and Matthias neatly sidestepped, shredding the wolf’s side with his claws as he barreled past.
His heart rate throbbed within his ears, within his chest, as his muscles bunched. A thump on his back propelled him forward, and he rolled, hearing the snap of jaws in his ear as he dodged a nasty bite. He kicked at the attacking wolf with force, sending him back awkwardly against a large boulder, and he heard the crack of the wolf’s head against stone.
The large black wolf charged, and they both rolled in the dirt and pine needles, snapping and growling. Matthias jerked his head back from the alpha prime’s jaws, and the wolf ended up biting on the chain around his neck instead. Instantly Matthias morphed, grabbing the snout of the lycan to prevent the chain from snapping. For a moment they glared at each other, man to wolf. As realization dawned in the lycan’s eyes, Matthias moved. A series of quick, hard jabs to the wolf’s soft belly, and the Woodland Alpha Prime was forced to open his mouth to suck in tortured gasps.
Matthias rescued the chain, morphing back into his beast form. He glanced around the clearing. His men were vastly outnumbered, although they held their own against the Woodland guardians. He turned to face the black wolf. Woodland lifted his head and howled. Matthias gritted his teeth. It was a call for reinforcements.
* * *
Trinity froze as the call of the lycans echoed through the forest. She glanced about, trying to gauge the direction of the alarm. Another howl echoed through the forest, a voice she didn’t recognize.
A trespasser. Someone else was in the forest, someone other than Woodland.
“What’s that?” Jax asked, his young eyes wide as he came bounding out of the underbrush.
“Time to go home.” She’d had to clear this excursion with Rafe himself. All trips into the forest were assessed with care, so the noises startled her out of her relaxed state, her heart pounding at the rude shock.
She whistled, and one by one, her class of juniors came running through the forest toward her. Her fists clenched as she counted them off on return, nodding with relief when she had full attendance. Their tracking exercise had just been cut drastically short.
She beckoned them into a huddle. “Follow me. Do not stray. Do not wander off. Do not make a sound, okay?”
The young children nodded, eyes wide in pale faces and she gave them all a reassuring smile. “It’s okay, guys. This is just a drill—but we do drills exactly like the real thing, don’t we?” She tried to make the lie as convincing as possible. They’d never had a drill for anything like this, with the sounds of fighting echoing through the forest.
The kids still looked a little anxious, so she tried again. “First one back to the hall gets a treat.” She started jogging cross-country, checking over her shoulder to ensure each of her wards were following closely. Ducking under ferns, leaping over logs, the children ran silently through the forest.
Trinity could hear the grunts and growls in the distance, and her heart hammered in her chest. The kids. She had to get the kids to safety. There would be time enough later to find out what had made hell break loose in the woods.
She skidded to a stop at the foot of the mountain and heaved against a massive boulder. It shifted slowly to reveal a dark hole, one that would just fit her if she bent over double.
“Go here,” she ordered to the first child who reached her.
“But it’s dark,” the girl whispered, shrinking back.
Trinity winked. “It’s okay, Mia. The dark can be your friend,” she whispered back. “It can hug you and hide you. Don’t worry, it’s only dark until the first intersection.” She’d learned that the dark could protect, could hide, could reveal all sorts of secrets.
“What if we get lost?” Mia whimpered.
“You won’t. Keep turning right, and you’ll end up in the laundry.” She knew all of the tunnels within the mountain like the back of her hand, knew exactly the quickest, shortest route to safety for her pups. “When you’re all inside, go and wait for me in the great hall. Now go.”
She put her hand over the child’s head, guiding her through the opening so that she wouldn’t bump into the rock face, then helped the next child, then the next. Seven. Eight. Trinity frowned. Where was number nine?
“Who’s missing?” she grabbed the disappearing ankle of the last child in the line as she mentally reviewed the names of the children who’d passed. “Jax. Where’s Jax?”
The little boy shrugged. “He saw a trail.”
Trinity swore under her breath. Great. The too-curious kid was wandering into a battle zone. “Go on,” she muttered. “Get back to the others, and stick together in the great hall until your parents come and collect you, okay?”
The boy nodded, then started crawling again, and Trinity pushed against the boulder until it concealed the bolt-hole, then took off running up the path, her eyes scanning the undergrowth for signs of Jax’s trail. When she got her hands on that kid...
She spied a branch that was snapped but not fallen. It had caught on another branch, indicating the direction the boy had taken. She skidded a little as she changed direction, following the slight indentation in the loamy soil here, the break of a branch there, the gap in a bush further along. Her heart pounding, she jumped over fallen logs, ducked under branches, and sprinted along paths that weren’t really paths at all, merely vague impressions of a little boy’s passing. Little trails worn by smaller creatures through the forest that unfolded at the same breakneck pace she ran. She had a skill for spying tracks and trails, no matter how faint, how old, how unused—or how newly trodden by a five-year-old pup.
Birds screeched and flew overhead, and she almost tripped over a rabbit as it bounded across her path. Something was going on, something big. She tucked her elbows in against her sides, fingers straight and rigid as she pumped her legs faster. Trees whizzed past her in a blur. She catalogued each little sign of Jax’s trail, then skidded to a stop, her chest heaving, her eyes wide.
Jax stood on the tips of his toes by a tree, his hooded sweatshirt clutched by a tall, bearded lycan. The man wore only a pair of camouflage pants. No shirt, no shoes. He was streaked with dirt and blood, and his expression was fierce as he gazed back at her.
“Let him go,” she said, her voice low. Despite the panic, the fear, her words came out dead calm. She stepped closer, just once, and the man backed away, pulling Jax along with him. Anger flared inside her. Jax was a pup, damn it. A Woodland pup. Nobody threatened her pups.
The boy whimpered, his eyes round with fear.
“It’s okay, sweetie,” she said in a soothing voice, although her gaze didn’t shift from the lycan. “You will not hurt him,” she said, her tone low and heavy with warning. If he so much as hurt a hair on Jax’s head, she would kill him. Or at least try to. Her skills weren’t in fighting. Her eyes narrowed. There was only one of him, and although he was big and obviously a warrior while she was neither, she was prepared to try and take him down, if only to give Jax an opportunity to escape.
“I’m going to count to three, and you’re going to release him,” she said, edging closer. The lycan narrowed his eyes.
“One,” she said slowly, then launched herself at him, using the element of surprise as an advantage.
A
