“We already have the right!” Ash roared, his face turning that interesting shade of purple Ryker remembered from that day out on the boundary road. “If not for your fathers and that asshole Chubbuck, this land would have been ours! You squander the wealth that sits within your reach.”
Ryker’s gaze flicked to the man he once called a friend, as he stood dispassionately behind Ash. “Is that why you fucking betrayed your own clan, Karl?”
Whatever the answer was, Karl was a dead man walking as far as Ryker and his bear were concerned, but he couldn’t help but be curious. After all, he couldn’t imagine anything that might convince him to betray his own.
“I’m tired of living here,” Karl said in a monotone, and Ryker wondered if the man had ever had a real emotion. “I want to leave, but I don’t want to work. This seemed like a good way to get money. It was never anything personal.”
“Don’t fucking kid yourself, Karl,” Bastian snarled from over Ryker’s left shoulder. “This is all about being personal.”
Ash stepped in front of Karl, his eyes flicking to an arctic blue, his wolf close to the surface. “Enough! I want this to end. I challenge you, Ryker Barrett, for the right to lead the Blackwater Clan.”
Ryker grinned, his body flooding with adrenaline and bloodlust as his bear pushed forward. “Oh, you arrogant prick, I accept your challenge.” He flicked his hand, partially shifting so that his claws shot forth. “My bear and I long for the taste of your blood, and nothing will stop us from getting it.”
He reveled for a moment in the shock that filled Ash’s eyes, and then he stepped forward with a shout that morphed into the roar of a pissed off bear as he allowed the shift to explode through him. Ash shifted just as quickly, and as Ryker stepped forward, they clashed together in their animal forms. Ash leaped onto his back, biting into the large mound of muscle at the back of his neck, and Ryker roared in pain and anger that the prick got first blood. But this was a battle to the death, so it didn’t matter who bled first. It only mattered who was left standing at the end.
With a mighty swing of his giant head, he dislodged the wolf, who slammed into the wall beside them. He heard bears roaring in challenge at each other and spared a glance toward where his brother was now locked in battle with Karl. From the ferocity that Bastian was exhibiting against the smaller bear, it would not last long.
Ryker spun back to Ash in time to see the wolf leap at him, and he swiped at the wolf in midair, pulling him from the air, and raking his claws as deep into the soft underbelly of the wolf as he could. Inside his bear, he cheered at the pained yelp the wolf made. Then everything was lost beneath the haze of red that befell his bear as he mauled Ash’s wolf to death. When he locked his large jaw around the mortally wounded wolf’s throat, there was little fight left in him. In fact, Ryker felt the moment Ash simply submitted to death and went limp.
A few moments later, his bear dropped his kill to the ground and roared his triumph as he stood over the body. When he heard his brother’s roar fill the air a moment later, his heart filled with elation.
When they stopped, there was a moment's silence before he heard his mate cry out. “Those bears are my mates, ladies. Drool if you like, but know that they’re mine.” Ryker swung his head to look at his mate and grinned, as much as a bear could, to see her sitting up, leaning against Lucas, and watching him and Bastian with pride shining in her beautiful green eyes.
He heard Bastian chuff in challenge and swung quickly back to face the threat of Ash’s wolves. Some of them had already fled, but a brave few remained, a stubborn gleam in their eyes. He rose onto his back legs, roaring his challenge to the pack, prepared to take on each and every one of the bastards. One by one his clan shifted and all stood to roar with him, showing those wolves that the clan endured as one.
The sign of a good leader was how the rest of the team came together in times of adversity. It was not surprising that the rest of Ash's pack took off. The Blackwater Falls clan was strong. They were united.
And fuck anyone who thought to come in here and change that.
