Watch The Dark
twenty six

Declan's P.O.V

His Betas, Deltas, and Tana's parents all filed into the conference room. They were waiting on Alec and Tuk, who were still on their way. They didn't yet know that their parents were there, but that wasn't something he wanted to disclose over the mind link. Sincere had been placed in the care of one of the den mothers. Despite being the alphas daughter now, the mothers still didn't seem too thrilled to care for her.

"I don't know about you all, but I love when dead beat parents show up out of nowhere," Jade huffed, picking at her nails. At that point, Declan was too tired to reprimand her. Plus, they deserved it regardless.

"Well, Reggie, I don't have a crush on you, so shut the fuck up!" Alec was yelling down the hall. Declan sighed and shook his head slightly. The one day Alec would need to not be so childish, he decided to just up his game.

Tuk looked absolutely disheveled. There were dark circles under his eyes and his hair was a mess. He looked about how Declan felt. But Declan imagined it was harder for Tuk, seeing as this was the third time he had been separated from his twin. This time, at least, he had Alec.

Alec, on the other hand, was raring to go. He had been seething with anger ever since Tana had been taken. He had had his fair share of fun beating the shit out of Blood Wolves who refused to offer up information.

"Declan, Reggie is in love with me. I think this should be classified as sexual harassment-"

Alec abruptly stopped when he saw his parents. His mother looked away, while Thomas remained stony faced as he looked at his two bewildered sons.

"Did you guys already know that Alec was still alive?" Jade asked suddenly, tilting her head in confusion.

"Of course we did. Despite popular belief, we love our children. We helped Alec get to the Dark Wolves' territory," Rayla said quietly, turning her head away from a very clearly confused Alec.

"This isn't a very nice surprise, Deck. What the fuck are they doing here?" Alec growled, pulling a shell-shocked Tuk away from them.

"Watch your mouth. I have an alliance with South Bay and they are members of that pack. They have information about Tana that could help us get her back," Declan said. Tuk looked up with sad eyes. He looked utterly defeated without Tana with him. He looked exactly as he had when he first arrived.

"They don't know shit about Tana. They hated her. Did they tell you about the time that they watched while she was chained to Talon's porch? Or when they just stood there when she got whipped within an inch of her life? They did nothing to save her. They told me that if she was strong enough she would survive it," Tuk finally spat, visibly shaking with anger.

"What did you want us to do? We couldn't do anything!" Rayla cried out, wrapping her arms around herself.

"You could have tried! You let Talon do everything that he did to her! Everything that happened to Tana is your fault. We never would have been there if it wasn't for you," Tuk snarled. Alec grabbed his arm, keeping him away from their parents.

"Enough. That's what we're here about. Let them tell us what they know and after that I'll decide what happens," Declan said gruffly, gesturing for the brothers to sit. Tuk just shook his head and sat down next to Alec, furthest away from Rayla and Thomas. Thomas took a deep breath, and then began.

"Tana had always been...off. Ever since she was born. She would never cry or fuss or anything. We thought something was wrong so we took her to a witch that Lionel knew. She told us that Tana...wasn't exactly a normal wolf. They said that she was a Gaia Werewolf," Thomas said. Declan's narrowed his eyes. He had heard that term before, but he didn't quite know what it was.

"They're also called Star Children. They're extremely rare and extremely powerful. Vampires can't drink their blood because of how pure it is. One drop of it could compel a wolf to do a Star Child's bidding for at least an entire day. She kept telling us that she would be fine. Tuk wasn't a Star Child, but we have no idea why. So we carried on as if we hadn't met that witch. Around the time Tana turned four we started noticing that she would get angry, like really, really angry. Her eyes would turn pure gold and at first we thought it was just her wolf, but when she first shifted her wolf's eyes were green. When we went back to the witch she said that Star Children were known for their golden eyes. The worst Tana could do would be to start compelling other werewolves and even witches to do her bidding. The origin was that Star Children were in place when packs were first formed to keep the peace until packs could live side by side without attacking each other. Her guess was that with Frasier Davids' new reign, the Moon Goddess had sent one Star Child down to end his reign," Rayla continued, taking in a deep breath.

"So her blood can make wolves do whatever she tells them?" Markus asked, to which Rayla and Thomas both nodded.

"The reason we went to the Blood Wolves was true. We wanted to take them down. But we also needed Tana there to appease Aurora herself. But we didn't know that Frasier had spies within the Dark Wolves. He found out what Tana was and when we first arranged a rebellion against him, he declared that due to our treason Tana would be promised to his son, Talon, when he became alpha. We couldn't leave at that point. We had eyes on us all hours of the day, even at night, to make sure Tana didn't get away. That was when we started to...to give her wolfsbane. Just a bit, every day, to keep her power at bay. It worked for a while but once Talon took full control of her she only got stronger," Thomas said.

"Talon said he was creating a serum to control his wolves. If he was using Tana's blood for that, or even if he wasn't, how did he manage to affect her with it?" Declan asked, earning a confused look from Thomas.

"She was affected by a mind control serum?"

Declan nodded.

The mates looked at each other and then back at Declan.

"Perhaps he found an element that was more potent than Tana's blood. Regardless, he has her now because he wants more of that serum. He wants to make it even more powerful. He won't just use it on his wolves either. He'll find a way to infect everyone," Thomas said, his fists clenched.

"So she's kind of like a demigod," Tuk said softly, clearly distraught by the information he was given.

"Without the power, I suppose. Star Children are simply stronger than regular wolves. That's really all they have in common with the gods and goddesses," Rayla replied.

"Why would you take her to the Blood Wolves when she was so young? Why didn't you wait until she was older? None of this would have happened if you had just thought it through," Alec snapped, slamming a fist onto the table with a loud bang. sᴇaʀᴄh thᴇ (ꜰind)ɴʘvel.nᴇt website on Gøøglᴇ to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.

"We were scared. We had two other kids to think about. We thought she might hurt one of you," Rayla said, narrowing her eyes at her son.

"Ridiculous. Even without your bullshit wolfsbane she was always the one to try and protect us. She would never hurt us. Not without good reason," Alec spat.

"Tana was just...too much. Okay? She was so much to handle and I just couldn't do it," Thomas said, looking away from Alec, who snarled.

"I appreciate you coming here and giving me more reason to hate you, but how does this help us? We know what Talon wants with her but that never mattered. We need to get her back," Declan huffed, pushing his chair back as he stood up.

"We came here to give you useful information and help formulate a plan. We know our daughter," Rayla said. Alec huffed indignantly at that.

"Right. The last time you saw her she was 15. Why come help now? What are you two up to? It doesn't make much sense to me. I don't trust you at all," Tuk added tartly.

"We aren't up to anything. What we did was wrong. We never should have left you three. It was the worst thing I've done by far," Rayla said quietly.

"You're just a pair of cowards. Your kid was different and you abandoned her and me. I needed you and you weren't there!" Tuk snarled, attempting to lunge for them. Quickly, Alec grabbed his arm and yanked him back. Tension rippled throughout the room. Blake has stood up with Markus, ready to restrain Thomas and Rayla at Declan's command.

“Take them to the cells. I’ll decide what to do with them later. Tonight, we get Tana back,” Declan said, moving to storm off when his arm was grabbed by Jade.

“You’re rushing into this. You’ll get everyone, including Tana, killed if you don’t think this through,” she hissed. He huffed and yanked his arm away.

“I’m the alpha, and what I say goes. If you want to defy me again you can go rot in the cells with those two,” Declan growled. Jade, however, growled right back.

“Alpha my ass. You’re acting like a child. I understand she’s your mate but this is your pack and I will not allow you to run it into the ground because you don’t have a clear enough mind to form a coherent plan. Now go sleep, right now, and when you wake up we’ll come up with an actual plan. Fight me on this and I’ll chain you to the bed,” Jade snapped. He recoiled slightly. Unfortunately, she did have a point. And she was stubborn. As much as he wanted Tana back in his arms he couldn’t risk the lives of young warriors just because of that.

They all had mates, too. He didn’t want to be the reason they didn’t get to come home to them.

“Fine. Get to the bottom of why they’re really here. I don’t believe for one second that it’s out of the good of their hearts,” Declan muttered, raking his hands through his hair as he stalked off to his room.

As he lay in his bed, he couldn’t help but wonder about Tana. Everything was so much to take in all at once. He had heard of Star Children before, but he didn’t believe they still existed. They had been exterminated years prior due to the fact that wolves didn’t want to be governed by something so powerful. Which begged the question that Declan had been dreading:

What was Talon planning on doing with Tana once he was done with her?

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