Chapter 8: "Blood and Betrayal"

Stephen's POV

The scent hit me the moment I walked through the front door of our castle. Wrong. Everything was wrong.

Maya's scent was fading, getting weaker by the hour, and underneath it was something else. Something that made my wolf pace restlessly in my chest, snarling and snapping at nothing. Chloroform. Fear. And another scent I couldn't quite place but made my teeth ache to think about.

"Where is she?" I bellowed, my alpha voice echoing through the stone halls.

Karl appeared at the top of the grand staircase, his face grim. "Gone."

That one word hit me like a physical blow. My wolf roared inside my chest, demanding blood, demanding answers, demanding our mate back safe in our territory where she belonged.

"What do you mean gone?" I took the stairs three at a time, moving faster than human eyes could follow.

Nathan and Elijah emerged from different hallways, both looking like they'd been hit by a truck. Nathan's shoulder was still bandaged from where Maya had shot him, and Elijah's usually perfect appearance was disheveled.

"We found signs of a struggle in the forest," Elijah said quietly. "About halfway between the school and her old house. Broken branches, disturbed earth. Someone took her."

The rage that filled me then was unlike anything I'd ever experienced. Not just anger, but something deeper and more dangerous. The mate bond was pulling at me, demanding I find her, protect her, bring her home. Even though she'd rejected us. Even though she'd rather die than accept us as her mates.

She was still ours.

"How long?" My voice came out as a growl.

"At least twelve hours," Karl said. "Maybe more."

Twelve hours. She could be anywhere by now. Hurt. Scared. Or worse.

"This is your fault," I snarled, whirling on my brothers. "All of you. We should have been watching her."

"My fault?" Nathan stepped forward, his own alpha energy rising to meet mine. "You're the one who insisted on playing games with her at school. Kissing Allison right in front of her like she didn't matter."

"She doesn't matter," I snapped, even though the words tasted like ash in my mouth. "She's just.."

"Our mate," Elijah finished coldly. "She's our mate, Stephen. Whether we like it or not."

The air in the hallway grew thick with tension. My brothers and I had always been united, always worked as one unit despite our different personalities. But now, with Maya missing and the mate bond pulling at all of us, cracks were starting to show.

"Maybe this is for the best," Elijah continued, his voice calm and detached in that way that always made me want to punch him. "She clearly doesn't want us. She shot Nathan. She tried to reject the bond. Maybe we should just let whoever took her keep her."

The words hit me like silver bullets. "You don't mean that."

"Don't I?" Elijah shrugged, but I could see the tension in his shoulders, the way his hands were clenched into fists. "She's caused nothing but trouble since the moment we discovered the bond. The pack is already talking. Questioning our leadership. A Luna who doesn't want to be Luna is worse than no Luna at all."

"She's ours," Karl said quietly, but there was something in his voice that made me look at him more closely. Something hidden.

"Is she?" Nathan laughed bitterly. "Because last I checked, she'd rather put a bullet in us than share a bed with us."

"Enough." I used my full alpha authority, and all three of my brothers went silent. "We find her. We bring her back. End of discussion."

"And then what?" Elijah asked, not backing down despite my alpha command. "Force her to accept the bond? Lock her in a tower until she gives in? You saw how well that worked before."

"Then we make her understand.."

"Understand what?" Nathan interrupted. "That we're going to keep her prisoner until she loves us? That we're going to terrorize her into submission? Because that's what we've been doing, Stephen. That's exactly what we've been doing."

The truth in his words made my chest tight. We had terrorized her. We'd cornered her, threatened her, made her sleep in my room like a pet. We'd let her father sell her to us like property and told ourselves it was fate.

"The bond.." I started.

"The bond doesn't mean anything if she doesn't choose it," Nathan said. "And she's made her choice pretty clear."

"So what are you saying?" I demanded. "That we just give up? Let her go?"

The silence that followed was deafening.

"Maybe," Elijah said finally. "Maybe that would be the merciful thing to do."

I stared at my brothers, seeing them clearly for the first time in days. Nathan looked haunted, like he hadn't slept since Maya shot him. Elijah was his usual cold self, but there were dark circles under his eyes. And Karl...

Karl was avoiding my gaze entirely.

"Karl." My voice came out sharp. "What aren't you telling us?"

He looked up then, and I saw something in his expression that made my blood run cold. Guilt.

"I might know who took her," he said quietly.

The temperature in the hallway seemed to drop ten degrees.

"What do you mean you might know?" Nathan stepped closer, his own anger flaring.

Karl ran a hand through his dark hair, looking more uncomfortable than I'd seen him in years. "I've been... talking to some people. Other packs. About our situation."

"What kind of talking?" I could barely keep my voice level.

"The Northern Pack has been asking questions. About Maya. About the bond. They think..." He trailed off, looking anywhere but at us.

"They think what, Karl?" Elijah's voice was deadly quiet.

"They think a mate bonded to four alphas could be valuable. Very valuable. The power that kind of bond could generate..." He shrugged helplessly. "I might have mentioned that we were having trouble with her. That she wasn't... cooperative."

The rage that filled me then was beyond anything I'd ever experienced. I moved without thinking, grabbing Karl by the throat and slamming him against the stone wall hard enough to crack it.

"You sold her out," I snarled. "Your own mate. You gave them information about our mate."

"I didn't mean for this to happen," Karl gasped, but he didn't fight back. "I just... I was frustrated. She'd rejected us, shot Nathan, and I needed to talk to someone who would understand."

"So you chose strangers over your own family?" Nathan's voice was pure venom.

"They're not strangers," Karl said. "Marcus Wells leads the Northern Pack now. He understands pack politics better than anyone."

I dropped Karl so suddenly he stumbled, my mind racing. "Marcus Wells? The same Marcus Wells who was at Maya's house that first night?"

Karl's face went white. "What?"

"He was there with her father, planning to..." I couldn't finish the sentence. The memory of that night, of Maya's terror, made my wolf howl with rage.

"Oh God." Karl's legs gave out, and he slumped against the wall. "What have I done?"

Nathan disappeared without another word, probably to his room to destroy something. Or maybe to pack a bag and leave. The way things were going, I wouldn't blame him.

"We have to find her," I said, but even as the words left my mouth, I wasn't sure my brothers would help me anymore.

"Do we?" Elijah asked. "Or do we let the consequences of our actions play out?"

I looked at him, really looked at him, and saw something I'd never seen before. Fear. My youngest brother was scared.

"She's our mate," I said simply.

"She's a girl who wants nothing to do with us," he replied. "Maybe it's time we accepted that."

But I couldn't accept it. Will never do. The mate bond was pulling at me, demanding I find her, save her, bring her home. Even if home wasn't what she wanted.

It took us three hours to track her scent to the forest where she'd been taken. Another two hours to follow the trail of whoever had grabbed her. The scent led us deep into neutral territory, to a compound I'd never seen before.

It was surrounded by a high fence topped with razor wire, and the smell that came from inside made my skin crawl. Rogue wolves. Dozens of them.

"There," Nathan said, pointing to a guard tower where a figure was silhouetted against the setting sun.

But it wasn't the guards that made my blood freeze. It was what they were carrying.

Silver weapons. Guns loaded with silver bullets. Crossbows with silver-tipped arrows.

"They're ready for us," Elijah observed quietly.

"They're ready for war," I corrected.

And somewhere inside that compound was our mate. Whether she wanted us or not..