Rising reign, p.1
Rising Reign, page 1
part #3 of The Wolves of Crescent Creek Series
RISING REIGN
TESSA HALE
CONTENTS
1. Wren
2. Kingston
3. Wren
4. Wren
5. Brix
6. Wren
7. Wren
8. Puck
9. Wren
10. Ender
11. Wren
12. Wren
13. Kingston
14. Locke
15. Wren
16. Ender
17. Wren
18. Ender
19. Wren
20. Wren
21. Brix
22. Wren
23. Wren
24. Wren
25. Puck
26. Wren
27. Wren
28. Wren
29. Kingston
30. Wren
31. Locke
32. Wren
33. Puck
34. Wren
35. Wren
36. Wren
37. Wren
38. Wren
39. Ender
40. Wren
41. Wren
42. Wren
43. Wren
44. Locke
45. Wren
46. Wren
47. Brix
48. Wren
49. Wren
50. Wren
51. Puck
52. Wren
53. Kingston
54. Wren
Epilogue
Also by Tessa Hale
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Copyright © 2024 by Tessa Hale. All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Cover Design: TRC Designs
Paperback Formatting: Champagne Book Designs
1
WREN
Rain pelted my skin, feeling like tiny knives slicing into me. But, still, I tipped my face to the darkening sky. Water. I needed this water. Opening my mouth, I caught as many drops on my tongue as possible.
I kept my eyes closed. It was easier that way, trying not to take in the surrounding walls of the pit. The towering way they enclosed me. The occasional snake that made its way down. The countless creepy-crawlies.
Breathe, Wren.
I forced my inhale to slow. No jerky, stuttered breaths that would feed my panic. As I brought the muggy air into my lungs, I scented the bayou water—the thick heaviness of it—and the rotting aromas that seemed to cling to my father’s territory.
No. Not my father. Bastian. The bastard who’d taken everything from me.
My back screamed, and the memories of the whip slicing into my flesh rose. A lash for every month I’d been away. My wolf pressed at my skin, wanting out, wanting to rid the world of every being who had caused us harm.
“With time,” I whispered. “With time.”
I lifted the shirt that had been given to me after the lashing, letting out a whimper as it peeled away from my blood-caked skin. Keeping my eyes closed, I called on my wolf—not for a full transition, but enough to bring on some healing.
My skin tingled as I felt fur ripple over my limbs, torso, and then my face. My breaths turned into those short pants I was trying to hold off—pain-filled ones—as my knees finally gave way, and I hit the muddy ground with a thud.
The healing was necessary but took far too much energy. Especially when I hadn’t been given food or water in at least seventy-two hours. As my fingers dug into the mud, I pictured the guys in my mind. I painted each of their faces in such detail that it felt like I could reach out and touch each one.
A keening noise left my lips, my wolf crying out at being separated from her mates. My human half was just as devastated. Everything in me ached, and it was from more than just the beatings I’d taken. It was a soul-deep pain.
But I kept breathing. For the guys and for myself. I refused to let Bastian Boudreaux win. He wouldn’t break me.
I slowly forced my eyes open. It was getting darker, ramping the panic inside me higher. But then I pictured Locke—the way he held me and soothed my touch-hunger, how his voice sounded with his gentle reassurances—and the panic eased a fraction.
Leaning back on my heels, I studied my surroundings: mud and stone held in place by what looked like heavy-duty chicken wire or something similar. It was the only thing keeping the pit from collapsing since it was so close to the water.
The rain eased a bit, but as it did, a shiver racked me. Not a good sign. My shifter nature should’ve protected me from the cold. If it wasn’t, my energy stores were running on empty.
I didn’t let the fear of that realization in. I let logic reign. Because Bastian didn’t want me dead. Not yet, anyway. He wanted me to feel every ounce of pain that he and his minions dished out.
A shudder ran through me at the memory of Marcelle’s snarling face as he took his turn with the whip. The way he’d grabbed my hair afterward and whispered, “Just wait until you’re in heat. I’m going to make you pay in ways your nightmares can’t even imagine.”
Breathe, Wren. Just breathe.
This time, I pictured Kingston. The way his callused hands felt as they framed my face. How he promised that everything would be okay and made it so. The sweet, thoughtful gifts he left for me to find.
My panic eased again. Because the guys were my talismans, my guiding lights. And I would find my way back to them.
Footsteps sounded in the distance, and I instantly launched to my feet, every muscle and limb crying out in protest. I might’ve healed myself, but that sort of pain lived on like an echo you couldn’t wash away.
I tipped my head back, watching, waiting, listening. The steps were heavy, likely male, and carried anger.
Steeling myself, I tapped into my empath gift ever so slightly.
Pure darkness slammed into me, making me stumble. I instantly threw up my walls, but the darkness still slid inside. Nausea rolled through me as sheer agony raged.
Then, a face appeared over the side of the pit, and Marcelle sneered. “Enjoying being back where you belong, bitch?”
I struggled to pull air into my lungs. The rotting bayou scents of the Red River and Marcelle’s stomach-turning stench filled my nose.
“Nothing to say?” he snarled. “Good. I like my women silent and obedient. You’ll be trained as such.”
I nearly vomited then but managed to keep a hold of myself. Losing any water from my system now could be catastrophic.
Marcelle threw a rope ladder down, and I scurried to get out of its path.
“That’s it. Run, little bitch.”
I bit the inside of my cheek to hold back my retort as the ladder clattered against the side of the pit.
“Start climbing. Your father wants to see you.”
It took everything in me to hold back my shudder. I didn’t want to give Marcelle or Bastian the satisfaction. Instead, I began to climb.
I’d tried refusing as a child, curled into a ball at the bottom of the pit, and hoping for death. Instead, I’d gotten the worst beating of my life. Then Bastian had brought a healer to fix me, only to do it all over again. I’d learned to never refuse.
But something about choosing to climb to my own punishment was even more painful. It made me feel weak and pathetic.
“You’re strong,” I whispered to myself. “You survive. That’s what matters.”
“What’d you say, little bitch?” Marcelle snapped.
I didn’t answer. Instead, I pictured Brix in my mind. The way he’d shielded himself and his emotions for so long. How strong he’d been through his pain. And the way he’d let me in—the gift that was. If he could make it through, so could I.
My entire body cried out in pain as I climbed. Muscle. Skin. Bones. Everything felt like it was a second away from irrevocably breaking.
“Faster,” Marcelle demanded.
I tried. My muscles screamed, but I pushed harder. The second I was within arm’s reach, he grabbed me by the hair, dragged me out, and threw me to the ground. I slid through the mud like some disgusting Slip ‘N Slide.
Marcelle’s nose flared. “You stink.”
No shit, Sherlock.
I refrained from giving voice to that thought. But whose fault was it that I smelled? It wasn’t as if they’d given me access to a shower.
“Get up,” he barked.
I struggled to my feet, my muscles quaking.
Marcelle was on me in two long strides, grabbing me by the hair again. “Start walking.”
I did as I was ordered. The pit was on the outskirts of the pack territory, with small cabins belonging to the lowest-ranking members surrounding it. Bastian didn’t want to listen to his prisoners scream all night long.
As Marcelle marched me along, a few people poked their heads out of their houses, curious to see the alpha’s traitorous daughter. There was a mix of reactions. Those loyal to my father sneered and spat. Others looked fearful. And a few looked sad—one or two even angry.
Something pricked my awareness: the realization that none of the women wore shoes. My stomach cramped. I didn’t have shoes on either. I never did on p
ack territory because my father thought it would keep me from running. But now, none of the women were allowed?
Marcelle’s lip curled as he followed my line of sight. “You cost them that privilege. You, and you alone. They all despise you.”
My shoulders curled in as if wings could spring from my back and protect me from the onslaught of the words. It did no good. The knowledge that the women of this pack were being hurt because of me sliced me to my bones.
“Keep it moving,” Marcelle said, shoving me forward by my head.
I stumbled, my feet sticking in the mud, but I kept moving. I took in the cabins through the mossy trees. They got nicer and larger the closer we got to the main house—Bastian’s home. It loomed in the distance.
It stuck out like a sore thumb against the more rustic cabins: white paint and columns that gleamed amid the swampy backdrop. It didn’t fit. Just like my father didn’t—fake and not true to its nature.
But Marcelle didn’t guide me toward it. Instead, he turned me. That’s when I saw them—torches lighting the darkening sky and forming a circle.
That twisting sensation was back in my stomach for a whole new reason now.
Two massive bonfires roared on either side of the circle, with a dais of sorts behind it. A chair like a throne loomed highest, snarling wolves carved into the posts and battle scenes playing out on the legs as my father sat impassively atop it, a woman kneeling at his feet.
I lifted my chin, refusing to be cowed by his flair for the dramatic. I would meet whatever he had planned head-on. I would not cower.
Marcelle shoved me toward the dais. I stumbled, but I didn’t fall.
Bastian’s gaze skimmed over me. “Little Flower, you’re looking a little worse for wear.”
I didn’t make a sound; just stared at him.
His lips twitched. “Such defiance in you. Such fire. It’s surprising, really. Maybe there is hope for the line that comes from you yet. But you’ll have to prove yourself.”
Marcelle scoffed, but I pretended I couldn’t hear.
Bastian’s fingers drummed on the arm of his chair, his many rings glittering in the firelight. “If you succeed, you’ll receive a shower, a meal, and a bed for the night. If you fail, it’s back to the pit for another week.”
I didn’t let hope show on my face. It would bring Bastian too much pleasure.
“But you’ll have to win it,” he growled.
Dread pooled low in my stomach. Win it.
I knew what that meant. The torches. The bonfires. The gathering pack.
They lived for these nights—the bloody battles that entertained Bastian and could earn them favor for a fleeting moment. But I was a submissive, and the past three days of torment had left me weak, my strength fleeting.
Bastian reached out a hand to grab the kneeling woman’s chin and lifted it. “Tell me, pet. Will you fight for my honor?”
“Yes, Alpha,” she whispered demurely. But I saw her muscles ripple as she spoke. Everything about her was a finely honed machine.
“Rise, Lilli,” Bastian commanded.
She did so gracefully, and my mouth went dry. The woman had at least a foot on me, and as she stretched, I saw that I’d been right about that muscle. The scars across her knuckles told me she was no stranger to a fight.
Bastian leveled his stare at me. “You will fight for the privilege of my shelter. You will fight until death itself comes knocking.”
2
KINGSTON
I stared into the fire as it crackled. It should’ve been too warm to have one, but the Colorado mountains had turned bitterly cold surprisingly early this year—as if the mountains, too, were grieving the loss of Wren, crying out for her return. My wolf howled inside me, raging against the walls I’d constructed around him.
There was no way I could set him free right now. I didn’t trust him not to turn feral and run straight for Louisiana. He’d head right to Wren and get us all killed in the process.
The pacing footsteps behind me grated, with their panicked quickness and desperate back-and-forth. I didn’t think Puck had stopped moving since Wren disappeared. “We need to move,” he growled.
I didn’t turn; I just kept staring into the fire as if it held all the answers in the world. “We need a plan. We need to know for sure if Wren is on pack territory, and we need reinforcements.”
To anyone else, my voice would sound as if it held no emotion at all. Only I knew that each word was filled with agony. Failure. Guilt. Emotional destruction of the highest order.
The clicking sound intensified, spurred on by my words. “I’m trying,” Locke growled. “Their system is good, but if I can hack into their security cameras, I’ll at least know what we’re walking into.”
After the fire, we’d tracked the Red River wolves to the airstrip north of town. But that’s where their scents—and Wren’s—had disappeared. Locke had done his thing and hacked into the flight records. They’d tried to cover their tracks by flying to Texas and then Kentucky, but the private plane’s final destination had been a small town several hours outside New Orleans. I knew in my bones that Bastian had taken her back to Red River.
A fresh wave of agony slammed into me. Wren, at the hands of a monster, the same man who had done such damage to my sister that she’d taken her life. My mind couldn’t help but invent the worst images of Wren enduring all that and more.
My fingers tightened around the edge of the stone fireplace mantel. A crack sounded, and the rock beneath my hand crumbled to dust.
A palm landed on my shoulder, fingers squeezing. I knew by scent that it was the one person I least expected, Brix, the man Wren had healed in untold ways. Someone who’d been so averse to any touch that wasn’t painful now sought to comfort me.
“It’s not your fault,” he whispered.
I shoved out of his hold and stalked away. Puck may have had it right with all the pacing. “Ender, anything from your source?”
He shook his head, his expression completely impassive. “He’s pulling all his usual lines. I’ll hear back as soon as he has something.”
Fuck.
Every second we did nothing was another that Wren lived in agony. My vision went blurry as fury surged. I moved without thinking, letting out a roar as I grabbed the antique coffee table and hurled it at the wall.
It splintered into countless pieces, shattering glasses of drinks and plates of uneaten food with it. The whole room went silent. The only sounds were the pieces of my destruction settling and the fire’s crackles and pops.
My chest heaved as I dragged in ragged breaths. It wasn’t enough. Nothing was. I’d failed Wren in the worst possible way, and now she was paying the price.
I charged toward the hutch against the wall, needing to shatter that, too. Puck, Brix, and Ender all moved in, Brix and Ender grabbing my arms as I battled against them, snarling and snapping.
“Fuck,” Puck muttered. “Should I get a tranq?”
We kept them in the medical room in case one of us slipped into a feral state, but the idea of him injecting me with one now only had me fighting harder.
Ender cursed. “Yes. Get it. Now!”
“Wait!” Locke yelled. “I’m in.”
Those two words ignited the barest amount of hope in me. A lead. Information. Something that could help us get Wren back safely.
The urge to fight slid clean out of me. Brix and Ender kept a hold of me, waiting to see if it was a false submission, but it wasn’t. After a few seconds, they released me.
I scrubbed a hand over my face. “I’m sorry. I—”
“Bugger off,” Puck muttered. “I hated that table anyway.”
I wanted to laugh, but I couldn’t make the sound. Instead, I rounded the couch, wanting to see the computer. The others followed. Locke’s fingers alternated between typing and using the trackpad. And then they stilled altogether.
“Fucking hell,” he swore, then expanded a camera view.
Wren stood before Bastian, who was on a goddamned throne, but that wasn’t what had Locke panicking. It was Wren’s back. She faced away from the camera, which had to be tucked in a tree, and wore an oversized T-shirt that should’ve been white, given the color of the sleeves. Instead, it was stained pink, red, and brown, with a mixture of blood and mud.
Wren’s scars played in my mind. Evidence of all the torture she’d endured at her father’s hand. And now she was back there. My back teeth gnashed so hard I was fairly certain I’d fractured a molar. But I didn’t give a damn. I only had eyes for Wren.
