Hehe...funny story...

I had just got home after a seven-hour car journey last night and got the chapter all ready to upload. Only, the thing is, I was a bit tired...so I might have forgotten to hit publish.

Seriously, sorry you guys, I'll make it up with an extra chapter sometime this week- probably Wednesday. Am I forgiven?

My dreams that night were unusually vivid recollections of the last few days. I don't remember exactly what I saw, but most of it involved Brandon and death.

It wasn't like me to be flinching at a little blood and gore — I had spilt plenty in my time. I later decided it was the alcohol that caused it. I hadn't had a dream since we'd got really drunk at the cabin.

I woke up nestled in my own bed long after dawn. I stretched out like a cat until one of my hands hit something that wasn't normally there. I rolled over, still rubbing sleep from my eyes and came face-to-face with Leo. He was still asleep, shirtless and had one arm around me.

Oh.

Oooh.

Now I remembered. My mate. My amazing, kind, good-looking mate. The events of the night before came back in a hazy rush. Our many kisses on the tower. Crawling back to bed at Goddess knows what time in the morning. Nothing more had happened, I was certain. We had both been tipsy and tired.

Someone cleared their throat behind me. I twisted my head around to see Fion leaning against the wall and smirking down at us. Her own bed didn't look slept in. Ah — that might have been our fault.

"Happy birthday. Something you've forgotten to tell me, Skye?" she asked mildly.

I sat up slowly, careful not to disturb Leo, and crawled out from under the blankets. "Um ... let me think. No, I reckon you're all up to date."

I was teasing her and she knew it. "Something about the half-naked boy in your bed and what you might have been up to, perhaps?"

When she put it that way, it sounded a lot worse than it really was. I shook my head vigorously. "Sleeping! Just sleeping! Gosh, Fion, why do you always think the worst of me?"

She ignored me and gave Leo a firm nudge with her foot. "All I'm going to say is he'd better be your mate. Because otherwise he's got one, you've got one, and it's not fair on either of them."

"Of course he's my mate," I scoffed. "Why? Don't you ship it?"

"Not really. It'll be the Titanic when Rhys gets home."

There was no point denying the truth of that. His protectiveness was most of the reason why I was so oblivious about boys. I nodded at her perfectly made bed. "And where exactly were you last night?"

"Certainly not in bed with a boy." She grinned. "I came back at 2 am and decided I didn't want to sleep next to the two of you for fear of what you might do in the night. Sophie let me share her tent."

"Wait, so you've... You've ... replaced me?" I stammered, faking despair.

She blinked lazily. "Yup. She also doesn't snore."

"What?! I don't snore," I replied incredulously.

"And you'd know, would you?" Fion's nudging changed to kicking in her attempt to wake up my mate. When she hit his ribs, he jerked to awareness.

"What the—? Fion?" Leo asked blearily.

"Don't Fion me," she growled. "You're the one in my little sister's bed."

He was definitely awake now, and he was scrabbling up to pull on a shirt. I heard a mental whine of disappointment and got the sudden urge to slap my own wolf (because that would hardly help our case with Fion, not because I didn't agree).

"It's not what it looks like, I swear," Leo insisted.

"I've already tried telling her — she doesn't believe it," I replied resignedly. "You'd be able to tell by scent if we were mated or marked."

She sniffed the air cautiously and nodded. "Alright then. You're excused. Just feel blessed that Rhys isn't here. Scent change or not, he would've kicked your scrawny ass back to Australia."

"Hold on a minute. Why do I get beaten up and she doesn't? Two consenting adults and all that?" Leo demanded.

"What the hell?" I muttered to him. "Don't give her ideas."

"Cough cough, gender equality, cough cough. I'm championing your rights to equal treatment here."

Before I could call bullshit on that, Fion, who had been resolutely ignoring our bickering, settled the argument. "Because she's his sister and you're not, duh."

"It would be really weird if you were his sister, Leo," I added.

Fion rolled her eyes, "You know what I meant. Now let's go and find some breakfast. I'm starving."

Outside of our little shelter, snow had fallen in the night — a light sprinkling barely thick enough to stick. What a wonderful beginning to my birthday. By the middle of winter, we would usually have several feet at least, so I enjoyed the novelty while it lasted. The walk over to the canteen was more scenic now that the entire castle was dusted in white.

The lunch hall was really quiet, as the majority of the camp was still sleeping in, even though it was late morning. I pulled up a seat next to Tally and Kyle, only to gape at them, wide-eyed, when I caught their scents.

"Damn, you two don't waste time," I muttered. They had marked and mated each other already. After only a day. Now I felt left out.

"Neither did you and Leo, by the sounds of it," Kyle sniggered.

I glared at Fion. "Did you tell the whole camp? Because we didn't actually do anything!"

"Of course I didn't tell the whole camp," she said innocently. "Only half of it."

"Freaking perfect," I growled.

Leo placed a bowl of oatmeal in front of me. Then he seemed to remember Fion, who was getting up to join the queue, and handed her his own bowl before going to get another one for himself. Always the gentleman.

"He brings you food?" Fion asked. "I've changed my mind. That one is a keeper."

She dug into the bland oatmeal happily. Rogues females were the kind of people who adored food and worship the ground it was found on. But then again, maybe that was just all females. Even now, I could see teenagers and adults alike trying to sneak off with party leftovers under their jackets, while Maggie hunted them down one by one with her wooden spoon.

"Hey, why don't you bring me food?" Tally asked Kyle with a frown.

He was taken aback by the question, and didn't seem to understand why it was so important to her. "Why do you want food so badly? It's not even that good here."

Oooh, I dare you to say that Maggie's face. She did her best with a makeshift kitchen and dirt-cheap ingredients. That boy wouldn't be satisfied with anything other than McDonald's.

"Because it's food," Tally whined.

"Okay, okay. I can bring you food." A confused Kyle huffed and went to join Leo by the counter.

With the boys out of the way, Tally leant forwards and smirked at me. "So what did you really do last night? Just between us girls."

She was settling in fast. It unnerved me.

"Just kissed!" I denied the accusation for what seemed like the hundredth time.

"And? Details?" Fion asked.

"Did you use tongues?" Tally added.

"What is wrong with you two?" I glared at both of them. "You're acting like ... girls."

Fion rolled her eyes at me. "We are girls, Skye. And, believe it or not, so are you."

I snorted. "Not that kind of girl — the gossipy, giggling type. They disturb me."

Ollie was the next to join us, but it wasn't to eat breakfast. He was deadly serious and looked like he'd already been up for hours. Dammit. Even though I was frustrated at his failure to take a break, it was times like these that reminded me why I had chosen him for my lieutenant.

"We have a problem," he said quietly, instantly catching my attention. I put down my spoon and walked with him away from the others. There was no need to disturb their meal. When we were out of earshot, I nodded.

"Shoot."

"The patrols are panicking. A group of Alphas just crossed the boundary line, and we don't have the numbers to stop them. They'll be here in five minutes tops," Ollie informed me.

"A group of Alphas?" I asked incredulously. Such a thing was rare, as the egotistical bastards had trouble playing nice with others. "Which ones?"

He nodded. "I couldn't get a specific answer. Most of the fighters are sleeping in, so the patrols are undermanned and hungover. And there's something else — I don't think they know they're trespassing."

Odd. Very odd. What were the chances that they just happened to stumble onto our turf? Not high, that was for sure. Either someone had told them where to go, or Zach had rounded up his buddies for a rogue hunt. Maybe I had pissed him off more than I thought.

"Next time we have a party, the drinks are going to be non-alcoholic," I muttered. "Oh well. Could you tail the group yourself? You must be the only sober fighter."

Fion, who must have been paying more attention than I realised, leant against my shoulder. "Count me in. I do love a good scouting mission."

"Sure." I shrugged. What harm could it do? She was certainly stealthy.

The two of them scarpered towards the woods together. We were attracting attention now. Rogues had stopped eating to listen in, as could be expected when the word 'Alpha' was mentioned in the canteen. Maggie appeared in the kitchen entrance, brandishing her wooden spoon hopefully. Like please, Skye. Please let me beat their pompous asses.

Leo had come up behind me and obviously heard part of the conversation. He looked down at his untouched bowl of oatmeal sadly and set it aside with a muttered, "Dammit."

"Squad," I announced loudly, "to your battle stations."

The canteen fell completely silent. Grinning faces, curious faces, sleepy faces: all of them turned to me. I wasn't surprised when no one moved to obey the command. 'Battle stations' wasn't a usual code. A few fighters took the initiative and wove their way through the crowd to form a messy group beside me.

Other than that, everyone stared a little longer, shrugged, and went back to eating their food.

Oh well. I tried.

Next, I used the mind-link to contact everyone at once. "Impromptu curfew. Either stay in the canteen or your tents. Fighters, to the courtyard."

In reply, I got a general feeling of consensus and more than a few curses for waking people up. There was a scuffle of motion at the camp as everyone moved to obey, and fighters trickled to the castle in twos and threes, most of them looking like they had just tumbled out of bed. Even sleepy reinforcements were better than none.

If we were going to have visitors, we might as well make them feel welcome, I decided. Fortunately, the courtyard had already been cleared of tables and rubbish. The children had volunteered, apparently. They liked to pull their weight.

With the entrance wide open, my other preparations included pocketing a smoke bomb (just in case), and pulling Brandon's leftover guns out of storage, loading them, and giving them to some ruthless-looking men. You could never be too careful when dealing with Alphas, as my encounter with Zach had reminded me.

I climbed onto the parapet above the eaves and surveyed the fighters. Their eyes were all fixed on me, so it seemed like a great time for a speech. "We have some Alphas headed this way. Stay out of sight until my signal, and let's remind those flea-bitten runts why they should fear us."

Despite the early hour, that suggestion raised a cheer. Allow a rogue to mess with a pack wolf and you had a friend for life. They hurried to obey, slinking off to the eaves and the tower entrances.

"Um ... Skye? I think I already know the answer to this question, but are you planning to piss off the Alphas of multiple packs simultaneously? Because even for you, that's pushing it." Leo was beside me, chewing on the inside of his cheek with concern.

"Relax. I'm only going to piss them off if they piss me off," I promised futilely, because even their presence on our land was annoying me. I was edging across the wall so that I was above the gatehouse as part of my master plan.

"Very reassuring," Leo muttered. He followed me onto the ledge with some reluctance.

We only had to wait a few minutes before I heard voices approaching the castle. So they were in human form? I wasn't sure they could be any more reckless if they tried. And they were approaching from the worst direction possible — an angle where they couldn't see camp. It must have looked like a deserted, ruined castle to them.

No, I realised, this couldn't be chance. It was like they were being led into a trap.

When they came into view, it all began to make sense. The group was close-knit but complacent. I could make out four boys and a girl. I squinted at one of the boys through an arrow slit. Could that possibly be—?

What? How?

They passed through the archway — Ollie and Fion not too far behind them — and into the courtyard below me. A dark-haired young man stopped to examine some worn letters on a pillar.

"Lle o Dristwch," he read hesitantly.

The girl frowned. "Something about this place feels wrong."

"Yeah, it's unsettling my wolf," someone else added. "We should leave."

Ollie and Fion slipped in behind them and shoved at the gates. When they swung shut with an echoing boom, my friends dropped the beam, sealing them in. As the group looked around in alarm, I dropped from my ledge to land in front of them. My leg twinged where I had been injured days ago, but I suspected it was ghost pain. Leo followed me after a second.

"I'm afraid it's far too late for that," I declared, allowing a satisfied smirk to slip onto my face.

They saw us standing defiantly in the way of closed gates, my sister and my second-in-command not far behind. For the first time, I saw their faces properly. There were three similar-looking, dark-haired boys, one of whom was Zach. He recognised me and rolled his eyes, clearly bored.

The second was Jaden, the recently crowned Alpha of Riverside Pack. I had first met him on the undercover mission for Rhodric, when Rhys had committed 'suicide.'

The last looked too alike the others to be anyone but Jaden's half-brother, Jace, the Alpha of New Dawn, even if I hadn't recognised him from the photo in the car. He had pushed his Luna, Emma, behind him at the first hint of danger. Obviously. Because she was totally safer out of his sight.

I sighed. Goddamn Alphas. And I had to deal with three of them.

But what really drew my attention was the last boy. He was covered in bruises and had his hands cuffed behind his back, but otherwise, he was very much alive and well. I smiled at the ruffled, light-brown hair, sparkling hazel eyes and a grin which I had always thought was stuck on his face.

Rhys.