PROLOGUE

"Papa!" Elora screamed watching as her father flew halfway across the room, breaking the table in the living room as he landed on it with a crash.

Bernard Belany, propped himself up on one arm bleeding profusely through his nose, shattered by their Alpha Rasmus’ punch, and sent comforting looks their way even though he was obviously in pain.

He coughed. "Stay back, Baby. Stay with Mama."

"Ah! You have no idea how much I've wanted to do this, Bernard." Alpha Rasmus smiled, uttering his words slowly as if to inflict more pain with them.

"You can't do this. He's your Beta. Res…respect. Respect him." Elora's Mother stuttered, her face shining in dawn's moonlight as its rays hit the tears that were streaming down her cheeks.

"Beta?” He asked incredulously, “He lost that the moment he chose slaves over his own pack!"

With the last word, he kicked her father's belly, sending him sprawling further across the room's floor.

"What is my crime, Rasmus?" Bernard groaned, guarding his belly from another attack from his Alpha's boots. "What did I do to deserve your hate?"

Rasmus replied with the boots. Again and again and again, kicking and kicking, until his Beta began to gag and choke on his own blood, as it flooded his mouth and nostrils.

Elora and her siblings held tightly to their mother as they watched their father get beaten to a pulp in their living room crowded with people that had come to execute their Beta.

Among the crowd were many werewolves they knew, who had come to this house, at some time or the other, to visit them. They had come again tonight— but this wasn't a visit for pleasure or a courtesy call. They'd walked in with torches, asking for her dad's death. The scene filled Elora with so much pain that it felt as though the ground under her was caving in.

Some of those in the room were in chains, bleeding and badly beaten. They had supported her Father and now they would pay for it.

Elora's mother ran towards her mate, in order to shield him from getting anymore bloodied up— but Rasmus stopped her with a vicious kick that had Elora cringing. His boots caught her in the jaw, knocking her away from her mate and she fell, face down, meters away with her hair in a mangled mess coated with tears and the pool of her mate's blood that had covered the floor.

"Please, leave my family out of this," Bernard growled. His eyes flashed a golden yellow and his teeth elongated for a second.

"You'll fight me now? Huh?" Their Alpha mocked. "You fucking traitor! I'll touch your children, if I….."

His words were cut short by the sudden force that had hit him. For a second, her father had shifted into his wolf and run head on into Alpha Rasmus, knocking him down in the process. It was a daring act that had the pack members on their feet and snarling in outrage.

Her father crashed to the ground beside Rasmus breathing heavily. It had taken his last strength to do that but Elora knew he didn’t regret it. Her father wouldn't let anyone hurt his family.

He had tried to fight them off when they had arrived but surrendered when he realized that would put his family in trouble. They had held his children and threatened to kill them as he watched if he didn't.

He had fallen to his knees and had been injected with the Wolf's bane serum so he couldn't shift to his wolf for long or heal from his wounds. That's when their Alpha began to hit him.

Alpha Rasmus got up from his fall, his hand hanging limply from his side. He got up and roared glaring hotly at her father, "Restrain this man in the name of Darwin Pack!"

They grabbed him up, lifting him on to his feet. His facial features were barely recognizable after the pummeling he had received. His face was contorted in pain with bleeding cuts and was rapidly swelling. His jaw hung loosely like it was broken.

Alpha Rasmus approached him and landed a firm blow into his stomach with his other hand causing him to cough up more blood.

The Alpha leaned forward into his Beta's ear and whispered; "Your family will suffer for this, I promise you. I'll make sure you're labeled a traitor, your girls will spend their days in whorehouses, and you won't be there to save them!"

Bernard Belony shook violently, trying to move towards Rasmus with the last of his strength yet unable to break free. The mention of his children had enraged him beyond measure but he hadn't enough strength to make another attack. He relaxed, the pain in his joints worsening by the moment.

"Lead him outside with the others. Bring the children too. Let them see." Rasmus laughed, still staring deeply into his face.

The crowd marched out of the mansion belonging to the Belany's and into the courtyard, heading for the gate, excited whispers carrying into the night air. Public executions hadn’t happened for a long time at the Darwin Pack so this was a rather memorable occasion.

Just outside the gate, Alpha Rasmus orders the crowd to stop looking more menacing in the waning light of the setting sun.

He pointed at the stakes that had already been set up and ordered her father and the other five werewolves be tied up.

They were going to be burnt as a warning to any other who might dare support her Father’s cause.

"You're going to…kill him? Rasmus. R.rr.rasmus! He's your friend!" Elora's Mother's voice rang into the night, a blood curdling chill settling over the air.

Her heart was broken already from the barrage of betrayal they had experienced. The public execution was too much for her already frayed senses.

The people standing here were supposed to be friends. They had eaten many times together and laughed together. But the thought of watching her mate die was the most excruciating. Yet she knew she had to protect her children. Bernard had asked her to stay still.

As the prisoners were being attached to their execution stake, Rasmus walked up to Bernard and punched him in the gut one more time.

"Beg for your life, Beta." He smiled mockingly, then lashed out his fist again at Bernard's face.

Bernard groaned and said nothing.

His eyes moved to his family; his wife kneeling trying not to run to him, and his children cowering under her embrace finally landing on her. Suddenly, he managed a smile as if he’d accepted his fate.

"Light 'em up!!!" Rasmus roared.

The guards walked forward with the torches, dressed in the typical guard uniform of the Darwin pack, with a wide brimmed hat and sword strapped to their side. The flames glistened against the buckles of their scabbard, as they set the stand on fire.

"Papa!!!" Elora and her siblings screamed.

Their mother held tightly to her struggling children with surprising strength, mouth ajar in silent shock as tears streamed down her face.

The glow of the fire seemed to grow, by the second, against the back drop of the darkening sky until it eclipsed the setting sun and brightened everything around it.

Even as the fire reached Bernard Belany, his eyes never left his family, smilling in the beautiful way he always had for them still.

And in that moment, as the flames engulfed him and the others, Elora could almost hear him whisper something in her own mind as they locked eyes for a moment but before she could decipher it, he was gone. Swallowed up in the flames only to remain in her heart.

The words she must have heard echoed in her mind. But how had he spoken to her?