Because they were all staring at me now.
Every one of them.
Eyes wide.
Spines stiff.
Because I wasn’t the Damon they thought they remembered.
I was something worse.
I turned to them again.
“You think my silence makes me soft. You think because I haven’t stood at this table and roared, I’ve lost control. But you forgot something.”
I gripped the edge of the table and bent forward, looking every one of them in the eye.
“I don’t roar for attention. I kill in silence.”
I took my seat.
Finally.
Let the silence hang until it screamed.
Then I spoke.
“Effective immediately. Blood oaths will be renewed. Patrol routes will be rotated. All wolves will be inspected by dawn. Anyone who refuses disappears.”
Ryven shifted in his seat. Slowly. Carefully.
“What do you mean… disappears?”
I looked at him.
Dead in the eye.
“I mean I cut their head off and leave it at the border as a gift to the rogues.”
Not one word followed.
Just the faint scrape of a chair as someone tried to sit straighter.
I leaned back. My fingers tapped against the armrest. Slow. Rhythmic. A sound that would haunt them for weeks.
“You want to survive this war?”
I asked.
“Then follow my lead. You don’t have to like me. You don’t have to trust me. You just have to f*****g obey.”
And one by one, they obeyed.
Chins lowered.
Voices silenced.
Heads bowed.
I didn’t smile.
Didn’t smirk.
Didn’t move.
I let them sit there in the weight of it. The weight of me. The weight of what they had just remembered.
That I am not their friend.
Not their savior.
Not their hope.
I am the reason the pack is still breathing.
And if they test me again, I will be the reason it burns.
I watched them bow.
I watched them pretend.
Their heads lowered. Their mouths shut. But I could still hear the grind of their teeth. Still smell the rot of disobedience crawling under their skin like maggots. Respect isn’t real when it’s born from fear. But obedience? Obedience I could work with.
The meeting ended in silence.
No hands raised.
No arguments made.
No challenges issued.
Exactly how it should be.
I didn’t move when the chairs scraped back. Didn’t blink when they stood one by one and filed out with their tails between their legs. They passed me like shadows afraid of their own shape, offering quick nods, clipped murmurs, stiff spines trying not to show the tremble behind them.
But one.
One didn’t walk like the others.
One walked too fast.
Too tight.
Eyes darting. Shoulders tense.
Trying to leave too soon.
Trying to breathe before the rest.
Blood and Obedience
Bronn.
I watched him.
He didn’t know I was watching.
He didn’t even glance back.
That was his first mistake.
I let him pass through the door.
Let him make it to the corridor.
Let him think he’d gotten away.
Then I stood.
No word.
No sound.
I moved like a predator..
I walked out after him and closed the door behind me gently.
Bronn’s footsteps were ahead and he walked really fast. Trying not to look like he was fleeing while his scent screamed guilt.
I called his name once.
Not loud.
Just enough to make him stop walking.
“Bronn.”
He froze.
He didn’t turn.
He stood there like his spine had been carved from ice and his blood replaced with lead. I could hear his pulse from ten feet away. He was panicking.
He turned slowly.
Face tight. Hands twitching at his sides.
“Yes. Alpha.”
I stepped toward him.
My hands were at my sides. Honestly it was relaxed But my wolf was right under my skin, teeth bared, waiting for my command.
“You left quickly,”
I said.
He forced a smile. Too stiff. Too fake.
New Book: Back Home to Marry Off Myself
Loredana’s father left the family for his mistress, leaving them to fend for themselves abroad. When life was at its toughest, her father showed up with “good news” after 8 years of absence: To marry off Loredana to a paralyzed son of the wealthy Mendelsohn family.