Chapter 15: The Beast
Liam POV
The training field was loud.
Clashing steel. Breath. Dirt kicking up under boots. The dull thud of bodies hitting the ground and getting back up because they knew better than to stay down while I was watching.
But my head was quiet.
Too quiet.
It kept circling back to one thing — one person.
Mara.
I rolled my shoulders once, loosening tight muscles that didn't want to loosen. Wolves stepped aside as I crossed the yard. Not because I roared or postured. I didn't need to.
They felt it.
Alpha pressure. Control. Contained danger.
"Pair up," I said.
They moved fast.
Beta Rowan tossed me a practice blade. I caught it without looking. He studied my face the way betas do when they're trying to pretend they're not studying their Alpha.
"You didn't sleep," he said.
"I slept," I replied.
He snorted. "Your definition of sleep is closing your eyes while planning murder."
I didn't deny it.
Because he was right.
Every time I closed my eyes, I saw a small omega sitting too straight on the edge of a bed that wasn't familiar to her, refusing to lean back because relaxing still felt like a permission she didn't trust.
I'd told her she could choose.
Stay, Leave, Hate me, Claim me.
I meant it.
And my wolf hated it.
He prowled just under my skin now, restless, ears pinned forward in the direction of the packhouse like he could hear her breathing from here.
Focus.
I stepped onto the sparring circle.
"Three minutes," I said. "Show me you remembered yesterday."
Two warriors came at me at once.
Good.
Smart decision.
They'd learned.
The first slashed high. The second went for my ribs. I pivoted, blocked, hooked an ankle, and sent the larger one onto his back with his breath gone. The second froze for half a heartbeat — mistake — and my blade tapped his throat.
"Dead," I said.
He swallowed. "Yes, Alpha."
I moved through them faster after that. Not angry. Just efficient. My body remembered before my mind did. Training was simple: movement, timing, control.
Everything my life used to be before a small omega stared at me like I was both storm and shelter and asked if I meant what I said.
I will not mark you until you ask me to.
The words came back like a punch.
My wolf twisted, growled low, unhappy. She is ours.
She decides, I answered silently.
That didn't calm him.
It didn't calm me.
Rowan stepped in next. He grinned — reckless idiot — and swung too hard because he wanted to see if I would bite.
"I liked your speech," he said between blows. "Very noble. Very modern alpha. 'Choice, empowerment, consent.' The girls will swoon."
"She isn't 'girls'," I said.
He raised a brow. "She's your mate."
My jaw tightened.
He felt it.
He backed off half a step without meaning to.
"Careful," he muttered. "You're leaking aura."
I exhaled and pulled it back. Warriors straightened around the yard like a weight had been lifted off their chests.
My control was good. It was always good.
But today it frayed.
Because Mara's scent lingered in my head — crushed leaves, clean rain, something soft I couldn't name. Because she'd looked relieved when I said she could say no.
Because part of me hated that she'd needed to hear it.
"Again," I said.
Rowan lunged. I parried. He feinted left and aimed for my shoulder. I let him land the hit just hard enough to make him think he'd done something impressive.
Then I flipped him.
He hit the ground and wheezed. " No fair You're cheating."
"I'm Alpha."
"That's… fair."
Laughter rippled around the field. Light. Relaxed.
Good.
That was what training grounds were for — turning fear into strength, tension into muscle, boys into soldiers who would die for this land because it was theirs.
My land.
My people.
My mate.
The word slipped through before I could stop it.
Mate.
It sat heavy. Real.
I wiped sweat from my brow and looked toward the tree line without meaning to. The forest crouched at the edge of the territory, old and waiting.
Something in it was wrong.
We'd known that for days.
Scouts reported movement that didn't match ordinary predators. Tracks too deep. Silence too thick. The kind of quiet that feels like the world remembering how to hold its breath.
The beast.
The one from the border report.
The one that shouldn't exist in our woods — too large, too cold, too deliberate in the way it watched.
I'd felt it that night when Mara ran through these trees.
The way the ground felt like it listened.
The way shadows leaned.
"Alpha."
A young warrior jogged toward me, chest heaving. His eyes were a little too wide. That got my attention faster than his words.
"Yes."
"Patrols say the forest's… moving again."
Wolves stopped mid-swing.
Rowan stood.
My wolf surged up in my chest so hard my ribs ached.
Mara.
I didn't run.
I intended to walk.
I failed.
I crossed the yard in seconds. Gravel sprayed behind my boots. My pulse went sharp and steady — battle rhythm — but under it something else beat faster, more raw.
Fear.
Not for me.
For her.
She had chosen to stay in my territory for now — chosen me for now — and something ancient in the woods had also chosen her.
Because power recognizes change.
Because predators smell beginnings.
The path to the packhouse curved through birch and pine. The air shifted as soon as I stepped into shade — cooler, thinner, threaded through with the scent that had been living in my head all morning.
Mara.
My wolf went still.
Not calm.
Focused.
I heard footsteps before I saw her. Light. Quick. Not panicked — she didn't run — but determined, like she already knew being prey meant moving with purpose, not speed.
She stepped into view.
Small. Shoulders straight. Jaw set like someone who refused to break again even if the world asked her nicely.
Her eyes lifted and found me instantly.
Everything inside me settled.
"Liam," she said.
Just my name.
But it did things to me I didn't have time to unpack.
"You were going to the village," I said.
She nodded. "Yes. I—"
The woods behind her changed.
Not sound first.
Weight.
Pressure rolled across the ground like a slow wave. Birds didn't flee — they went silent. Leaves stilled. The air thickened with the kind of awareness that doesn't belong to human minds.
Her skin prickled.
I saw it.
Her hand twitched at her side.
"Don't turn around," I said quietly.
She froze.
Good.
Instinct. Obedience. Not submission — trust.
The smell hit next.
Wrong.
Not wolf. Not bear. Not anything that belonged here. Cold earth and old rot and something metallic like blood that had forgotten warmth.
My wolf bared his teeth.
It stepped out of the trees.
Large.
Too large.
Shoulders like boulders under fur the color of shadows. Head lowered. Eyes reflecting green-gold light that didn't exist in this clearing. Its body was shaped like a wolf's story someone had told badly — stretched, heavy, slightly wrong.
It didn't look at me first.
It looked at her.
My vision narrowed to a single point.
"Mara," I said. "Walk to me. Now!."
She didn't argue.
She didn't scream.
She moved.
Slow. Careful. Precise. The way prey survives — not racing, not challenging, simply refusing to trigger the thing whose attention felt like hands closing around her spine.
The beast tracked her.
Step for step.
Its lips peeled back without sound.
My aura slammed outward before I could rein it in. Warriors at the edge of the training field staggered. Trees creaked. The beast's head snapped toward me.
Good.
Look at me.
Come for me.
I put myself between it and her before my next thought finished forming. My hand brushed her shoulder as she reached me. That was enough. My wolf locked onto the contact — mine mine mine — and went still again.
"Behind me," I said.
She obeyed.
I felt her breath against my back. Fast. Warm. Alive.
The beast stepped forward.
The ground dipped under its weight.
"What is that?" she whispered.
"Not from this forest," I said.
My claws itched under skin I hadn't shifted yet. My vision brightened at the edges. The world went sharp — bark detail, pulse rhythm, the faint tremor in her exhale.
The thing wasn't rabid.
It wasn't wild.
It was focused.
On her.
My voice dropped, Alpha-deep. "You will not touch her."
It paused.
Then it smiled — not with lips, not human — a curl of hunger through its gaze.
It lunged.
Mara gasped.
I shifted forward without moving fully — hybrid reflex, half man, half beast — my power snapping through muscle like fire under ice.
The clearing exploded into motion.
I met it.
Claws scraped earth. Air tore past my ears. The whole forest seemed to lean in.
We didn't collide yet.
We were about to.
Everything inside me fixed on one simple truth:
Mate behind me.
Monster in front of me.
That was all that mattered.
The beast's eyes flashed.
My wolf roared.
We reached each other—
And the world broke open between us.