Chapter 1

My three blood brothers are going to shatter my legs and trade me to the enemy Alpha for the Omega they all share as a mate.

And right now —

I was tied to my own bed.

The taste of the farewell drink is still on my tongue — bitter, herbal, wrong. My wrists are bound. My ankles are bound. The silver in the ropes burns my skin and keeps my wolf locked deep inside me, silent, useless.

Caelan stands at the foot of my bed with a silver-laced iron rod in his hand.

Marek is pinning my shoulders.

Sable is pinning my legs.

"Raven," Caelan says, "don't hate us. Elara can't be the one they take."

He swings.

The rod comes down on my right leg. My bone snaps. I'm going to hear that sound for the rest of my life.

Silver bites into the break. My wolf screams inside me and can't get out.

I don't scream. I won't give them that.

"So it should be me," I say through my teeth. Blood is filling my mouth from where I bit my tongue.

Marek's grip on my shoulders tightens until I feel something crack in the joint. He won't look at me. His jaw is locked so hard it's shaking.

"Raven, this is for the pack."

"This is for her," I spit.

Sable's hands tighten on my ankles. His eyes — usually the warm ones, the laughing ones, the brother who used to braid my hair before patrols — are cold as winter stone.

"You're the Iron Wolf," he says quietly. "You're worth more alive than dead. They might not kill you."

"Might not." I laugh, and it sounds like something dying.

The rod comes up again.

I see Caelan's hand on the grip, steady.

The crack is louder this time. Sweat soaks through my shirt. My vision tunnels.

I hear, very far away, Caelan drop the rod. I hear him wipe my blood off his face with his sleeve. Slow. Careful. The way our mother taught him to clean a hunting knife.

He leans over me. His hand brushes my hair back from my forehead like I'm a pup again.

"Sleep, little wolf," he murmurs. "When you wake up, Elara will be home."

I dig my nails into the bed frame. I find the last scrap of breath in my body.

"Caelan."

He stiffens.

"Marek. Sable."

I make them hear their names. I make them hear them in my voice — the voice that called for them when I was six and lost in the north woods, the voice that howled their victory after Bonecrag's first defeat.

I smile. Blood bubbles between my teeth.

"You're going to regret this. All three of you. For the rest of your lives."

Caelan's face does something then. Something small. Something that breaks.

But he turns away.

Marek lets go of my shoulders. Sable lets go of my legs. They line up behind their oldest brother like soldiers, like strangers, like three men who have already buried me in their heads.

They walk out without looking back.

The door closes.

The lock turns.

Click.

And just like that, I, the Iron Wolf of Ashfall Pack, become a broken thing chained in my own bedroom, waiting to be delivered.