“Do you know why Max is the main Alpha of Clan Blackmane even though he’s my youngest brother? Naturally, the first born gets to lead the clan.”
Claudia shook her head. In truth, she had never thought about it, but now that he mentioned it, it did sound strange. Werewolves were very strict when it came to their rules and traditions, especially if they concerned their Alphas.
“It’s because I could never control my wolf the way Max could. He’s always been the calm, calculated one. Even as a child, he liked spending more time in his human form than in his wolf form, while I preferred running through the woods and hunting for days. It might have influenced my temper later. My… anger issues. I would spend days as a wolf, shifting back only when my parents insisted I had to. I never understood why. I mean… when you have the possibility to be either a man or a wolf, why hold onto both when you only wanted one? I was a foolish child.” He paused for a moment, lost in his memories. “Anyway, it’s not an excuse. The explanation might even be simpler than this: Max has always been better at controlling his wolf. He’s a good Alpha. The Alpha our clan needs. As we grew up together, I always looked up to him and tried to be more like him, but during the war… God, what a mad time to live! During the war, I had to make my own decisions. He was leading his pack, I was leading mine. We fought side by side, but we had different tactics, and for the first time it was a good thing that we weren’t the same. Max saw this, and he let me be. I could feed off my anger and let my wolf run wild, tear our enemies apart. No one stood in my way. My Dark Wolves and I were bringing victory after victory. Until…”
Karl stopped and squeezed Claudia’s hand. She answered his gesture by holding onto him. He was still looking out the window. She waited patiently.
“Until the humans started gaining ground and cornering shifters faction by faction. It was as if they had a strategy going on… They studied our strengths and weaknesses, our attacks, and they came up with ideas to hit us hard, really hard. The eagle-shifters went down first. Flight had been an advantage to them, until the humans figured out how to shoot them down. Then, the fox-shifters. The bear-shifters and the wolf-shifters were holding their ground, but the dragon-shifters were the best. They could burn down entire cities before the humans’ weapons could do any real damage. Oh, they were beautiful, mighty beings. They still are.”
He smiled, and Claudia smiled with him.
“What happened?” she asked.
Karl sighed.
“They killed a dragon. I don’t know how, I wasn’t there to witness it, but as Max and I were retreating and regrouping, we heard rumors that the humans had shot down a dragon. Right from the sky. I went mad with anger. I thought it was a clear sign that we were losing the war, and I couldn’t take it. The pain, the defeat… the certainty that so many of my kind had died for nothing. I ran away from Max and his wolves, and my Dark ones followed me. I ran and ran, I didn’t even know where I was going and I didn’t care. I just needed to let off some steam. When I reached this village, this small, poor farm village… I couldn’t stop. It was like something dark and primal had taken over all my senses, over my body and mind. All I could see was blood. Blood that had to be spilled to wash the death of the fallen dragon-shifter.”
Claudia swallowed hard and tried not to gasp or pull her hands away. This didn’t sound good. It didn’t sound good at all, but she had asked for it, so now she had to sit there and listen to the end.
“We. Killed. Everyone.” He emphasized every word, and it hurt even worse than he had thought it would. “They weren’t dangerous… those farmers. They were mostly women, children, and old men, all their young men having gone to fight in the war. They never knew what hit them. Or why. It was over before they could ask for help or mercy.”
“Oh my God.”
He didn’t look at her. He didn’t want to see the disappointment in her eyes. Maybe if he failed to mention the next bit… But no, he had promised he would tell her everything.
“That’s not all…”
“Wait! Just wait. Why didn’t your wolves stop you? Was Matt there? Ethan? Terry?”
She couldn’t imagine the Beta and the two Deltas slaughtering innocent people. Then again… she couldn’t imagine Karl either.
He smiled bitterly.
“They were all there, right behind me. There’s a strong connection between the Alpha and his pack, especially in wolves. The other factions have it too, but it’s most prominent in wolf-shifters. The Alpha can feel what the members of his pack feel. He can even hear their thoughts sometimes. I guess it’s a remnant of our telepathic powers, which we suppressed a long time ago.”
Claudia knew about that. Every faction had some sort of power that had been lost in time. In the werewolves’ case, it was telepathy, and it had been lost on purpose. Trying to minimize their ability to get into each other’s heads without meaning to, the wolves had decided to give up on their talent and close their minds. The invention of the phone, and later the Internet, had helped a lot.
“What’s worse,” Karl continued, “is that the Alpha can easily influence his pack. It’s like the wolves’ brains are wired so that they would always follow their Alpha, do what he wants or… what he does. When I let my rage get the best of me, it was as if my Dark Wolves were contaminated with it too. They had no choice. Matt… oh, he would have stopped me if he had had the power, but his Beta statute and his connection to me made it impossible for him to listen to his own thoughts, to make his own decision. It happened to Ethan, Terry, and the rest of them too. If Max had been there… he would have put an end to it. But he wasn’t. Thinking I needed some space to myself, he let me be. The next morning, when one of his scouts told him about the village, he only found blood and dead bodies.”
Claudia took a deep breath and struggled to keep her tears at bay. She was scared, confused… outraged. She couldn’t decide how she felt. She didn’t know how she felt about Karl anymore. She cleared her throat before daring to speak.
“You said that’s not all…”
Karl cringed at her words, then gathered his courage for the last bit.
“I did more than lose my mind and unleash my pack’s anger onto those people and their families. I ruined Max’s life. By ruining Sabine’s.”
“Sabine? Isn’t that… the rogue she-wolf who tried to kill Avelyn?”
“Yes.”
Claudia was starting to put the pieces together.
“Oh my! You were… you were the one who turned her.”
“No, I didn’t turn her. Max found her on the floor, bleeding to dea
th, but still holding onto life. He couldn’t kill her to end her pain, so he bit her and waited until his werewolf venom healed her. He took her back to the Schloss, where she shifted on the first full moon. Later, he made her his bride.”