A/N: violence/death presented.

Physically, my father wasn't the largest man I'd ever met. I was sure Theo bench pressed him, but he was by far the most intimidating. He exuded influence, fanned waves of cruelty and suppression without expressing a single word. The clench of his jaw, creasing marks of tension along his angular jawline, dotted gray like sprinkles of salt intermixed with pepper. His brown eyes burned, not with a father's disappointment but a sinister heat promising silent retribution.

Caleb grunted, clenching his own jaw. By their dipped down helmets, the guards averted their gaze. I always assumed the gesture was done out of respect but trembled under the weight of his influence as he approached me with slow, deliberate, and heavy footsteps.

Each pound of his boots into the hard, dirty cement floor sounded like the beat of a drum that marched to my own death sentence. Intermittently, my heartbeat increased and thumped against my chest walls. Time slowed with his entrance. Recoiling, the scratch of hard, unforgiving brick gouged my back. As I pressed into it, every piece of me wished for the brick wall to swallow me whole.

Against the canvas of his pale skin, draped paper-thin by age over his cheekbones, my father's brown eyes were cold and sterile. Devoid of emotion as he looked down on me, his head tipped to the size, angling the view from his stare down his nose.

After moments where I pulled back under the weight of his stifling, intense gaze, he cleared his throat. "I'm severely... disappointed," he spoke out, earning a scoff from Caleb's cell.

"Wasn't speaking to you, mutt." With a snap of his head in Caleb's direction, my father continued with a snarl, "After I put down your pathetic Southern family Caleb, I'll -"

"Don't," I begged in a whisper and slid off my bench, my feet padding closer. "Please... Call it off, you have us. You don't need -"

"Never did learn, idiotic, insolent bitch." Even while standing, he spat down at me. Heat flooding my cheeks, they burned hot. I hated myself for allowing his festering words to slither into my skin, pricking goosebumps up the back of my neck. "I gave you an opportunity and you learned nothing. Begging and pleading. You're weak, like your mother. Fitting that you'll have a similar ending."

As he turned with a sneer, one of my hands slid through the bars and clenched onto his sleeve. The tips of my fingers ran over and curled into rough leather, smooth if it weren't for the presence of scratches and fading with age.

My dry lips parted when my fingertips chilled against a piece of cold metal, a small, hard object. Like a child, a broken, discarded child, I tugged. Constriction swelling my throat, my voice turned into a rasky, begging whisper, "Did you love her at least? Or... me?"

With a jarring wrench, he yanked his arm from my grasp. My empty fingers extended before they curled inward. When my nails brushed my palm, I drew my fist back to my chest.

Like a moment in slow motion, his lips parted. Tipping his head back, dropping his shoulders, and he barked out a sharp, biting sound.

Of all possible reactions, I didn't expect laughter. He didn't sound happy. Rough, dark, sinister waves of laughter echoed off the brick walls and cement floor. The longer, and the louder, he laughed, the more I recoiled and shrank back, curling myself smaller.

With an abrupt stop, a thick, brooding silence again filled the space. My father stood in front of my cell, as stoic as a statue and colder than ice.

"This." His index finger and thumb held up a small glass vial, rolling in to reveal a light blue liquid.

My eyes blinked at the rhythmic, wavelike rolls of an aquamarine blue-colored liquid through the clear glass. He turned it over in his hand, as if manipulating the liquid under his own accord. My heart clenched at the insult of the unnatural tint of that color, a saturated exaggeration of my sole purpose in his life. Aware of the silent slap, I clamped my teeth.

"This is all that matters. Not you, not him." His eyes darted to Caleb, then snapped back to mine. "Not your pathetic pack, or your soon to be dead brother. Only what you can make together offers any significance to your otherwise pathetic existence."

With one movement, he unlocked my door. With a twist of his hips and hand raised, he struck my right cheek with the back of his hand. Since I hadn't anticipated his move, my head snapped back from the blow and my cheek bit with pain. My right palm cupped my cheek while my left hand lifted, fingers trembling.

"You're weak, Zara," his voice struck me the same time as his hand. The stinging smack of skin contacting my cheek burned on contact, chased by heated throbs.

"You've always been weak." One sickening crunch of his knuckles into my injured ribs radiated pain through my bones, crunching them like gravel and weakening my knees. "A weak disappointment."

Grasping air, I clutched onto his sleeve again to steady myself. Hardened leather slipped through my fingers as he rotated and struck again. With one more blow to my ribs, I cried out and stumbled onto the floor. The cold bite of cement hit my side as I coiled, tears trailed over my cheeks.

"You'll always be... weak." I rounded my back, gritting my teeth and wincing as the toe of his boot swung into my stomach. Thud after thud, he pounded pain in me. The volume of his grunts matched the intensity of his kicks, intensifying one after another.

My lungs compressed, leaving me drawing in raspy breaths. My back heaving, my spine froze with a silent gasp as one of his hands cupped around the back of my head. Sting erupted in my scalp as he fisted the soft hairs.

Kneeling down, his other hand's fingers dangled that blue vial in front of my blurred gaze. His voice chilled my body more than the cold, hard floor.

"This is all that you ever were, or ever will be, to me, Zara."

Within a blink and click of the door, he was gone. Trembles wracked my body like aftershocks. I wasn't sure how long I laid on the cold, rough cement floor in the prison but the more time passed, the colder my body grew. Goosebumps pricked over my arms and legs like a rash of shame and humility. The more the dirty smell of clay, dust, and faint iron from blood twitched my nose, the more heat flooded over my face.

A slight shadow blacked over my hands. For once, I was glad I smelled Caleb's awful scent.

"Wow..." He knelt down in my peripheral vision and muttered in a quiet, dry voice. "Bet he was real fun at Christmas."

Despite the circumstances, I choked out a hot breath of laughter. "Shockingly, we didn't celebrate it," I admitted more to the floor than Caleb.

His low voice sounded closer to my ears and a warm softness smoothed over my hair. While his fingers pushed soft trails over my scalp, his deep voice tensed with restrained anger. "We'll get out of here."

"Are you... petting me?" I rolled my head over and caught his wrist in mid-air with my closest palm. "You suck as much at comforting someone as you are being romantic."

Despite the circumstances, both of us beaten down and locked up behind silver bars, the corners of his thin mouth turned up. "No argument here," he admitted with a soft chuckle.

My other hand slapped a small, cold object into his palm. His eyebrows creased, confusion swirling in his irises as he inspected the small, rectangular piece of metal. When his eyes met mine, I slipped the pad of my index finger over my lips. With a slight nod, his fingers coiled into a fist, which he tucked at his side.

My father held many facets, including being a master, yet paranoid, manipulator of control. With the latest encryption technology, he carried the master key for all of his packhouse locks in a custom-sewn pocket on all of his coat's sleeves.

A lapel location was too obvious, too predictable. So, he had custom concealment sleeves sewn in his left coat pockets.

Such a tiny detail was overlooked except by, for example, someone who lived behind those locked doors with more than enough time to contemplate minute details for the first eighteen years of her life.

Two copies existed, with Beta Baron being who he trusted the second copy with.

Until now.

Right when my lips twitched to return Caleb's smile, staccato cracks and pops rang out. The two guards stationed near the entrance door exchanged a look then shifted in their stoic stances.

Footsteps thundered outside the door, as loud as a herd of trampling buffalo. Followed by more rapid, pattered gunshots and muffed shouts of directional assignments, the pounding of my heart lifted my head.

Pushing myself up to sit, Caleb threw me a smirk and stood. The guards shared a side glance, unlocking the safeties on their guns with a click. Grounding my palms into the cold floor, I pushed myself up.

Stabs of pain shot into my left ribs and my right palm cradled them gently. With my teeth gnashed, my knees wobbled and calves burned. Caleb's eyes left mine once I stood and gave him a forced smile.

The faintest, foggiest voice cut through the silence in my head. Jarring my thoughts, it crashed waves of emotions, relief and hope at the crests, even when I didn't recognize whose it was.

'Zara?'

The voice jolted Lumi awake in my mind, like she roared to life. She leapt up, shaking off her grogginess with a roar that rattled the inside of my skull. Scratching and clawing for control, her desperation to escape tingled ripples through my skin.

We've gotta get out first.

I squeezed my eyes shut against her advances, the toil of her repression slamming against the mental block I erected.

Heavy and uneven footsteps pounded the hallway outside, rattling the metal door. Caleb's smirk carved deeper into his cheeks as his eyes glossed over.

The cracks of gunshots mixed with loud snarls and sounds of a frantic struggle approached, the sounds deafening on the other side of the door. Once thuds and bangs erupted against it, shadows danced at the bottom crack, the guards pointed their barrels at the door. I didn't know who linked me but my mind screamed as loud as I could.

'Here!'

With a loud bang, the door rammed open by a man's giant, hulking figure. The dark of night outlined his tall, wide frame. Boulder-like shoulders pitched as he stood with his head tucked down. A sheen of blood and perspiration flashed as sharp breaths heaved his stone-chiseled chest.

Despite two guns being pointed at the center of his chest, he stood unwavered, chin to chest.

My lips curled up and my feet brought me to the front edge of my cell when his brown-haired head lifted in slow motion, setting his square jaw in determination. Right as the guards' fingers flinched into their triggers, the shadowed giant man stepped to the side and a smaller, nimble figure dashed forward.

Two shots rang out but blurred movements continued. The smaller, female figure dropped down like she disappeared. With one leg jutting out, she swept one guard's feet out from under him, clasped around his neck in a chokehold before it hit the ground. Gurgled sounds choked his throat as his fingers clawed her at her wrists but she kept her hold.

The other guard wasn't so lucky, as the male figure wound back, smashed his fist into the guard's face, and dropped him to the ground with one punch. Once the guard's body fell to a heap, he turned and looked at the female. My lips parted open and cheeks warmed at the grin of admiration twisting his lips. His brown eyes burned with full-on lust, dilating his pupils.

Raina was no better. Her chest, dotted with perspiration, heaved with labored breaths. Shaking a few dark strands out of her eyes, she met Theo's heated gaze and smiled.

Guess they are perfect for each other.

"Zara!" Raina cried out from her hold until the guard's flailing arms and legs stilled into spastic, jerked movements. Once he stopped, she threw him aside and jumped up to her feet.

"We'll get you out." Theo grabbed onto Caleb's cell and snarled at the hiss of silver that bit into his palms. He ignored it and yanked hard, not budging the bars.

"Or..." Caleb flicked the access card between his index and middle fingers. "You could use a key, Meathead."

"You had a fucking key and didn't use it!?" Raina's dark eyes narrowed at me.

"We just - umm, yeah?" I stood back while Theo unlocked Caleb's cell, who stepped next to Raina.

Once my door was open, I walked out, doubling over in pain in one step. The smell of too much Axe spray, sweat, and blood hit me as Caleb's arm slipped around my shoulders and steadied me into his bare side.

"Can you shift -" Raina started when another familiar figure showed up at the door, splattered with blood and a murderous look in his eyes.

"Stand around later!" Cole shouted out. "Cassius slipped out."

"Don't mind me," I gritted out and hobbled forward. With a strong arm wrapped around my shoulders, Caleb supported half my weight.

'Outside,' the male voice mindlinked me. 'Roof.'

''We're coming,' I pushed back then turned to Cole. "He's on the roof. Find Erik and you'll find Cassius."

"Coward probably went for the helicopter escape," Cole groaned and rushed out the door. Raina and Theo followed, her small frame dwarfed by his.

"Can you walk?" Caleb's voice and warm breath washed into my ear.

Sagging my weight into his side, I pressed my shoulder in his bare armpit. "I'll be -" I started when the scene outside froze both my voice and walking steps.

My eyes stretched as wide as they went at the raw, violent carnage that overwhelmed the inner courtyard. Under the dark of night, dimmed with a soft glow of a half-moon, the Southern wolves had the numbers. They rolled like waves in a dark, reddish brown river of destruction and death. Gunfire shots rained down, snipers targeting them from above by snipers. Each gun in the Central pack's hands made each one more like four men.

One joint, labored step at a time, Caleb dragged me along the brick wall of the building we exited. My eyes watched as Cole, Raina, and Theo's figures put more distance between us. The horrifying sounds of attacks, limbs hacked and dismembered, flesh shredded, growls, and life-ending shrieks and yips filled the air.

My nose twitched with the faint smell of metal bullets mixed with body odor and blood. If carnage had a scent, the air was thick with it and I choked in shallow, ragged breaths.

Each step throbbed pain into my left side but adrenaline surged me forward, step by step. Clinging to Caleb, my feet took over my senses and I rushed faster, blinding my surroundings and moving to the far corner of the packhouse. Once we reached the base of the stairs, I palmed my hand into the rough brick wall.

"Caleb, go!" I nodded up the stairs.

"Are you -" Caleb started but we both knew I slowed both of us down. I nodded, bent down with a groan, and grabbed a gun from a fallen security guard's grip.

"I'm fine." I winced while I stood up,

"Theo gave me this for you." Caleb's arm extended and a flash of silver reflected the moonlight. "Just... stay alive."

"Kill Cassius and everyone does." I gritted my teeth, clasping my other hand around my Silencer. While I had no idea how Theo found it, I was glad to have its handle back in my grasp.

Frowning, he gave me a torn look, half-sadness and half-guilt, but nodded and ran up the stairs. I trudged behind him, one slow step at a time. My heart beat pulsed in my ears and another rush surged me forward, one forced step climbed at a time.

With a growl, a security guard flew down the stairs at me but two shots into his chest with the fallen guard's gun mauled him down. The gun rattled and shook in my palm while I watched as his body sagged against the brick wall, his eyes dark and pupils dilated.

"I'm sorry," I whispered and lowered my trembling hand to my outer thigh.

With a breath, I thumbed his eyelids closed and moved forward, up, forward, up. My thighs and calves burned with each step, numbness soaking my swollen ribs.

Needing painful minutes to ascend the stairs, I paused at the top with my sweaty palm on the wall. A cool breeze tugged a few loose blonde strands over my cheeks and the sounds of further fights hit my ears. Blunt contact sounds paused my feet, once I got my bearings on the top of the southernmost building's roof level.

The first form I saw was Gamma Erik's large frame, blood streaked across his face and shaved head like war paint, before he shifted into his large, bulky wolf. Lifting the guard's gun, I aimed in between his shoulder blades, but one empty click later, tossed the gun aside. Before I flipped off the Silencer's safety, Sable's large, muscular form charged at Erik's wolf.

A slight circle of open space formed around them while they mirrored predator-like pacing, each stalking the other as prey. Beyond the clearing, a still helicopter sat with gleaming metal blades. With a loud growl, Erik's tawny wolf leapt first but Cole's wolf slipped out from under his claws at the last step. With a sharp turn of his head, Sable's canines sank deep into Erik's shoulder. A high-pitched yelp rang out, to be strangled by the savage blow of a brownish-red right paw into Erik's jugular.

Since that situation looked under Cole's control, I lowered my gun and looked around. Theo and Raina shifted into their reddish-brown and striped gray wolves and, shoulder-to-shoulder, cut through a barricade of defense along the furthest away corner. My eyes lifted further over their line of disturbance, where my father's tall frame dragged a struggler's body behind him to the waiting helicopter.

My eyes shot wide when I saw Cassius' elbow squeezing around the throat of -

No.

My feet moved heavy and slow, like I trudged through quicksand. Painfully, my hands shot quickly, almost blindly, at whoever lunged in my direction. My index finger squeezed, firing off more shots than I counted in succession. Limping, I circled around the attention Theo and Raina drew until I stood fifteen paces from where my father now pointed a gun at my brother's right temple.

Solomon.

Despite being constant, time was a fickle, cruel aspect of life. I spent what felt like the longest days of my life, trapped inside a bedroom in my father's house while time ticked away at a torturous, slow pace. Yet, once I left my isolation, the days blurred by while the world around me expanded into amazing, beautiful territories I never knew existed.

Now though, I wished that time froze still. I knew that the single-second image of my father, his elbow in a chokehold around my brother's neck and a threatened gun pressed into his temple were ingrained in my memory forever. A sense of dread rose up, cold and clammy in my palms, threatening to overwhelm me if I made the wrong move and cost me the life of my most important family member.

A blood-curdling scream ripped from my lips. "Solomon!"

His light blonde hair blew like soft strands of silk through the air, highlighted pale white in color from the moonlight. His skin wore similar highlights, contrasted by the dark streams of blood down the sides of his forehead and from his nose. Our father's limped gate suggested Solomon hadn't gone down without a fight but Cassius locked his body like a shield, depressing the barrel into his temple.

"Take one further step, Zara," our father snarled out from behind Solomon's shoulder, eyes dark and hooded with his threat. "And he's dead."

The bitterness in his voice, combined with a complete lack of regard for Solomon's life, froze every muscle inside my legs, locking and rendering them inoperable. My mind, however, ensnared within an internal argument. The constant, inevitable pull of a daughter who sought her father's love and approval clashed against the cruel, evil reality of who mine was.

A monster.

A cold, almost calm sensation chilled my body, drawing my shoulders down and chin up. My spine straightened and my grip tightened on my gun, the pad of my index finger tickling the trigger.

A voice that sounded nothing like mine, bitter, emotionless, and detached, spat out the cold, sobering reality of our family situation. "He's dead anyways, isn't he," I stated, not asked.

After a slight pause, a cruel, near sinister corner of his mouth crooked up. A flash of recognition seared itself in his brown eyes.

When he spoke his words were the same as usual. "Pity." He scoffed, depressing the barrel of his gun into Solomon's temple and rolling the skin. "By the time you catch on, Zara, it's too late."

"I must be a slow learner." Quirking up one eyebrow, I trained the barrel of my gun between his eyebrows. "You never helped in that department but now I know why you kept us around."

"Whatever you're looking for, Zara..." He tightened his elbow's chokehold on Solomon's neck, whose eyes pleaded with me to end this. "It doesn't exist."

"It does." I stared him down and took one step closer, which earned Solomon a sharper jab of the gun in his temple. My brother's grunt stabbed my heart, vibrating my lips with a low growl. "But not with you. You're no father."

Another round of sharp, callous laughs escaped from the back of Cassius' throat. They rolled through the lead-thick tension in the air, settling in my ears like dead, decaying leaves. "About time you got something right, insolent bitch."

His words, and more importantly the ones that he didn't say, struck into me like a stray bullet. The remaining shards of my heart, cracked by this sham of a father, eroded within my chest when he directly.

He's not... No, he's lying.

He's not... No. NO.

Caleb and Solomon suggested the same but I refused to accept what was obvious in front of my own face. Blood rushed up my neck, pounding in my ears and searing heat in my cheeks. At my walled resistance and denial, Lumi surged forward, pushing me into reality.

'Not father.'

"I had no idea the gift that Nieve carried inside when I took the Istas Luna, decimating that pathetic pack out of existence." Cassius' dark gaze and voice never wavered, even as he slithered one step back. "But now that I have what I need, you've both outlived your usefulness."

'Kill him,' Solomon linked me in a voice that sounded as desperate as his straining eyes. Pulled round and wide, white surrounded his light irises.

Calmness overtook my body. I drew a slow, steady breath in and, once I exhaled, the last threads of attachment, emotion left my body. Gone were the false hopes of a little girl and replaced by the anger, guilt, and disappointment from a lifetime of lies, manipulation, and deceit.

A white flash of movement surged out of my left peripheral vision. It distracted my gaze from the murderous look in our father's eyes, but I gripped my gun tightly.

'This might hurt, sorry, Sol.' My index finger squeezed tight into the trigger and my last bullet cleared the chamber.

After a soft click between my palms, Solomon's body flinched when the silver bullet grazed over his left leg. After it burned over his skin, the bullet sank into Cassius' left quadricep with a squelching sound of metal buried into flesh.

As expected, Caleb's wolf roared out with front paws extended. They slammed into my father's shoulders, thrusting his frame backward. The fighting and gunfire sounds around me screeched to a halt at the slow movement of Cassius' gun lifted up.

The barrel flinching, he fired two shots, two bangs. With a murderous yelp, Caleb's wolf fell shoulder-down into the concrete. His pupils dilated into his golden irises, swallowing the light. His shoulder and chest heaved for breaths as Cassius stepped past him.

"Nooo!!" I screamed out, unlocking the hold choking my leg muscles and rushing forward. Pressing through my side's stabs of pain, I ran until I found Caleb's side.

Streams of crimson gushed from two bullet wounds, one in his leg but the other his belly. I slipped one hand under him and slumped when I felt the bullets had gone through him. Warm liquid coated my hand. My stomach clenched hard, heat rising underneath my skin. The sight of his white fur, matted to my fingers and palm with blood, ripped trembles over my lips.

"No." I whispered into the golden yellow eyes gazing up at me. "Hang in there, I - ahh!!"

With a roar of uncontrolled emotions, Lumi screamed forward, forcing a shift that ripped my body in pieces. Her pain surfaced through my body, stretching my limbs. A feral cry scratched my vocal chords when she rebroke my ribs and split my heart open.

With a weightless, backward pull, she tossed me into the back of her mind like an afterthought. Her storm of anger and rage fogged around me in a clouded haze, choking my own thoughts into nonexistence. The warm, sharp taste of iron coated her tongue as she dragged it over Caleb's wounds fueled her craving for another's blood.

At the soft pants Caleb's wolf offered, her lips curled back. Saliva pooled behind her canines and she directed all thoughts and actions toward a single word.

'MATE.'

I sat back, a spectator within my own body, as she took step after step to where Cassius fought against Solomon's wolf. Watching in silence, I realized why Solomon was important, why our father strove to keep him suppressed, restrained, and caged.

Solomon's the one wolf who could defeat our father.

He was the powerful white wolf, an alpha capable enough to rise over other alphas until they bowed down to him. Invisible waves of strength, power, and authority radiated from his wolf. Under layers of white fur, his muscles ripped with wavelike movements as he crouched and sprung his large form like a blur.

Against Cassius' long, lithe, brown wolf, Nor moved like a white ghost. His paws thrust through the air, his claws swiping with strike after strike. Sprays of red blood misted over Nor's white fur as he moved, connecting in jagged cuts across Cassius' chest. His corded shoulder and leg muscles flexed in a one-sided massacre that ended with the scruff of Cassius' neck lodged between a set of bloodied white jaws.

With one look, Nor's ice-blue eyes lifted to Lumi's. Jaws locked and Cassius flinching for release, his body stilled. At her brother's unspoken gesture, radiated pleasure through her entire body like rushed blood flow. She stepped forward, lifting her snout and curling her lips up.

One bite.

One bite was all Lumi needed to seize her opportunity.

With one clamp of her canines, the knife-like teeth tore through sinuous neck tendons until her jaws locked. She clenched down, rolling and tugging her head back until Cassius' throat was ragged beyond repair. Hot, thick liquid with a bitter iron taste spilled into her mouth, pricking her taste buds and dampening the edges of her mouth. His blood flowed freely, coating her teeth and tongue, but she locked on.

Cassius flinched and struggled, but with one last ragged shake and bone-crushing crunch, he fell. With his wolf defeated, his body sagged and he shifted back into human form. Crumpling to his hands and knees, his breath wheezed out his gaping mouth.

For the first time in my life, he looked like the vulnerable one, weakened by his own children.

His bloodied hands clasped his shredded open throat, unable to speak through the crimson blood rivers that trailed down his chest. Only gurgling, strangulation sounds erupted as his cold, gray eyes communicated with me. His look offered enough, all emotions he felt inside about me radiated from within his irises.

Power. Manipulation. Corruption. Hate.

Both Lumi and I relished every second of pleasure while we watched them die with him. Once Cassius' body fell limp, eyes rolling back, her chest swelled up with a sharp breath in.

One snort later, she relinquished control back to me.

A sluggishness overcame me and Lumi's muscles sagged as the sounds of skirmishes around us faded out. With one slight turn, I looked back to where Caleb's wolf had fallen.

Instead of his amazing, beautiful wolf, I found an abandoned pool of blood.