Ambushed in the Badlands

Violet:

I felt it the moment we crossed over into the badlands, and despite Alec’s rapid speed, he felt it when a violent shudder rolled through me.

“What’s wrong?” He asked the moment I resituated on his back. 

“I hate the badlands,” I admitted, fighting the urge to touch the scars that seemed to have come to life on my back the moment we crossed into the territory.

Before he could finish the sentence he had opened his mind to ask, he stopped, and so did the rest of the group. 

Alec’s body shifted beneath me, muscles tightening, head lowering slightly. Around us, lycans spread into formation without needing to be told. I slid down from his back before he could protest, boots hitting the cracked earth just as figures began emerging from the broken treeline ahead.

One.

Three.

Seven.

Then more.

Rogues.

But not like the scattered, half-starved ones most packs whispered about.

These were thick with power. Veins dark beneath their skin. Eyes glowing unnaturally bright, almost feverish. Their movements were sharp—too sharp—like their bodies couldn’t fully contain whatever had been pumped into them.

They were supercharged, like rogues on steroids. Alec moved slightly in front of me. But, I stepped around him as his head snapped toward me in warning. Then one of the rogues laughed. A harsh, scraping sound.

“Well, I’ll be damned,” the man at the front said, stepping fully into view. I knew him instantly. Brogan. Bigger than I remembered. Crueler in the eyes. “Look what the Alpha’s pet dragged in.”

Pet.

The word slid across my skin like acid.

“I’m not his pet, Brogan,” I said calmly.

Recognition rippled through the group. They knew me. Every single one of them. Some of them had trained with me, bled with me, and survived winters with me.

“You should leave,” I told them, my voice steady despite the way Alec’s power flared behind me. “This isn’t your fight.”

Brogan’s smile widened. “Oh, it is now.”

“You don’t want this,” I warned quietly.

He looked past me at Alec, eyes narrowing. “That the Alpha you’ve attached yourself to? Didn’t take you long to find a new shield, Violet.”

Alec’s growl rolled low and lethal behind me as Brogan took one more step forward.

“You always did hide behind something stronger.” That was when I felt it. The shift in the rogues’ stance. I realized then that they weren’t here by accident. They were here because Neal somehow paid them to be there, and when Brogan’s gaze locked on Alec with open challenge, when he said, “Let’s see how strong he really is,” something in me went very, very still.

“I’m asking you one last time,” I said softly. “Walk away.” But Brogan lunged, not at me, at Alec. I moved before the pack could get in formation to protect him, before Alec could protect himself. 

My hand reached over my shoulder mid-stride, fingers wrapping around the compact steel at my back. I pulled. The staff snapped free with a metallic hiss, extending to full length in a single smooth motion. The blade at its end gleamed as it locked into place. I jumped forward. I used Alec’s lowered shoulder as leverage, boot planting against his flank for height as I launched myself directly into Brogan’s path. His eyes widened just as I twisted in the air.

The blade drove down, clean and brutal as it punched through bone with a sickening crack and buried itself deep in his skull. Momentum carried us both to the ground. I landed in a crouch as his body collapsed beneath me, staff still embedded. Silence fell as Brogan’s blood soaked hungrily into the dry dirt of the badlands.

I rose slowly, one boot planting against Brogan’s shoulder as I ripped the staff free with a sharp twist. The metallic ring of it locking back into place echoed in the stillness.

“You were always stronger than this,” I said to the remaining rogues, meeting their stunned gazes one by one. “This isn’t power. It’s poison.”

One of them trembled—not in fear, but in withdrawal. His eyes flickered violently.

“They’re dosing you,” I realized aloud. “Who?” No one answered.

Alec shifted fully beside me, towering, lethal, his pack fanning outward to flank the rogues. The moment stretched. Then one of them snarled and chaos erupted.

The silence shattered without warning.

The rogues moved as one, not wild or scattered, but coordinated in a way that made my stomach drop. Two launched straight for Alec while three broke wide to engage the outer lycans. The rest came for me.

Of course they did.

Alec shifted fully in a violent snap of bone and muscle, his massive lycan form colliding midair with the first attacker. The impact cracked like splitting timber, the force of it sending both bodies rolling across the Badlands dirt in a storm of claws and dust. Trenches carved into the earth beneath them, but the rogue didn’t fold the way he should have. He struck Alec with unnatural strength, driving him sideways with a power that did not belong to any rogue I had ever fought.

They were dosed. Overcharged.

One reached me before I could move to assist. He swung high, claws aiming for my throat. I ducked beneath the arc and pivoted, bringing my staff around low. The blade sliced clean through his thigh, opening muscle to bone. Blood sprayed hot across my hand.

He didn’t slow.

He snarled and came again as if he hadn’t been cut at all.

Another hit me from the side. I barely managed to get the shaft of my staff up in time to block his strike. The impact rattled through my arms and forced me back two steps, boots grinding into cracked earth. They were stronger than they should have been, faster too—but there was something unstable in their movements. Too much force, not enough control.

I let the second rogue overextend, baiting the next lunge. When he committed, I dropped low and rolled beneath his reach, spinning the staff as I rose behind him. The blade flashed once in the thin Badlands light. It didn’t fully sever his head, but it didn’t need to. He collapsed in a twitching heap.

Alec roared, and the sound tore through the field like thunder. I looked up just long enough to see him rip a rogue off his back and slam him skull-first into a boulder hard enough to fracture stone. Another had latched onto his shoulder, claws digging deep into fur and flesh, but Alec twisted with savage precision and tore the attacker free in his jaws.

Blood streaked his coat.

Mine might have answered that roar if I could shift.

Instead, I ran toward him.

A smaller rogue broke from the chaos and sprinted straight at me. He moved differently—quicker, more precise. Familiar. Recognition flickered in his eyes as we circled each other.

“Don’t,” I warned him quietly.

His expression faltered for half a breath. “Vi…” he rasped.

Then he lunged anyway.

This time, I stepped inside his reach instead of away from it. His claws grazed my shoulder, tearing fabric and skin in a shallow burn, but I was already moving. The blunt end of my staff drove up beneath his jaw with a crack of bone. His head snapped back. I reversed my grip in the same motion and thrust the blade straight through his chest.

His body jerked once, then sagged.

“I told you to leave,” I murmured as I let him fall.

Behind me, one of the lycans went down under the weight of two rogues attacking together. They fought with reckless abandon, striking in frenzied bursts fueled by whatever poison coursed through their veins.

“Left side!” I shouted.

A girl I had heard called Anna shifted mid-motion and barreled into one of them, tearing him off her brother with a savage snarl.

Alec was no longer simply fighting—he was dismantling them. Massive and relentless, golden eyes blazing, he carved through the field with brutal efficiency. But even he was taking hits. One rogue slammed into his flank with enough force to stagger him, something that should not have been possible.

Rage flooded me.

I sprinted and used a fallen body as leverage, vaulting onto the rogue’s back. My staff came down in a decisive arc, the blade punching through the base of his skull. He dropped instantly, nearly dragging me down with him.

Alec’s head snapped toward me, our eyes locking across the chaos. Fury burned there, but beneath it was relief.

Three rogues remained. They hesitated now, breathing raggedly, pupils blown wide and veins dark beneath their skin. One began to laugh, the sound cracked and unhinged.

“They said you’d be weaker,” he panted, staring at Alec. “Said the Alpha would be distracted.”

Alec’s growl deepened into something that vibrated through the ground itself.

“Who said?” I demanded.

The rogue’s grin stretched too wide. “You’ll see.”

Then he charged.

Alec moved at the same time I did. We hit him together—claws and steel striking in brutal synchronicity. Flesh tore. Bone gave way. He did not survive it.

The last two rogues broke, not retreating strategically but fleeing outright, scrambling back toward the cracked horizon. Alec surged forward to give chase, muscles bunching for the pursuit.

I grabbed his fur before he could launch.

“Don’t,” I warned, breath sharp.

He skidded to a halt, chest heaving.

“It’s bait,” I said, scanning the terrain. “They wanted to see how we fight.”

After a long, tense second, he stopped pushing forward.

The surviving rogues vanished into the Badlands.

Silence settled again, thick with blood and dust and the metallic tang of whatever drug had fueled them. One by one, the pack regrouped—wounded, breathing hard, but standing.

Alec shifted back to human form in a ripple of bone and muscle, blood streaking his skin. His eyes found mine immediately.

“You’re bleeding,” he said, stepping closer.

“It’s shallow.”

He didn’t ask before his hand slid to my shoulder, fingers brushing the torn fabric where claws had grazed me. His jaw tightened at the sight.

“They knew you,” he said quietly.

“Yes.”

“And they still came.”

“Yes.”

His thumb pressed slightly firmer against my skin—not to hurt, but to ground.

“They won’t get a second chance,” he said, as the wind shifted across the Badlands, carrying the scent of something deeper and far more deliberate than a rogue ambush. Someone had strengthened them, someone had sent them to us with a purpose, and yes, they may have failed… but what if this was all part of Neal’s plan?