“Inside, Evelyn, please,” Victor growls, and Evelyn moves away from him. She looks between the two brothers for a moment, and though she would usually push against an order like that from Victor – or anyone, really – something, in this case, suggests that it’s best not to engage.

So she simply moves away, quickly climbing the steps to the porch and disappearing through the cottage’s front door.

“What the hell is wrong with you,” Victor snarls when she’s gone, advancing on his brother, feeling the tips of his claws start to poke at his fingertips.

“What’s wrong with me?” Rafe challenges, holding his ground. “What the hell is wrong with you, Victor!? Letting Walsh go, because Evelyn decided that she wants her dad to go free?”

“Enough!” Victor shouts, slashing the air between them, his fangs lengthening. Rafe’s eyes go wide at this – Victor is usually in perfect control of his transformation, but something about this has really set him off –

But still, this decision – it goes too far –

“You can’t let her do this, Victor!” Rafe shouts, his own fangs lengthening in response to his brother’s threat. “He will do it all again! Everything you fought for, he will take from you!”

“And you think I can’t manage that threat?” Victor asks, still advancing on Rafe, their bodies close together now. Violence is in every line of Victor’s muscles as he stares his brother down. “You think I haven’t considered this? You think I have made this decision easily?!”

“However you’ve made it, it’s the wrong decision! You’ve got to make him pay!”

“It’s not my decision –“

“You’re going to let her decide! Her be the arbiter of justice in your pack – in our pack!? And Walsh’s too – the pack your sons will inherit – she gets to decide its future?”

“Who else should do it, Rafe,” Victor asks, his voice low, his pulse racing now, barely keeping a leash on his rage as his brother insults his Luna again and again. “Who would mete out justice in this pack, if not her? It is her father’s fate, hers, her sons’, for which she decides –“

“She’s too close to it!”

“Precisely why she should decide!” Victor cries, shoving Rafe now, making him stumble back a few steps. “There is no one for whom this decision is harder, you i***t! She has spent days being tortured by this – having to face the actual people who this decision would affect! And she’s sobbing in my arms because she’s had to make it – and you come along and challenge her on it!?”

Rafe snarls but Victor lashes out, pushing him again – hard enough that he falls to the ground.

“Stay down, Rafe,” Victor snarls, standing over him. “You will learn your place in this pack – even if I have to teach it to you by force –“

“My place!?” Rafe rages, snarling at his brother. “On the ground – lower than her – I’m supposed to take the decision of a Luna as law!?

head at him, taking a step back. As Rafe watches, Victor leashes his self again, his fangs retracting, the claws that started from

just said, Rafe?” Victor asks,

“What?” Rafe asks, baffled.

you reject the idea that you’re lower than

what

Rafe. “You f*****g i***t,” Victor snarls, “don’t try to deny it – try

back, admitting – at least internally – that even if those hadn’t been his exact words,

his head at him again. “Don’t you get it, Rafe?” he asks. “This is why she won’t come back to

objections, with

his words meet his lips, Rafe realizes that he can’t speak them. Because Victor

a man, an Alpha, who always sees her as lower than him? Who always understands his own word as

go weak. He lets himself fall backwards into the gravel of the drive, his head bouncing, but he ignores the pain. He hadn’t realized…hadn’t thought that those

But clearly…

about having complete control and shaping the world into what you want.

is your Luna, your moon. The sooner you figure out that you’re not the earth in this metaphor – the thing around which she

watches his brother

as he

back to him. “You rise to her when she calls. You drown cities at her command. You

Victor walks up the stairs

head back against the gravel

_______________________________

out the front picture window with me as Victor stalks up the steps and heads towards the door. Ian crouches on my other

Uncle Rafe going to get run over by a car if

take a moment to

scared. “Should

little mad. “Let him risk it. He’s a

a second, but we’re interrupted when Victor opens the door, coming into the dark house and looking around. It

sighs and sinks his hands in his pockets, shaking his head at us.

my voice soft but even. “You wouldn’t want us to miss the

curious. “What is the

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