Stolen
and
Forgiven
A Branded Packs Novel
By
Alexandra Ivy and Carrie Ann Ryan
Stolen and Forgiven
A Branded Packs Novel
By: Alexandra Ivy and Carrie Ann Ryan
ISBN: 978-1-62322-196-6
© 2015 Alexandra Ivy and Carrie Ann Ryan
Cover Art by Syneca
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All characters in this book are fiction and figments of the author’s imagination.
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Stolen and Forgiven
Branded Packs Book 1
Stolen
The first rule of being Alpha of the Canine Pack is to protect their secrets from the humans at all cost. One look at the dying human at his doorstep and Holden Carter knows he will have to break it. The broken woman with no hope at survival is his mate. When he forces the change on her to save her life, he not only sets forth motions that could risk both their lives, but the lives of every shifter in the world.
Ariel Sands grew up in a post-Verona infection world and under the care of the very humans she thought had cured the disease. When they betray her in the worst ways imaginable, she finds herself not only mated to the Alpha of a the very species she’s been taught to fear, but the focal point of a traitor and path to destruction for everyone’s way of life. It will take more than trust and a mating bond for Ariel and Holden to not only survive their enemies, but the burn of their own temptations.
Forgiven
Soren Slater is a Beta wolf who understands that duty to his Pack comes before his own needs. At a young age he takes a position as a liaison between his Pack and the other species of shifters. He never expected his enticing flirtations with Cora Wilder, a Tiger Princess, would encourage her cat to consider him a potential mate. He’s forced to walk away, choosing a partner among the wolves to try and strengthen his Pack.
Cora has no intention of forgiving or forgetting Soren’s rejection. Not even when the Packs are forced to live together and she discovers Soren’s former mate has died. But then, she’s kidnapped by the SAU and she has no choice but to work with Soren to escape. Together they must put the past behind them if they’re to survive the human’s evil plot.
Stolen
The Beginning
Twenty-five years have passed since the Verona Virus nearly wiped out human civilization. It was only when the shifters reluctantly came out of hiding to offer their blood as an antidote that the virus was brought to a halt.
Instead of creating harmony between the two species, however, the humans took control. The shifters found themselves branded, collared, and forced to live like animals. The Canine, Ursine, and Feline compounds are small and territorial, their populations on the edge of extinction. Each Pack is suffering from infighting, and even worse, the humans keep finding ways to enforce new laws that threaten their very existence.
The Alphas and other hierarchy are the only ones that stand in the way of their people’s demise.
Or are they?
Chapter 1
If everyone didn’t get the fuck away from him, they’d be responsible for the trail of clawed up assholes in his wake. Holden Carter, Alpha of the River Pack, ran a hand through his hair. His muscles strained, and his wolf prowled far too closely to the surface for his liking. It didn’t matter that they sat on old couches and the scarred wooden floor in his home. He’d take them out one by one if they wouldn’t let him breathe.
“You look ready to kick someone’s ass, Alpha, you’d better rein it in.”
Holden turned to his second, Soren and narrowed his eyes. The smug bastard might be a Beta, but there wasn’t a submissive bone in his body. The only thing that kept Soren from leading like Holden was his wolf.
The wolves determined dominance, not the strength of the man beneath.
Instead of smashing his best friend’s face in, Holden lifted a lip in a semblance of a smile. Of course, from the look on Soren’s face, it must have come out as more of a grimace than an actual smile. Oh well, the man deserved it. As did the rest of them. Hell, he needed to run. Or a drink.
Anything at this point.
Holden turned back to the wolves in front of him and let out a low growl. Each man and woman quieted, the collars around their necks a stark contrast to the color of their skin. He fucking hated the collars his brothers and sisters wore more than the metal one wrapped tightly around his neck.
It reminded him that the Pack wasn’t free.
Weren’t equal.
Weren’t human.
They were caged and branded, but not forgotten.
He’d make sure his Pack was never forgotten.
That was his duty as Alpha. One of many.
“You’ve aired your grievances,” Holden growled out, his wolf clawing at him. “The collars can’t come off. It’s a death sentence at this point. You know this.” The collars themselves wouldn’t kill them if they took the metal cages off their necks. No, it was the humans who held that power. They had eyes everywhere, a hold over their lives and future.
“But we can overpower the humans,” Theo, a younger wolf, bit out. He had been born within the compound walls and had never stepped foot outside as a free man. Between the need to find some semblance of who he could be and the natural aggression of a new adult wolf, Theo always toed the line of wolf and man. “We’re wolves. We’re powerful. Not like the fucking cats and bears in the other compounds.”
Rumbles from the other wolves who agreed with him.
Holden suppressed a growl of agreement. The cats and bears were in their own compounds and had their own troubles. Many of the wolves in the Pack had never seen another type of shifter. The humans had broken from their brethren, and the results weren’t a shared connection of pain. Instead, the old taunts of cat vs wolf vs bear had turned to something far more feral.
Again, Holden didn’t want to think of that. Instead, he wanted—no needed—to run.
“That’s enough,” he growled, his wolf in his voice. “We’re not all dominants. There are submissives, non-fighters, and children to consider.” Holden let out a breath. Always so much to consider and never enough leverage to protect his people from atrocities of the worst kind.
Humans.
The wolves, cats, and bears had been locked within their own compounds for twenty-five years. Two and a half long decades where a new generation had been forcibly denied a glimpse the outside world; destined never to breathe the air of freedom, never to run on four paws for as far as their legs could take them.
Instead, they’d been collared, imprisoned, and branded like cattle.
Holden rubbed his left forearm where the brand of his species, his people, burned as it had when he’d turned fifteen and been forced to wear the mantel as Alpha and savior of his kind. The tribal wolf howled at an unseen moon—ironic since the humans who’d designed the brand had done their best to cut the wolves from their nature and their need to be one with the earth. The act of defiance in tattooing the left side of his Pack tattoo had cost him dearly, but he’d never regret the ink on his skin.
N
ot when it meant his people had a chance at life.
Holden squeezed his forearm, his claws breaking through the tips of his fingers slightly before receding. He had better control than any wolf here, but sometimes, the wolf needed to run.
The men and women who sat in his home were his council. Not a true council since wolves didn’t work that way, but they were the pillars of their Pack, their compound. Each of them wove within the den, learning what they could and keeping the peace. For if a wolf stepped out of line, it wouldn’t be the Alpha in all cases to punish them. Instead, the humans would take that on their shoulders and make them an example. The people in front of him helped him keep his Pack in line and let him know of problems that he could be unaware of as Alpha.
Soren, as Beta, did most of the legwork when it came to that, but he couldn’t do it alone. Not when their numbers grew monthly, but the space they’d been provided hadn’t. The walls became more confining daily, and soon they would have to find a way to glimpse freedom. However, today was not that day.
“We cannot fight against the humans with what we have,” Holden continued. “We are gaining in number, gaining in strength, but it is not enough. Not yet.”
“When will it be enough, Alpha,” Ana, another young wolf, snarled.
Holden clenched his jaw and met her gaze. Her wolf whimpered and lowered her eyes after only a moment of meeting his. Ana wasn’t a weak wolf by far, but she wasn’t anywhere near Holden’s dominance. Between her and Theo, Holden had reached his limit in dealing with cocky attitudes and far away dreams of a freedom without thinking of the cost.
“We’re done,” Holden bit out. “We are dealing with the problems we can control, and the rest are tabled.” He let out a breath, his arms threatening to shake. If he didn’t get out of there soon, he’d start shifting right then. “Go to your families.”
The others shuffled out, their own wolves reaching out to him. He could feel their power brush his own, but that didn’t calm him like it should have. Instead, it only egged him on.
“You need me to run with you?” Soren asked, his voice low. His best friend understood him like no other, but Holden needed to be alone right then. It didn’t help that he knew Soren needed to run off his own demons, but it was not Holden’s place to help him. Some scars could never be healed.
Holden shook his head. “No. Go back and make sure Theo and Ana don’t start shit.”
“They’re young,” Soren said simply as the two of them walked out of Holden’s home into the night.
A breeze brushed over Holden’s face and he stopped to inhale the sweet scents of nature. As much as humans wanted to close them in and never let them breathe free air again, that hadn’t worked. When the compounds were built twenty-five years ago during the first months after shifters had been discovered, the wolves, cats, and bears had been forced to live in warehouses of sorts, breathing recirculated air with no trees around them or soil beneath their feet.
Holden stifled a growl at the memory of their brutal captivity. The chain-link and razor wire electric fences surrounding their newer compound clawed at his soul, but it was nothing like before. When his packmates had started dying, he’d begged—fucking begged on his hands and knees—to let his people have fresh, unfiltered air and the space to run on four paws that they needed to survive.
In the end, he’d bargained with his life and won. At least as much as he could. He refused to rub between his shoulder blades; the puckered scars there a stark reminder of what he’d endured for the facade of freedom his Pack now held. Between the blood he’d lost and the brutality he had been forced to endure and take part in monthly, he’d found the cost of that small freedom.
But his Pack’s lives were worth all that and more.
“Alpha?”
He shook his head, his hands fisting at his sides. “Go.” One word, a growl on the wind, and Soren lowered his gaze. Holden didn’t miss the sadness there. Soren alone knew the pain Holden endured to keep his people safe, but there was nothing the other man could do—nothing Holden would require his friend to do.
Soren gave him a tight nod then loped off after the other wolves that had gone their separate ways. Holden knew Soren would hold the fort while he ran along the forested edges of their compounds. He couldn’t hunt as the humans had done all in their power to keep game and other animals out of the wolves’ territory, but he could at least run hard between the trees.
He made his way to the forested area on the westernmost edge of the compound. From there he could barely make out the shadowed peaks of the Rocky Mountains. After the humans had found out about shifters and done their best to kill them off, the rest of those with two natures had been forced into compounds around each major city in America—and across the world if what Holden had heard back then was correct. Denver loomed in the distance north of them, but he couldn’t quite see the lights of the big city. That was on purpose, of course. God forbid humans were forced to see the atrocities those in power had created—manmade camps where freedom was nonexistent and torture was a way of life.
The Canine compound sat between the Ursine and Feline compounds, with the Ursines to the west nearer to the foothills, and the Felines to the east, their compound brushing the plains. By law, Holden and his people were not able to visit the others. In fact, they were never allowed to step foot off their compound unless the humans took them out. And even then, it was only for questioning and study.
He swallowed back the bile that rose in his throat at that thought. He needed to run, to forget those who had bled at his hands and out of his control. With a sigh, he stripped off his shirt and undid his pants. While he could shift fully clothed, he’d only end up disengaging anything on his body that wasn’t etched into his skin or a special metal. The collars, of course, were made of a metal that adjusted to the size of the shifter’s neck after they changed into their animal form. Such ingenuity from a people who had all but killed his own.
He let out a breath then pulled on his wolf. The change was quick, a breath of sweet agony, and soon he found himself on all fours. In his animal form, he stood a little larger than a natural wolf. The moon wasn’t full so he’d be able to hide easily within the shadows if he felt like it. It helped that his midnight-black fur blended so well with the dark. The only real color was a white stripe on his nose.
His mother had loved that little stripe.
He repressed a growl and buried the pain of her loss. When the Verona virus had hit, most of his people were safe from the disease, but not the carriers. He’d lost his parents, his siblings…everyone.
A growl escaped his throat, and he shook his body like he’d stepped out of water, and ran. His paws slammed onto the ground, the force of the impact vibrating in his jaw, but he didn’t care. He had dirt between the pads of his feet, and a slight breeze through his fur. If he could ignore the stench of metal and burning electricity, he could almost forget that he lived within a cage.
He’d been running for only a few minutes when he scented another wolf.
Well, hell. He wasn’t in the mood for this, but Theo needed to get it out of his system. As Alpha, it was Holden’s job to help the younger, dominant wolves find their place within the Pack. That meant fielding dominance challenges and takedowns when necessary. Theo wouldn’t win tonight, but the wolf would be able to let his aggression out. Too much suppressed aggression within a system, and that system would break. Holden had seen firsthand what happened when a younger wolf not only didn’t learn to control their urges but didn’t learn to let them out, as well.
Holden lifted a lip in a snarl as Theo padded toward him. The younger wolf had grey, tan, and white patches, much like many of the wild Timberwolves outside the compound. Theo’s human side had finished growing, though Holden knew he would gain more muscle over time. However, Theo’s wolf wasn’t quite finished growing. Holden had a feeling Theo would soon be as large as Soren. That would be good for the Pack since they would need all the strength they could get in the coming
months and years. Right then, though, Holden had more pressing matters on his mind.
He let out a warning growl, but Theo didn’t stop moving. The animal within Theo maintained control, and Holden would mold and shape that into a dominant wolf worth having in the Pack. Theo snarled but didn’t lower his gaze.
Challenge issued.
Theo pounced, a quick movement that surprised even Holden. It seemed the young wolf had some speed. Good, but not good enough. Holden moved out of the way at the last moment and nipped at Theo’s flank. The younger wolf snapped his large teeth, but Holden didn’t get bit. Instead, he threw his own body at Theo, smashing the young man into the dirt. Theo struggled, but couldn’t fight Holden’s greater size. Knowing it had to be done, Holden bit into the back of Theo’s neck, marking him has his lower. Pride swelled inside, even if it warred with frustration. Theo would make a good enforcer or tracker one day, once he’d found his calling. He just had to refine his balance with his wolf. They all had to do it, though Holden had accomplished it far younger than most.
When Theo relaxed in his hold, Holden released him and stood back. He nudged at the other wolf and they both shifted back, Theo panting in exertion.
“Feel better now?” Holden bit out. He’d needed his run and a dominance challenge hadn’t helped his wolf.
Theo ran a hand through his too-long hair and grimaced. “Sorry, Alpha. I…I tried to hold back.”
He waved him off. “Your wolf needed a fight. I get it. It’s what makes us wolves and not human. But, next time? Try Soren or someone else first.”
Theo let out a breath. “Yeah, I know. I just…I don’t know.”
Holden had a feeling he knew. Theo would one day be one hell of a strong wolf. Perhaps not as strong as Soren to be Beta, but he’d be up there. Theo’s wolf needed to seek out the strongest of them all, even if he was certain to lose. Holden understood it, but he didn’t have to like it.