fallen shadows

Dante Milburn

I could scarcely hear the confessor’s testimony over the roaring of blood in my ears.

“So…so you're saying she’s innocent? Are you certain of this? She had no knowledge of my sister’s murder?” Caius bellowed, flailing his hands dramatically at the freakishly tall woman who maintained an air of calm even with the mountain-sized beast towering over her.

He looked like he would break her in half, his harsh gray eyes narrowing with confused suspicion.

She was innocent. 

I almost couldn't believe it, and the weight of guilt felt like it was tearing through my insides like a large boulder, crushing all the organs in its path.

The entire time i’d dismissed her and treated her like shit, she was innocent?

The moisture drained from my mouth when I realized her crumpled form on the carpet remained motionless.

She was nothing like Leila.

It was always a cold day in hell when I misjudged someone, and yet, I had made that mistake with Amara Eldwood.

I needed to see that she was okay. I had to.

“Fuck,”

My body shot forward before I could stop myself and the crowd gasped around me as I descended the stone stairs two at a time.

“Your Highness,” the siren-faced confessor stammered before blushing when I shouldered right past her.

I knew her history with my friend, and I wasn't planning on playing nice any longer than I had to.

“Miss Eldwood. Are you alright? Get the nurses here immediately!” I snapped at the guards who stood confusedly at the foot of the dias before scrambling toward the double doors.

Blood….lots of it pooled around her and the soft core in my gut tightened.

The confessor had promised only to cause enough pain necessary to get the truth but it seemed to me like she had gone to town and back with her magic.

“It hurts…so much—” She choked, her green eyes were wild with delirium as her body spasmed reflexively, making me reach out a hand to steady her.

“Your wounds should have started healing by now. Why is it taking so long?” 

I breathed, watching a flicker of panic flash in her eyes before they rolled back into her head again and my chest tightened.

She was even weaker than I thought. 

Fucks sake, I was almost certain she would die when the confessor plunged her claws into the sides of her head.

The deep red gashes hadn't stopped oozing thick syrupy blood, and I resisted the urge to lick it off her, bunching my hands to fists beside her head.

“Milburn, you mustn't. You're the Alpha damn it, enough—” Ronan’s reasonable whisper was prompt ignored when it reached my ears where I was hunched over the frail woman, tracing my fingers over her arms in an effort to calm her. 

This was all my fault. I did this to her…me.

Tiny black threads seeped in from the corners of her eyes, making the elite wolves who stood the closest gasp.

Black arts. Did she have confessor powers too? 

No…no, that couldn't be. Confessor powers were bright white…black had to mean something else…something from The Darkness.

“What on earth?” Laziel’s cold hiss came above me and a second later, a wide circle had cleared around us…the other wolves terrified of his rage.

So he was allowed to blow his cool and I wasn't? 

Bull-fucking-shit.

A group of uniformed maids crashed down around us, scrambling with their basin of milky white herbs and incense which they passed over her face.

I peeled my body away, my wolf so close to the surface that I was sure its fur would rip through my skin and force me to shift at a second’s notice.

I couldn't breathe, couldn't think… couldn't move as I watched the healers try to resuscitate her.

“Your Highness! We’re losing her! She needs blood! The backup won't arrive from the treasuries in time!” the wide-eyed healer hissed, sticking a green-fluid needle in her vein.

I watched the green’s short burst of luminescence as it raced up her arm before shooting back down. Failing to contain whatever it was that was wrong with her.

“Confessor. You did this, what’s happening to her?” I turned to spit at the woman frozen behind me, her hands shaking from nerves or adrenaline, I wasn't sure.

Laziel stiffened beside me, his frenzied bronze eyes snapping to my face before swinging between us.

“N-Nothing, I did nothing to her alright?” Selene Willow stammered, her face flushing to a bright red hue.

“What visions did you see when you were in her head?” Kefas snapped, and alarm bells clanged wildly in the back of my mind at the startled look on the woman’s face.

She was looking everywhere but at the elder’s face, only shrugging, “The usual stuff,” 

“Why do you care so much about a reject anyway? Its not like she's anyone important—” the raven-haired witch heaved, and I thanked the stars that I had my back to her and my hands full when a surge of rage crackled in my chest.

Laziel moved before I could stop him, and I turned just in time to see him yank on her arm, his yellow, razor sharp fangs dangerously close to her face.

“The next time you refer to our mate as a nobody, Willow, will be your last night on earth. I will kill you myself.” He spat acidly, his voice not low enough to prevent the other wolves from overhearing.

“I-I’m sorry… excuse me,” The confessor rasped, her jaw ticking as tears filled her eyes before she bowed low, marching away from us.

 Well. 

The fucking cat had run away with the bag now.

An insidious gasp licked across the crowd like flames on gasoline as the wolves exchanged wary glances.

Kefas’ face was the most insidious mask of all. The broad strokes of it screwed up into a furious scowl I knew would come and bite me in the ass later on.

“Where…how—” Amara sputtered suddenly, before wheezing through a gasp, battling for breath and flailing around helplessly.

It hurt my core to see her like this, and I glanced around to see the worried faces of some of the wolves all trying to peer down at us.

Caius Winters was missing from his spot at the front lines.

Where had he gone? 

You would think the fucker would feel some shame at having been so loudly wrong, but a fucking ‘sorry for being such a dimwit asshole’ just wasn't our style.

“Shhh, don't say anything now, the nurses would be here any minute,” I soothed, horrified when the redhead cringed away from me, her body shaking violently as she refused to meet my eyes.

Guilt stabbed into my back before I stumbled back a step, hating how i’d managed to make my own mate frightened of me.

Maybe it was best that I was such a monster to her.

I knew deep down nothing good would come from me mating her.

Not when I had so many enemies who would love nothing more than attacking my weaknesses.

That's right, Amara Eldwood was a weakness if I’d ever seen any, but for some reason, I didn't want to cut her off.

“Your compassion is moving, Alpha.” the old commander’s voice was too close to my ear when he spoke and I felt the hairs on the back of my neck stand pin straight.

“Ronan. Would you see to it that our court guests are escorted safely back to their quarters? And double patrols and security around the fortress,” My voice when I spoke sounded like it had come from someone else, floating authoritatively in the air with all the power and finality I didn't feel.

“If only your killer had shown my daughter any. I sent her to your fortress because you promised me you would protect her, Dante Milburn. But instead, you have compassion for killers,” He accused in a heavily accented voice before glaring over my shoulder at the whimpering woman as shudders racked her frame.

I stretched to my feet as my lips formed a straight line, facing the shorter wolf in a way that made his soldiers reach for their swords.

I froze, watching the commander hesitate a tad too long before he held up his hand to stop them.

“Imagine the surprise and rude shock I felt when I woke up to news that my precious daughter is not only dead. She’d been murdered. By someone from your pack. You were careless with the wife your people begged me to send over—” His rage was quiet and icy, and his eyes crinkled with such venom that the lights flickered ominously above us, as if warning of impending doom.

The tension in the room was so thick that it could have lit a bloody firecracker for all it was worth as the old man’s balmy eyes narrowed to slits.

“Commander, I understand how you must feel, but this woman is innocent—” I started, careful to tuck the woman’s frail body behind mine.

I didn't trust the barrel-shaped old man not to strike at her in a flash and ruin what shred of conscience I had left.

“You don't understand a thing. You broke your promise, Alpha, my apologies, but your word is as good as the sawdust your pigs trample on in your fortress barn,” he barked so viciously that the crowd gasped animatedly and a muscle ticked in my temple.

Was he trying to piss me off? 

Caius should have been here to calm him down at least. 

I didn't appreciate threats even on my good days, but right now, I was too edgy to deal with this courteously.

The commander’s beady eyes squinted and narrowed to slits to match the hard look I was giving him.

“I don't know what else you want me to do, commander—” I tried again but he spoke over me, the hard tenor of his voice grating in my ears like chalk scraping across a board.

“I want your whore’s head. And that of her confessor for wasting my fucking time. It is an insult to my pack, Mr. Milburn, that my daughter isn’t even cold in the ground yet and you're already whoring it up with the next bimbo throwing her legs open for you.” He rapped icily and I felt Laziel skulk forward from the shadows like a shark sensing blood in a pool.

Whoring? 

He thought I'd slept with the shadow just because I was protecting her from a very painful death.

“We will do no such thing, Commander. You’ve gotten your confession, now beat it.” Laziel spat, before Kefas’ restraining hand held him back by the shoulders, his unflinching eyes not leaving my face.

The commander seemed taken aback by his statement and his mouth twisted into a cruel smirk.

“Then it cannot be helped. I will take my daughter’s body back with me. And when I get to my castle in the mountains, Alpha Dante, we will war.” He deadpanned, voice and face devoid of emotion as he swung his long brown coat around and exited the hall with his soldiers flanking him on both sides.

“Oh, Milburn. Do you have any idea, what you have just done?” One of the elders hedged, his wild yellow eyes fitting over my face as he straightened the hunch on his back, the air of trepidation circling him like a tornado.

Gallagher Strumwater. 

One of our attack elders who looked deceptively frail. I’d seen him take out a hundred thousand of the infected horde before with just a single swipe of the scythe he kept hidden in his robe.

He was one of the wolves even an Alpha didn't dare cross.

“You have made an enemy of the west, you fools. We can only hope our fortress can handle the commander’s wrath.” the hunchbacked elder cursed, shooting me a look filled with malice before sneering at the woman in my arms.

“Idiots. You are all just a bunch of fucking idiots.” He snapped, his monologue fading to an indecipherable murmur as he shambled down the carpet and a distant boom of thunder rolled through the silence.

Deep black clouds masking the wan light of the morning.

Turning our day into night.