Well, hello again. We've been having an influx of new readers, so if you're only just joining, welcome to the forty-ninth annual hunger--  No, I mean family.

Thank you Sydney Boulter for all your votes and remember, kids, the best way to get a dedication is vote on every part. That way you show up more obviously on my notification list. Mwhahaha.

"Take this," Fion said as she handed a bottle of dark, gooey liquid. "But don't touch it, don't open it, and don't go pouring it into anything without mind-linking me first."

"Because you need to work out the dose," I agreed.

"That's right. Too much, and they'll start dying before everyone's had a drink. Too little and they won't die at all. The dosage is important — and that reminds me. You'll need this, too."

A tape measure was pressed into my free hand. We would need to measure every water container we found and send the dimensions back to Fion so she could calculate the volume and tell us how much poison to add. I didn't pretend to understand much of the process, but I knew Fion could walk us through it.

"I'm not sure I know how to use that thing, Fion," Rhys admitted sheepishly.

"That's because you didn't go to school," Leo retorted. "And that's why I'm coming. I aced GCSE maths."

Fion rolled her eyes, because she had mastered GCSE maths in a month at the ripe age of eleven, so my mate wasn't exactly impressing her. "It's not you three I'm worried about. It's Team Knuckleheads. Emmett has at least proved that he knows his way around a tape measure. Aaron, though..."

"He worked construction for a summer. He'll be fine," I assured her. "I'll fetch him now."

Rhys was on his feet before I could even finish the sentence. "No, it's okay. I'll go."

He had been looking for an excuse to escape the tent since the moment we arrived, so I waved him off without a fuss. I hadn't been keen on the trip, anyway. I'd been edgy around Aaron even before his little brother had died on my watch. Now I was downright nervous of the guy.

I lay back on my bed, letting my legs rest across Leo's lap. The bottle was cold and heavy in my hand. I turned it upside idly and watched the dark liquid slosh about. The scent was strong and sickly sweet, but I couldn't pick out any individual smell. "What's in here?"

"It's mainly a hybrid of monkshood, hemlock and nightshade," Fion said without looking up. She was squinting at a pair of syringes. "But I did throw in a bit of foxglove just to be sure, so don't let it touch your skin."

And, hearing the names of those poisons, the enormity of what I was going to do struck me once again. "Will they suffer?"

She threw me one of the syringes. "They'll have respiratory failure, paralysis, hallucinations and vomiting, so it won't be pleasant, but it shouldn't last very long — a minute if we're lucky, five if we're not."

Well, it would be quicker and easier than ripping them apart with our teeth, and that was what Jace was planning. If they were ordinary enemies, I would agree with him. But they were our own people — fathers, brothers, mates, cousins. Even if we won the fight, we wouldn't be winning. We would just be losing fewer lives. And so I was going minimise that loss however I could, even if it meant sacrificing my honour and every last scrap of my humanity.

"How long until it starts working?" Leo asked.

"I laced it with Tylenol to slow everything down, and it ain't toxic until it's metabolised," Fion sighed. "As long as it's in plenty of water, no one should start dying for three or four hours."

"What if the ferals ain't drinking water? The stuff we got from the river is nasty — tastes like piss."

"That's what this is for." Fion tapped another bottle, this one sludge-brown. "It's modified for delivery via an alcoholic medium. The third team will be looking exclusively for kegs. But you don't need to worry about that, because you're on water duty."

I narrowed my eyes. "Who did you put on alcohol, then?"

"Ryker and Emmett," Fion said breezily. "I'm told they're the only ones who stayed sober on your excursion to Ember Pack, so I'm trusting them not to drink on the job."

Oh, wow. She'd really done her homework on us. And so what if I had a mouthful of something, anyway? I could add the poison afterwards. I stopped messing around with the bottle, put it down on an upturned crate, and scowled at my sister. "Who the hell told you that we got drunk?"

"Tally may have mentioned it."

"Tell-tale scum," I muttered under my breath.

A heartbeat later, before Fion could berate me, the tent flap opened and the four fully-grown men in my brother's wake — Aaron, Connor, Ryker and Emmett — attempted to squeeze into the space between the beds. When that didn't work, we tied the flap open and they stood outside.

"Found these two on the way," Rhys explained, nodding towards Ryker and Emmett. "I told them everything, and they're all up for it."

The guys nodded at this part, uncharacteristically solemn.

"You're in?" I asked Aaron suspiciously, because this felt too easy.

"You're surprised?" he countered. "Those pricks murdered my brother. I ain't passing up a chance to return the favour."

Oh, right. He wasn't only willing to participate, he was enthusiastic. And who was I to argue with that? Fion handed each of the teams a bottle of death-cocktail, and they, like me, immediately started examining them. The tape measures and syringes followed soon after, along with a thorough explanation of what they would be doing.

"This is all well and good — nice plan, y'all — but what happens if we get caught?" Ryker asked once she was finished.

Fion shrugged. "My advice? Drink your cargo. In that quantity, you'll hardly feel a thing."

He nodded amiably, and the other three guys exchanged looks that said something along the lines of fair enough, okay. None of them appeared daunted at the idea of committing suicide. But I had to override my sister. "No, actually, I have a better solution. Let them torture you for a few hours, and then escape while they're dying."

"I don't want to get turned, boss," Ryker muttered. "Give me a quick, clean death over that any day."

"Ah, but there's a way to get feral immunity."

"Do elaborate," he drawled, cocking an eyebrow.

"Mark each other," I said bluntly.

I had never seen two people jump apart as Ryker and Emmett did then. The smiles were wiped clean off their faces.

"Excuse me?"

"The hell—"

"You heard me," I sighed. "You might fool most people. But you're two guys in their thirties with mates and kids nowhere in sight, I don't think I've ever seen you apart, and you bicker like an old married couple."

Everyone else in the tent was slowly overcoming various degrees of shock. Fion had gone back to her calculations as if she couldn't hear us, Leo was openly gaping, Rhys was grinning, and Aaron and Connor were exchanging confused looks.

But Emmett ... he scowled and spat on the ground at his feet. "Kid, do you know how we ended up on your doorstep in the first place?"

"You were from Llyn..." I began uncertainly. "Your leader died."

"Nah, he didn't just go and die. I tore his throat out."

Sensing where the conversation was headed, I stayed quiet and waited for an explanation.

Emmett simply shrugged. "To be fair, he started it. Found out we were mates and beat us within an inch of our lives. That didn't sit too well with the other guys, so we threw a mutiny. Killed that bastard and everyone who'd helped him."

It wasn't an uncommon story. Three of the packs wouldn't tolerate same-sex mates, and the other four could be temperamental about it. There was some religion involved. A lot of gay and lesbian wolves ended up at the castle, because it was a safe haven, and because rogues were the most accepting of the werewolf societies. At least, we were supposed to be. These Llyn guys seemed to be an anomaly.

Love was love — it was as simple as that. And what two consenting adults did in private was nobody's business except their own. It wasn't hurting anyone, so I didn't understand why some people had to be so hateful.

"I'm sorry that happened to you. But nobody here is going to give you shit," I promised quietly. "Not on my watch. Mark each other, because it might save your damn lives."

They looked at me, looked at each other, and had one of those conversations with their eyes.

"We'll think about it," Ryker offered after a moment.

"Well, think quickly. You've got five minutes," Fion muttered.

Once they had gone, I stood up and stretched out my aching muscles. Aaron and Connor were hovering somewhere nearby. Neither of them had found their mates, so they had no way to protect themselves. I would have sent someone else, if I could trust anyone else to walk into the ferals' camp without getting caught.

"So you knew that those two were mated," Fion began without looking up, "but you couldn't work out that Leo was your mate?"

I glowered at her. "I was a little busy trying to stay alive, if you remember."

"Fine, whatever. I just find it interesting." She looked away, smiling, and reached down to pull something out from under the bed. "This is for you. It has everything you could possibly need."

It was a sketchy-looking duffel bag. I hefted it and made a disgusted face. "Shit, that's heavy..."

Rhys took it off me and swung it onto a shoulder easily — because damn him and his six feet of muscle. I glared at him, and he grinned back at me. It wasn't long afterwards that Ryker and Emmett reappeared smelling of blood. They each had a mark just above their collarbone, and their lips were swollen.

"Are we going?" Emmett asked impatiently.

"Yeah, two seconds," I replied. With one hand, I pulled Fion up by her sleeve. With the other, I dragged Rhys closer. And then we were all hugging, and Leo was left to watch awkwardly. It didn't matter how well he got on with my siblings: he would never be allowed to participate. It was for our trio alone and not even the mate bond could change that.

"Don't get caught," Fion whispered. She had omitted the first part of the saying because for once it wasn't necessary. There would be no staying out of trouble — only surviving the consequences. "Promise me."

We broke apart.

"Promise," Rhys and I said in unison.

***

Ryker and Emmett split off halfway to the ferals' camp. Aaron and Connor not long after that. If we went in together, there was only a bigger risk of getting caught, so we were each approaching from a different side. We had picked south.

The trek was long and tedious. We followed our noses for the most part, because the stench of three hundred unwashed bodies was not inconspicuous. They were in the next valley — three miles over rough terrain. We did it in human form because it was still only half three and our distraction hadn't yet begun.

I had hoped that, at some point, the duffel bag would prove too heavy for Rhys — that he would have to put it down or least move it to his other shoulder. No such luck. I wasn't exactly surprised: he could carry me, after all. But I was a little annoyed. I even debated adding rocks when he wasn't looking, but that was impossible unless he put it down.

With a mile left to the feral camp, Leo was acting as our rearguard, I was leading, and my brother was throwing the bottle of poison up in the air and catching it because he was an idiot.

"So, guys, what do you think?" he asked after a while. "Do I put the sass in assassin?"

"More like the ass," I muttered.

"Ass is in there twice," he retorted, snickering. "So you must be one, too."

I smacked the back of his head, which only made him laugh harder, of course.

"I'm surprised you two illiterate shits can even spell assassin," Leo muttered from behind us.

"We can't," we told him simultaneously. We were just sounding it out — if it was longer than six letters, it was safe to assume I didn't know it. And as for Rhys, well ... his writing was even worse than his reading, and that was saying something.

Ahead of us, I heard a twig snap and stopped in my tracks. It could have been my imagination but, seconds later, thirteen magpies took to the air noisily.

"Who's there?" a new voice demanded shakily.

I dropped to the ground and flattened myself as much as I could. There was only a holly bush between me and whoever the hell happened to be wandering the forest so close to the feral camp —  if I had to guess, it might be a feral. The leaves pricked at my skin, but I didn't dare move.

Behind me, Rhys and Leo had found their own cover and now looked to me for guidance. I didn't have any for them. It was a guy's voice. I couldn't check his scent, because he was upwind, and I couldn't get a look at him without giving away my position. We would just have to wait and hope he left.

"Hello?" the guy tried again. He sighed to himself. "Yeah, Malcolm, great ice-breaker. The psychopath hiding in the shadows is really going to answer you."

Malcolm. Malcolm? Shit — that name — it couldn't be a coincidence. Should I try to kill him? If I shifted, I could close the distance in seconds and make a jump for his throat. But ... Rhodric had been hunting this man for years, and he was still breathing against all the odds, so it couldn't be that easy, could it?

Still, I wanted to have a conversation with him, at least. Nothing like feeling out the enemy, maybe even finding out why he wanted my entire species dead...

I stood up abruptly. Yes, he was human. Auburn hair, small blue eyes and a scrawny build. He didn't look dangerous; he looked like the kind of man you could pass on the street and not pay the slightest bit of attention to.

"Well, if you'd given me a little more time, I would have said hi," I protested. "Even psychopaths have manners."

Rhys and Leo took their usual places flanking me, and it was easy to believe Malcolm was frightened. He took a step backwards, his eyes wide and alarmed. He was still playing scared, so I could only assume he didn't know I had recognised his name. Or... Or he was just a random human hiking through the woods.

"You're not really psychopaths, are you?" he mumbled.

"Of course not," I scoffed. "But I guess that's what a psychopath would say."

A smile flitted across his lips — so fast that I almost missed it — before he plastered on the mask of anxiety again. That little slip put me on my guard once again. Not a coincidence at all.

"I suppose it is," he laughed. "Are you three out for a stroll in the woods?"

"Just picking snowdrops," I said and smiled sweetly. There was something about his manner that I didn't like, something off about him. He wasn't crazy, I didn't think, but he was damn close.

"There's a joke that goes like that," Malcolm began. "A couple went into the woods to pick flowers. There were so many people around — they actually had to."

Rhys laughed aloud, but I knew him well enough to know it was forced. "That's hilarious. Really. Now, if you'll excuse us, we need to get home."

This time, Malcolm didn't even bother to hide his smile. His eyes were colder than ice. "Probably a good idea. You don't want to be in these woods when it gets dark. It's far too dangerous for kids like you."

"We'll bear that in mind," I replied quickly.

"Oh, I wouldn't worry about bears. It's the wolves you've got to look out for," he laughed, and I felt my blood run cold. "They hunt in packs, see, but they're only dangerous when they work together. Get a wolf alone and you can put a bullet in its skull before it can blink."

He was definitely a hunter. A man who dedicated his life to eradicating my species, for reasons known only to him. And I had a horrible suspicion that he'd planned this meeting, down to the very last word. He was the sort of person to think ten moves ahead of everyone else.

"Lucky that there aren't any wolves left in Britain," I said quietly.

"Luck? No. It was very deliberate. Did you know that you could pay your taxes with wolf heads under King Edward? Wolf hunting was considered good sport back then." He paused, smiling as if in reminiscence. "You have to wonder if they knew something we didn't... To drive a species so thoroughly extinct..."

His left hand slid casually into a coat pocket, where it closed around something I couldn't see. I thought I heard a faint click ... like the safety being taken off a gun. There was no doubt in my mind that he was making a threat. If we didn't let him leave quietly, there would be consequences.

No wonder Rhodric hadn't managed to kill him yet. Goddess above.

"Anyway, it was nice meeting you all, but I must be going."

He gave a final sly nod before heading east. Every now and then, his head would turn to the side so he could glance at us from the corner of his eyes, just to make sure we weren't trying to follow. He looked at us like I would look at a rabbit — predator regarding the prey, the lesser being. Once he was safely out of sight, I released the pent-up breath I hadn't realised I was holding.

"If that's a hunter," Rhys muttered, "we're screwed."

He didn't even know that he had just met his mother's killer, and I couldn't tell him. I'd promised. Besides, he would only go and get himself shot.

"Royally screwed," I agreed quietly.