July 17“We have to go. Now!” The words still echoed through my head, and I replayed the conversation in my head like a bad movie.“What’s going on?”“Alpha Westley is working with other packs, there’s an attack planned on Silver lake.”“When?” The single word from Able’s lips was strained and I worried for a moment that his wolf was about to take over once again.“He was on the phone with Alpha Greening, from Black rock. It sounded like they were setting out tonight. Black rock is only half a days travel from home.”“Who else is involved?”“Don’t know, he didn’t say specifically, just said that ‘the others’ would join them as soon as possible. He also has a contingent from Red mist already on route.”“Shit!”What followed were lots of hurried directions, phone calls and plans, and the entire time I sat in a trance, not really comprehending what was happening. I mean how could I. My life had gone from being simple, where on any given day I followed directions and didn’t need to worry

July 18Anders led the way inside the pack house, through the double front doors, the large entry hall with open plan staircase and upper balcony, and into the only door on the right hand wall, he didn’t pause to point things out or even let me look around, and with the single minded focus he was exhibiting, I was worried that if I stopped for even a second I would end up losing him, not something I wanted to have as my first memory of this house.I stepped through the wide doorway into a room bigger than any I had ever seen before, with huge picture windows and heavy drapes, cream walls, hard wood flooring and dark wood trim.It was a little surreal as I glanced around the room, as though everything was supersized. The stone fireplace almost directly in front of me was almost as tall as me, the armchairs placed around it could likely seat two people each. The largest sectional imaginable sat on a huge cream rug to my right, the corner sofa could easily seat twenty people and was posi

July 18The medical centre was a large redbrick building set somewhere in the centre of the town. We drove past houses and shops and what looked like offices, all while maintaining a speed that meant it was impossible to take in my surroundings, not that my wolf or I were in a state to do so.My hands were shaking by the time the SUV pulled to a stop with a screech. My mate was injured. And it didn’t matter that Able and I barely knew each other, he was mine, ours, and the instinct of my wolf was to protect and avenge.The anger that coursed through me was like nothing I had felt before, it was an instinctual feeling that rose in me, one that my wolf had to explain was partly caused by the mate bond.By the force of the Goddess we were bound to each other in a way that would change us. Over time, I would become more like Able and Able would become more like me, our temperaments would even each other’s out. That was the point of the bond. Fated mates were the perfect pair, the perfect

July 20An older woman came into view in the open doorway, bending to help Rebecca stand, edging around the puddle of sick, her dark eyes lifted and landed on my patient before her skin paled. I guess it was a gruesome sight, I mean it turned my stomach initially but all the same, there were an awful lot of people struggling with this. Who was this boy?I shook off the thoughts. As my hands moved, cleaning an incision in the boy’s bowel before placing a stitch to hold the edges together then moving on to the next hole.“Talk to me Jay, what’s wrong with him.” I asked my guard, who was cutting the fabric off the other man’s body as my eyes kept sweeping up to Rebecca in the doorway.“Beck?” Greyson’s voice out in the hall caught her attention and I glanced down, cleaning out another cut, adding a stitch then continuing.“Kora, I need you to start at this end.” I instructed, handing her the other end of the bowels. “He’s losing a lot of blood, we need to get him closed up as soon as we

July 20The sun was setting by the time Able and I left the medical centre. Over the last few hours, Doc Barrett and I, with the assistance of Kora and Addison, had managed to get the case load under control, with six patients who would be staying in for monitoring, including Brody and only a handful left to be seen.Able had caught up with everything that was going on and formulated a plan with the assistance of his father and Beta. We received confirmation from a nearby pack that further reinforcements were being sent, along with one of their pack doctors and supplies.For now it looked like the fighting had come to a standstill, although shifters of all ages patrolled along the edge of the pack lands, waiting for an opening to invade.The general consensus right now was that they wanted something, and Able expected that Alpha Westley would be in contact with demands soon enough, in the meantime, the pack was using the down time to rest and recover and plan out additional defences.