Breaking point

Chapter 2: Breaking Point

Ezra

Smoke poured through the shattered ballroom windows as wolves scattered in every direction, their expensive clothes becoming a barrier to their will to survive. Another explosion rocked the eastern wing, close enough that I felt the vibration in my bones.

"Get the civilians to the safe rooms!" Damon's Alpha command rolled across the ballroom, forcing every wolf within range to obey. Guards materialized from hidden positions, ushering screaming nobles toward reinforced interior chambers.

Milo gripped my arm. "Ezra, you need to go with them."

"Like hell."

"You are not trained for…"

"I am a wolf, aren't I?" I pulled free, already moving toward the balcony edge. Below, in the courtyard, dark shapes poured through the breached outer gates. Dozens of them. Feral wolves with matted fur and eyes that gleamed with madness.

But something was wrong with them. Even from this distance, I could see the wrongness… black veins spider-webbing beneath their skin, mouths foaming with dark saliva that looked more like tar than spit.

"What are they?" I breathed.

Damon appeared beside me, his face carved from stone. "Corrupted. I have seen this before, years ago."

More guards rushed past us, weapons drawn to meet the charging beast. The Royal Guard had trained for this scenario… but theory and practice were viciously different things.

"The border outpost sent no warning," Milo said, voice tight with controlled fear. "They should have reported any breach."

"They're probably dead." Damon's blunt assessment made Milo flinch. "This was coordinated."

A corrupted wolf scaled the palace wall with unnatural speed, claws scrabbling against stone. It launched itself toward the balcony, jaws wide and dripping that black poison.

I moved without thinking.

Power exploded through my limbs as I jumped, meeting the creature mid-air. My fist connected with its skull with a sickening crunch, and we both crashed onto the balcony in a tangle of limbs. The wolf snapped at my throat. I rolled, using momentum to throw it off, then grabbed a decorative iron torch from its wall mount and drove it through the creature's spine.

It died with a wet gurgle.

I stood, panting, staring at my hands. They were shaking. Not from fear.

From exhilaration.

The marks on my chest, back, and wrist pulsed with molten heat, but for the first time in months, it didn't feel like pain. It felt like purpose. Like my body was finally being used the way it was meant to be used.

"Ezra." Milo's voice was strangled. "Your eyes."

I turned. Both my fathers stared at me with identical expressions of shock.

"What?"

"They are glowing," Damon said quietly. "Purple light. Like…"

Like power was leaking out of me.

Another explosion. Closer this time. The western guard tower collapsed in a shower of stone and fire.

"I am going down there," I said.

"Absolutely not…"

"Father." I met Damon's gaze, letting him see the determination in mine. "I am your strongest warrior, and right now I can help. You know I can."

For a long moment, we stood in silent battle of wills. Alpha King versus prince. Father versus son.

Milo touched Damon's arm. "Let him go."

"Milo…"

"He is right. We need every fighter." Milo's purple eyes…my eyes…found mine. "But you stay with the Guard units. No solo heroics. Promise me."

“I promised.” I never meant it.

We descended into chaos.

The palace courtyard had transformed into a war zone. Royal Guards fought in tight formations against waves of corrupted wolves that seemed to feel no pain, no fear. I joined a unit defending the main gates, falling into the rhythm of combat with an ease that should have terrified me.

Duck, Strike, Dodge, Kill.

The marks burned hotter with each movement, each impact. Power flooded my system in waves… building pressure behind my sternum like a dam about to burst.

A corrupted wolf twice my size charged straight at me, black veins pulsing beneath its fur. I braced, caught its momentum, and used its own weight to flip it over my shoulder. Before it could recover, I brought my boot down on its throat.

Crack.

The black mark on my chest flared with white-hot agony.

I gasped, stumbling backward. The pressure building inside me reached a breaking point. I could feel it… the raw, uncontrolled power surging through my veins, it was looking for release.

"Fall back!" Someone was screaming. "The prince… something's wrong with the prince!"

I tried to answer. I tried to tell them to run.

The world turned purple.

Power detonated outward from my body in a shockwave of pure physical force. It slammed into everything within a thirty-foot radius… corrupted wolves, stone walls, iron gates. Bodies flew away from me.

Then darkness swallowed me whole.

*****************

I woke up to white ceiling and the sharp smell of antiseptic.

The palace infirmary.

I recognised the place that I have spent enough time here as a child after training accidents. Soft light filtered through gauzy curtains, but it couldn't stop the migraine at the back of my head.

It couldn't stop the flashes of memories of what happened before I blacked out.

I groaned, turning my neck to look at my body. Someone had stripped me to my waist, and bandages wrapped my chest and wrist.

"He is awake." Healer Daphne appeared above me, her silver hair pulled back in a severe bun. Her expression was grim. "Don't try to sit up yet."

I sat up anyway. Pain lanced through my chest, but I gritted my teeth and swung my legs over the edge of the bed. "How many did we lose?"

"Fourteen guards. Twenty-three civilians. Could have been much worse if you hadn't…" She paused, choosing words carefully. "If you hadn't intervened."

Fourteen guards. Twenty-three people died because something had breached our defenses during a party meant to celebrate peace.

"The corrupted wolves?"

"All dead. Your... ability... destroyed most of them. The Guard finished the rest." Daphne moved to a side table, gathering supplies with practiced efficiency. "Your fathers are waiting outside. But before I let them in, you and I need to talk."

Something in her tone made my stomach drop. "About?"

She turned, and in her hands was a leather-bound book that looked older than the palace itself. "About why you are dying, Prince Ezra."

The words hung in the air like a death sentence.

"The marks aren't just burning you," Daphne continued, her voice soft but merciless. "They are consuming you. Your body is producing power faster than it can safely channel it. That's why you lost control during the battle. That's why…" She opened the book to a marked page covered in ancient script and anatomical drawings. "That's why you will be dead before the Winter Solstice unless we stabilize the bond."

Winter Solstice. Three months away.

"What bond?" I asked, though some part of me already knew.

"The triad mate bond." She pointed to a drawing of a wolf with three crescent marks identical to mine. "Rare. Ancient. And absolutely forbidden under current pack law." Her finger traced the text beneath. "Three marks for three mates. The bonds are designed to anchor and distribute supernatural power too great for one wolf to contain alone. Without all three mates present and bonded, the power tears the marked wolf apart from the inside."

Three mates.

In a world my fathers had rebuilt on the foundation of traditional pair bonds. Three mates were unheard off.

"Have you dreamed of them?" Daphne asked. "Your mates?"

Yes. God, yes. A scarred face in falling snow. Gentle hands among green leaves. Voices I couldn't quite hear calling my name.

"What happens if I find them?" I whispered.

"You live." She closed the book.

"What happens if I don't?"

She didn't need to answer that, because the door opened at that moment.

Milo and Damon, my two fathers entered, their faces etched with worry that transformed into relief when they saw me sitting upright.

"Ezra…" Milo crossed the room in three strides and pulled me into a crushing embrace. "Don't you ever scare me like that again."

"Daphne told you?" I said against his shoulder.

“Told me what honey?”

I looked at Daphne in shock, who just gave a shrug that said it's not my cross to bear.

“I…Daphne said, my marks...”

“Ezra is dying.” Daphne cut me off.

“Whatt!!”