sensor. The locks clanked open, the door sliding back with a hiss to reveal the research lab. It was bright, sterile, and reeking of chemicals and antiseptic.
Two lab techs, both wolves that were thin and pale from too much time underground, stood waiting. They adjusted their masks, their eyes darting to the tarp-covered form as my men laid their gruesome delivery on a stainless-steel examination table.
“Commander Varek,” one said nervously. “Is this?—?”
I ripped the tarp back before he finished. The Nyktos’s face glistened under the lights, its skin dark and stretched tight over bone, its mouth still open in a rictus of pointed teeth. Blackblood clung to its chest where a set of claws had torn clean through.
Both techs recoiled.
“Do your job,” I growled. “Get it on ice before it rots any further. The Council wants results.”
They scrambled forward, fumbling with their instruments, and I turned away, already sick of the sight.
Behind me, my men waited.
Joren, my second in command, leaned casually against the wall, his arms crossed over his chest. He was taller than me by a head, all lean muscle and a scar down one cheek he liked to tell rookies he’d gotten from a Resistance blade. In truth, it had been a pissed-off bear. He was loyal, though, and smart enough to keep his mouth shut when needed, so I liked him.
Beside him stood Rafe and Gareth, brothers who’d joined the Guard together. They were younger, brutal in a fight, but reckless. I was still hammering discipline into their thick skulls, and I knew it would be a while yet until they learned anything useful.
Then there was Brenna. Small, muscular, incredibly intelligent, and with a knife she was terrifyingly skilled with always within reach. She was the only female in my unit, and meaner than the lot of them combined. She’d cut a man’s throat just to make a point, but she followed orders like they were gospel.
They were all killers. Wolves forged for war. My soldiers.
They trusted me.
If only they knew.
I was taking my time, but eventually I was going to burn the wolves from the inside out.
And I’d start with the ones who killed my Elena.
It had taken years, but I’d followed the trail like an alluring scent. I noticed small things at first, the kind of loose threads that most men might ignore: a patrol rotation that didn’t add up, a ration manifest rerouted through the Council docks, a medic who’d been moved off-shift the week of the raid on my home. I pulled at those threads until names surfaced, until I found signatures, all approved by Darius Voss.
The commanding leader of the Council.
Tall, pale, with silver at his temples and a smile that practiced civility while his men murdered people in the street, he’d risen through the Council not by brute force, but by papers signed in clean rooms and promises whispered to men who wanted power. He’d built the human breeding program, sat in glassed boardrooms while others did the breaking, and convinced himself it was science and order, not cruelty.
He was going to die, and it would be by my hands.
I hadn’t loved anyone since her. I’d sworn away from it, vowing never to take a mate as long as I lived.
I’d lost too much to love again. There could never be anyone to replace Elena.
The wheels of the gurney squealed and broke my focus when the techs pushed it into place, muttering to each other like nervous carrion birds. The heavy door slammed shut behind them, sealing in the reek of rot.
