Winter: A time for love and revenge

The first nine challenges went pretty smoothly. Sebastian was able to get all of them to submit. Some of the fights were faster than the others. The second challenger submitted in under a minute, which would normally be embarrassing, but with the strength and skill with which Sebastian fought, he’d had no chance. The longest match so far had been nearly six minutes.

Despite fighting for over a half hour, Sebastian wasn’t showing any signs of weakness. If it weren’t for the sweat darkening his hair, his heavier breathing, and the fact I had watched each challenge, I would’ve never believed he spent this time-fighting.

Buzzing anticipation ran through the crowd with each challenge won. There were some still betting against Sebastian, saying each challenger would be the one to take him down, only for him to come out victorious.

Challenger number ten was a man named Everett. I’d seen him around and had heard his name, but I didn’t know all too much about him since he was in his early thirties and spent most of his time trying to climb the political ladder. Because I didn’t know much else about him, I didn’t have an opinion on him challenging Sebastian, but Adalind did.

She was on the other side of Aspen, letting out a groan that was hidden by the whispers in the crowd, but I was able to catch it. I leaned around Aspen to look at her, finding her nose wrinkled in disgust, intriguing me even more.

“Why don’t you like him?” I kept my voice at a whisper since the room had quieted as Sebastian and Everett circled each other. Everett was first to attack, his punch just narrowly missing Sebastian’s jaw. Everett was a large man with several inches on Sebastian. His shoulders were massive, and his arms were almost the size of my thighs. Based on sheer size alone, Sebastian was going to have a hell of a fight.

Adalind shook her head, biting her lip as she watched Everett remain on the offense, going for attack after attack. “He’s the most annoying suck-up I’ve ever met. I’ve never seen anyone so up my father’s ass in my entire life.”

Adalind’s father was the werewolf representative on the North American council, and with Everett’s lofty political aspirations, it made sense he’d try to cozy up to her father. While people like that were annoying, there had to be more to Adalind’s hatred of this man based on what I was witnessing.

“And?”

“And, my father has taken a liking to him. Trust me, anyone my father favors is not someone you want to associate with.” Adalind paused, cringing, as was I, when Everett landed a brutal blow to Sebastian’s side that had him grunting. Sebastian had barely shown any signs of pain in any of the fights, but he was showing it now. “And he’s certainly not someone you should want as Alpha.”

Despite being in the same grade, Adalind and I have never been close. We were more acquaintances than anything else, sharing a brief conversation here and there. Because of this, I didn’t know all too much about her situation with her father. I knew her mother passed away within the last year, but that was all. Based on Adalind’s tone, she didn’t get along with her father. I was fairly sure she rarely ever went to visit him, but like I said, we weren’t close, so I’d never paid too much attention.

From what I’d heard about him as a council leader, he was brutal and wasn’t the lenient type. I’d never heard anyone suggest he was crooked, but then again, I didn’t pay as much attention to the politics of our kind as I should’ve.

Sebastian managed to avoid most of Everett’s strikes, but it was clear he wasn’t the one in control of this fight. He’d taken multiple brutal punches and kicks that had my stomach plummeting and my anxiety rising. Everett was the first to draw blood and the only one of the ten challengers to do so.

“It’s a good thing it isn’t the first to draw blood,” Aspen murmured, resting his forearms on the railing and clasping his hands together. Based on the muscles flexing in his forearms, he was just as stressed as Adalind and me.

“He waited to be the last one so he’d have the advantage of Sebastian being tired,” Adalind muttered, squeezing the railing in a death grip. I had a feeling she’d love nothing more than to jump down there and attack Everett. Oh, there was definitely more to the story, but now wasn’t the time for that.

My heart felt like it was beating against my rib cage as Everett landed another blow, this time to Sebastian’s back. When Everett got his arm wrapped around Sebastian’s throat, I reached out and grabbed Aspen’s hand on instinct. I hadn’t been expecting him to release his other hand and thread his fingers through mine, allowing me to squeeze the ever-loving fuck out of it.

The crowd was quiet for the most part, with whispers occasionally running through it. Challenges weren’t like sporting events where you outwardly cheered for someone. There wasn’t an official rule against it, nor was it frowned upon, but it wasn’t recommended. It wasn’t wise to risk pissing off a potential Alpha. It would be some serious bad luck that you’d root for one, only for the other to win and know you were rooting against them.

So basically, it was a bad idea to show favoritism. “Kick his fucking ass, Sebastian!” I yelled, not giving a single fuck if Everett knew I was the one cheering Sebastian on. I’d walked into the training room wanting Sebastian to win all ten challenges, and that feeling had only been solidified. Adalind clearly knew a lot about Everett, and if she said he wasn’t good news, I believed her.

Aspen’s hold on my hand tightened in what I assumed was a quiet reprimand. It seemed like my cheering for Sebastian had broken a seal, as if others had been wanting to do so but had been afraid of repercussions. But now that I had put myself at risk, they were willing to join, and cheers erupted through the crowd in support of Sebastian, which Everett didn’t like.

Now, I’m not saying I was the reason Sebastian was able to break free, but he hadn’t been able to break his hold before the cheers started. Once others began cheering, Everett had let himself become distracted, not by much, but it was enough for Sebastian to finally find his way free.

Just because people had started cheering for Sebastian, it didn’t automatically mean he started winning or anything of the sort. Everett was still in control of the fight, and if anything, his strikes had more power, more rage behind them. Sebastian was able to dodge most of them, but not all. Despite how much it had to hurt, the only indications he gave were winces and grunts when the blows landed. He was also moving a bit slower than before, but not by too much. But even so, he remained on the defense, never going for any punches or kicks, which was odd.

It wasn’t until Everett’s movements slowed and began having less power behind them that I realized his plan. A grin lifted Sebastian’s lips—which were bleeding from one of Everett’s punches—when he was easily able to evade his punch. For the first time in the fight, Sebastian went for a strike, landing a punch under Everett’s jaw. He was relentless after that, not letting up or giving him a moment to breathe. Each of Sebastian’s moves was measured, and each hit was designed to weaken his opponent.

Sebastian had realized early on he was at a disadvantage against Everett, not just in size but in their energy levels. He knew that in a flat-out fight, he would lose and not be able to match Everett’s power, so he waited him out, letting him exhaust himself.

Unlike with the other challengers, he didn’t go for the submission, figuring Everett’s pride would never allow him to tap out. Sebastian went for the knockout, which took him longer and earned him a few more strikes from Everett, although not as strong as before. When Sebastian landed his final punch to Everett’s jaw, and he went down, we all collectively held our breaths as we waited to see if he’d get up.

It wasn’t until Haden came out onto the mat and announced Sebastian victorious that we finally began cheering. My excitement at not only having an alpha once again but one I could respect had me throwing my arms around Aspen and pulling him into a hug, my feet leaving the floor.

As with many areas of our friendship, this wasn’t out of the ordinary—we’d hugged many times in the past, but it was all different now. Once I came to my senses and realized it was probably weird to be burying my face against his neck, I eased my grip around his shoulders, and Aspen placed me back on my feet. He kept his hands on my hips as he met my gaze, once again seeming like he was trying to decipher something.

I was spared from having to answer any questions or come up with an excuse when Haden began speaking, officially announcing Sebastian as our newest Alpha. He not only congratulated him but acknowledged the impressive fights the challengers put on as well.

Everett had been pulled from the mats and presumably was being checked over. Sebastian didn’t get checked out just yet. He was handed a towel that he used to mop up his sweat and the blood smeared on his lips and chin. Even though he had just been through a hell of a fight, he still stood tall, showing no signs of weakness and proving without a shadow of a doubt he was worthy to be our Alpha.

Haden led Sebastian through his oaths that basically swore he would do his all to protect and lead this pack. He would put the good of the pack over his own personal wants and aspirations.

This was the first Alpha swearing-in ceremony I’d attended, and while it wasn’t a typical one, it still held great significance. I would argue it held more than the typical one with everything we had recently faced and gone through.

In a typical Alpha swearing-in ceremony, the former Alpha would be the one giving the oaths to the new Alpha. It also wouldn’t be done in the training room. They would move to a clearing and perform the vows just before the full moon rose so that once they took their oaths, they’d all be able to run together and bond. Obviously, we couldn’t do that since we just had our full moon. We didn’t have the time to wait for the vows—we needed an Alpha now.

As Sebastian took his final oath and spilled his blood into an ancient chalice, the cords tying him to each member snapped into place. I could feel my wolf stirring as she probed his energy, noticing the difference between this tie versus the one with Mitchell. The energy from Sebastian’s wolf was different, more vibrant with his youth and vitality. Now that his tie to us was in place, he could mentally speak in all of our minds at once. Only the Alpha could do this; the rest of us could only speak to one person at a time.

There were other benefits that came with having an Alpha, but the most important was that now we could finally do something about those shapeshifting bastards. Yes, our pack had killed or captured all the ones that had attacked us, but I had a feeling there were more involved in this.