AIDEN POV
The ergency howl cut through the night like a blade through quiet.
I bolted upright in my homade command center, instantly alert. That wasn’t one of our pack’s screams. It was higher, more desperate, and it ca from the direction of Moonview Pack territory - twenty miles south of Silver Peak.
"Alpha!" One of our scouts burst through the door, his face white with fear. "River Valley Pack is gone!"
My blood turned to ice. "What do you an gone?" "Wiped out. Every single wolf. But not by people or rogues." The scout’s voice shook. "Sothing else. Sothing that left marks we’ve never seen before."
I was already grabbing my coat and guns. River Valley Pack had over two hundred mbers. For sothing to destroy them completely in one night ant we were facing a threat bigger than anything we’d faced.
"Get Brock," I ordered. "And send word to the other nearby packs. Everyone needs to know."
As I ran toward Moonview territory, my mind raced through options. The humans with their mind control technology were bad enough. The void entity pretending to be Lily’s son was another nightmare entirely. But this sounded like sothing new.
Sothing worse.
I reached the line between our territories just as howls erupted from Moonview Pack lands. Not ergency howls this ti - death howls. The kind wolves made when sothing terrible was happening.
"Too late," I whispered, forcing myself to run faster.
The scene I found at Moonview Pack’s main village made my stomach turn. Bodies everywhere, but not torn apart like you’d expect from a normal attack. These wolves looked drained - their fur gray and dead, their eyes empty holes.
Like sothing had sucked the very life out of them.
"Alpha Aiden?" A weak voice called from behind a fallen cabin.
I spun around to find Alpha Garrett of Moonview Pack crawling toward . He was barely alive, his once-strong body withered to skin and bones.
"Garrett! What happened here?"
"Hunters," he gasped. "But not human hunts. Things that... that eat dinsional energy. They ca through tears in the air, looking for sothing."
My heart stopped. "Looking for what?"
"Soone who moves between worlds. Soone who exists in various realities at once." His dying eyes t mine. "They’re hunting the Triple Moon bearer."
The words hit like a physical blow. Entities that hunted interdinsional beings were targeting Lily specifically. And she was sowhere in another reality right now, totally unaware of the danger.
"How many of these hunters are there?" I asked quickly.
"Started with three. But they increase every ti they feed." Garrett coughed up blood. "By the ti they left here, there were dozens."
I knelt beside him, feeling helpless as the life drained from his eyes. "How do we stop them?"
"You can’t," he whispered. "They live between dinsions. Physical strikes pass right through them. Only soone with dinsional powers can hurt them."
He gripped my arm with the last of his strength. "But Aiden... they’re not just hunting Lily. They’re hunting anyone linked to her. Anyone who’s been touched by interdinsional energy."
My blood turned to ice as I understood. "The mate bond."
"You, Brock, Caleb - all of you are linked to her across dinsions through your pack ties. You’re all targets now."
Garrett’s eyes went blank, and I was alone among the bodies of two entire packs.
I ran back toward Silver Peak faster than I’d ever run in my life. These dinsional hunters had taken out four hundred wolves in two nights, and they were coming for my pack next. Coming for everyone Lily cared about.
But as I reached our area, I found sothing that made my situation even worse.
Brock was kneeling in our main clearing, clutching his head in pain. Around him, several other pack mbers were doing the sa thing.
"What’s wrong?" I demanded, dropping to my knees beside my brother.
"Sothing’s happening to the mate bond," he gasped. "It feels like it’s being pulled apart."
Caleb stumbled out of his cabin, his face twisted in pain. "I can barely feel Lily anymore. It’s like she’s being erased from reality."
That’s when I understood the horrible truth. The dinsional hunters weren’t just tracking Lily through our bonds - they were using our ties to hurt her. Every connection she had to our world was being turned into a weapon against her.
"We have to break the bonds," I realized.
"What?" Brock stared at in shock.
"The mate bond, the pack ties, every connection that links us to Lily across dinsions. We have to cut them all, or these killers will use them to kill her."
Caleb shook his head furiously. "If we break the mate tie, we might never be able to find her again. She could be lost between dinsions forever."
"But if we don’t break it, she dies for sure," I pleaded. "Along with everyone else these hunters target."
More pack mbers were dropping to their knees now, crying out as their bonds to Lily were attacked by forces they couldn’t see or fight.
"How do we even break a mate bond?" Brock asked through gritted teeth.
Before I could answer, Elder Henrik appeared beside us. The old wolf looked ancient and tired, but his eyes were sharp.
"There is a way," he said softly. "A rite from the old tis, before the Triple Moon prophecy. But it takes a sacrifice."
"What kind of sacrifice?" I asked, though I was afraid of the answer.
"The Alpha’s life force," Henrik stated. "To break ties that strong, soone has to give up their connection to the pack entirely. Beco fully human, with no dog spirit left."
I felt the world spin around . To save Lily, I would have to give up everything that made who I was. My wolf form, my enhanced strength, my connection to the pack I’d been born to lead. "And there’s no guarantee it would work," Henrik continued. "You might sacrifice everything and still lose her."
Around us, more pack mbers collapsed as the dinsional hunters’ attack increased. Whatever was happening to Lily in that other world, it was tearing apart everyone who loved her.
I looked at Brock and Caleb, seeing my own desperate decision reflected in their eyes.
"There’s sothing else," Henrik said, his voice heavy with fear. "The ritual has to be perford at the exact mont the dinsional hunters reach our world. Too early, and the bonds will reform. Too late, and everyone dies."
"When will they get here?" I asked.
Henrik pointed toward the horizon, where strange tears in the air were starting to appear.
"Now," he whispered.
As the first dinsional hunter stepped through a crack in reality - a creature made of shadow and hunger that seed to exist in several dinsions at once - I realized I had seconds to make the most important choice of my life.
Save Lily by destroying myself, or watch everyone I loved die trying to protect ties that were killing her.
The hunter turned its empty eyes toward , and I could feel it beginning to drain the life from every wolf in Silver Peak.
Ti was up.
Reviews
All reviews (0)