POV

Lucas

We stepped through the portal Philip created after leaving the gaelies camp, we dressed and allowed Philip to magic us dry. His portal felt different than the one summoned by the bottled wish, Philip's portal felt tight, and it wasn't like walking through something, it was a sucking sensation, like being flushed down a toilet, and spat out.

"What's happening?" Stone asked, as soon as we were ejected out of the Portal, standing in front of the packhouse. Stone looked around, there wasn't a soul in sight, I knew we were on alert, undoubtedly everyone except for the warriors and other high ranking fighters was hidden away. "Arthur is leading the men to the northern border, Lucas little Stone is out there, Angel, go inside, your mom is expecting you." Stone said, his eyes turning pitch black as he attuned into the pack-link.

"What the hell is my son doing i the middle of a rogue war?" I asked, "Miro took control, forced his shift and is leading a group headed to the east, rogues are all around us; I don't have the time to explain everything, I'm going to go find our son, then I'm gonna end this. I need you to go inside." He said, snatching off his shirt, preparing to shift. "I'm going with you," I said.

Stone turned on me, and I swear Jaz and I whimpered at the same time. "I will not repeat myself, you're carrying our pup, get in that house and stay there, or when this is over I won't hesitate to punish you. Go!" He barked, and I turned, hating myself for obeying, but knowing he was right.

"He'll be fine, both of them. Come on, I'll get you inside with your mom and Lucinda, then I'll go help in the fight." Philip said, but I didn't feel all that better, Philip was powerful but he couldn't be everywhere, and there were rogues, a pack of them, clearly more than seventy wolves, where'd they even come from.

#   #   #

I was treading the floors of the mansion basement style panic room, there was anything one could need in the room, including games, food, clothes, and meds. Lucy and my mom were off sitting somewhere, with Stone's mom. 

Omega were here and there, children sat quiet, some were too small to realize what was going on, others looked on the verge of tears. One child sat unmoving, staring at his hands. Soren. 

His mother was beside him, I could see her, trying to engage him in conversation, but he wouldn't say more than a few words. I understood him perfectly, he was a child, but he was also the first child to have an adult wolf, an adult wolf whose estranged mate was out fighting in what could be a deadly battle. 

I assume he felt what I was feeling, sadness, after all of that had happened in the months since my return to Brickston, I found myself sad. Sad that I might lose my child, sad that I might lose...  that I might lose Stone, as I paced, I kept replaying scenes from my times with both my mate and my son. 

The night little Stone was born, the first time he walked, his first word, our first straight talk. The day Stone rejected me, the way he looks at me, the words from his letters, the ten days that felt like hours. I could lose that. 

A part of me screamed that I shouldn't care about my ex-mate, but I could no longer lie to myself, Stone had gotten to me, I loved the attention and the way he chased me, and I wasn't prepared for it to stop. As that realization hit me, there was a sharp knock on the panic room door, two quick knocks a pause then two more. 

I turned to watch Stone's mom go over to the door. "Open the door, I have to drop off little Stone." My father's voice called. I rushed to the door yanking it open and taking in my tall father, he was naked and quite cut up. I looked from him, down to my son. He was also naked, but there wasn't a scratch on him. His eyes were still black and rimmed in red, Miro was still in control, but I hauled Stone into my arms, while my father, turned to go back to the fight.

"What were you thinking?!" I shouted, pulling Stone into the room and over to the baskets filled with spare clothes. "I am not a child, Omega," Miro responded, pulling my son's arm away from me and grabbing some shorts. 

I growled as he put on the shorts, then I grabbed his cheeks in my hand, making Miro look me in the eye. "As long as you're in my son's body, I am your mother and you are my child, so you will respect me, and you will not put my child or yourself in harm's way, do you understand?" I snapped.

Miro stared back at me, then he snarled softly, saying he understood. I hugged Stone's body into mine, surprised when he hugged me back. I pulled away watching as those eyes became my son's. "I'm sorry ma, he just took control, I can't control him, I swore I wouldn't." Stone said, hugging me tight, clearly, his little body was worn out. "You should go check on Soren, he's worried," I said.

Stone walked over to where Soren was seated,  his mother next to him. Cheyanne spotted my son, and though she still wasn't all the way okay with Miro, she knew Soren needed to know Stone was okay. Soren looked at Stone like he wasn't there, before rushing him. As they hugged I turned going back to my pacing.

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POV

Stone

I was in the midst of battle, trying to get to my son, he was surrounded by feral growling rogues, but without effort, Miro shook them off, crunching necks, and tossing wolves yards away from him. I couldn't focus on the fight at hand, I knew having Miro on our side would lessen the burden, but I needed my son safe.

So I charged in, knocking into dozens of rogues, they seemed to just keep coming, Arthur was three miles east of me, leading the Beta team. When I got to Miro, I realized I couldn't mind link with him, Stone Jr hadn't received the pack mark yet, I was supposed to do it after Lucas and I got back from Adoria, but we got caught up and now my whole pack was in danger.

It was only after I had a quick growling match with Miro, that I got Enoch to take a pissed Miro back to the packhouse. Then I focused on the battle, looking around I jumped straight into the fray. My team, the Alpha team was made up of twenty of the strongest warrior wolves. 

With their help we were ravaging the rogues, one charged me, a huge blonde wolf. We rolled and I pinned him under me, my canines clashed dangerously close to the wolf's throat, but he drove his dew claw into my chest hard, puncturing my underbelly. I growled and pushed through the pain, I leaned forward and bit down on his muzzle, crushing it and leaving him mutilated.

Looking around I spotted two wolves, they were about to gang up on Mitchell, he was young, only nineteen and he'd just met his mate, I sprang over several snarling wolves, throwing myself in front of the two big wolves. They charged and I twisted through them grabbing the tail of the brown one, snatching it off. The wounded wolf howled, but like any rogue, he was accustom to pain, and it wouldn't deter him. 

The second wolf charged me, but I quickly grabbed his scruff and flipped him, seconds later his throat was crushed. The tailless wolf sprang on my back, his canines piercing through my first and second coat of fur, I bucked easily tossing him off and some yards away, the next time I saw him, Mitchell was biting down on his skull. 

We fought endlessly for what had to be an hour, Arthur called through to tell me the eastern border was clear, my Delta confirmed the north was clear, then my Gamma. We won, I felt great, even though I was hurt in a lot of places, the worst was the wound that would sure be a deep puncture in my stomach. Then looking at the fallen rogues, thinking for sure that the fight was over, my blood ran cold. 

I watched the dead rogues slowly rise. I realized then, that this wasn't a random rogue event. 

Watching the dead stitch themselves together, watching broken necks snap back into place, watching pools of blood be reabsorbed, I knew only one thing that could do that, a necromancer, this was a planned attack, so I called for protocol W.

It was a spell given to my ancestor, created during the vampire war of eighteen ninety-five, it was a spell built into the grounds of pack territory, it would remove anyone who wasn't of blood relation to the Alpha, anyone who wasn't a pack member or mated to one, so it was perfect, the only bad thing would be that it wouldn't last, it would place my territory in a protective bubble, one that wouldn't last longer than a full twenty-four hours.

The spell was a one-time thing, it was a powerful defense and once it was used, that would be it, and who knows if the future generations would ever need it. I never would have considered using it, not before Lucas came home, but I wasn't willing to risk my life, not while my mate was pregnant and so close to letting me back into his heart. I couldn't risk it.

So I stood tall, digging my paws firmly into the dirt. Then I released a thunderous growl, an Alpha's roar. The ground began to shake as a white glow rolled from where my paws were embedded, pushing out through the whole of the wooded area. The rogues around me were being pushed away from us from the force of some nonexistent wind.

The ground shook, tossing them away from my team. The members of my team knew exactly what was happening. It took all of three minutes for the rogues to be removed, once they were outside of my territory a haze erected keeping them out, the shield was like a wall of vibrating energy, it was like the heatwave of a barbeque. 

The rogues began throwing themselves at the wall, they were dead, I hadn't seen it before, but now as they robotically smashed against the shield I knew. I was about to mind-link with Arthur and my third and fourth, but Arthur contacted me first. { Alpha, you have to come to the east border, the rogue Alpha and his Luna want to speak with you} He said, and I took off, telling my team to follow me.

#   #   #

Arriving on the eastern border, I saw Arthur and his team standing with my Delta and Gamma, we all watched the rogues as they stood unmoving, they stood slightly behind a huge Alpha, he was a bright gray, he stood tall next to a smaller tan wolf, a wolf I knew all too well. I shifted, racing to the edge of the shield. The rogue Alpha and the wolf beside him shifted.

I couldn't believe what I was seeing, I wouldn't have thought it possible, I stood at the edge of the shield looking into the face of a tall scruffy man, there was a scar across the left side of his face. in fact, there were scars all over him, but he wasn't who my attention was on. It was on the Alpha's Luna, my ex-Luna, Nancy.

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