Beg

The Rookery lay deep within the mountain’s roots. Elara descended the spiral stairs two at a time, adrenaline warring with fatigue. Kael followed silently, a void in the air behind her.
At the blast doors, the smell hit them—ammonia and musk. The scent of apex predators in a cage.
"Stay back," Elara warned, reaching for the lever. "They feel the battle. They smell the blood."
"They smell me," Kael corrected.
He was right. The Unbound magic radiating off him was agitated. To a beast, it was a threat.
The heavy doors swung inward. The cavern was immense, lit by flickering braziers. Inside the iron-barred alcoves, the Wyverns were screaming.
Harran, the Roost Master, struggled to keep order. "My Queen! The flock is frantic tonight."
"Open the third gate," Elara ordered, walking toward the center alcove.
"My Lady, Vethor is in a mood. He nearly killed a handler when the tower exploded."
"Open it."
As the bars rose, a massive head slid into the light. Vethor, a nightmare of iron-colored scales and bioluminescent eyes, lunged.
Elara didn't flinch. She stepped forward, raising her hand.
"*Sihk*," she whispered, a harsh command in the old tongue.
Vethor stopped inches from her face, his breath hot and smelling of raw meat. It was a silent battle of wills. Elara held his gaze, projecting absolute dominance. Slowly, the Wyvern lowered his head and chirped, nudging her chest.
"Saddle him," Elara told Harran. "And two escorts. We fly for the Western Pass."
As the apprentices rushed forward, Kael stepped into the light.
The reaction was instant. Vethor roared, rearing up and snapping his wings open. He looked past Elara, straight at Kael.
Kael stood with his hands in his pockets, looking bored. But the shadow behind him flared like a cobra hood.
"Control your beast, Elara," Kael said. "Before I skin him."
"He knows what you are," Elara said, wrestling Vethor’s bridle. "You feel like a predator to him."
"I am the predator," Kael murmured, taking a step forward.
Vethor hissed but backed up. The beast sensed what the humans couldn't—that the man was more dangerous than the dragon.
"You cannot ride," Elara said. "He will throw you off. Meet me at the pass."
"Don't be late," Kael said.
He stepped off the ledge into the open sky. As gravity took him, his form dissolved into black smoke, tearing through the air like a bolt of lightning.
Elara kicked her heels into Vethor’s sides. "Fly!"
The Wyvern surged forward. They hit the lip of the cave and dropped into the void before Vethor’s wings caught the updraft with a crack like a whip. They rocketed upward, the cold air biting Elara’s face.
Two other Wyverns flanked her as she signaled a bank left toward the Western Pass. The heavy timber of the forest below was a black ocean. Elara leaned forward, pressing her hand against Vethor’s neck to borrow his thermal sight.
Suddenly, the world shifted. The trees became transparent outlines.
There.
Moving through the dense pines was a river of heat. Hundreds of shapes moving with terrifying fluidity.
"Shifters," Elara whispered.
They were fast. They would flank the castle in less than an hour. At the front, a massive heat signature led the pack. The Alpha.
"Dive," Elara commanded.
Vethor tucked his wings and rolled. They plummeted toward the canopy, wind screaming. As the ground rushed up, Elara saw a streak of darkness moving through the trees below. Kael was already there.
Elara pulled up at the last second, skimming the treetops. "Now!"
She pulled the release cord. A canister beneath Vethor’s belly exploded, dropping a cloud of silver dust and crushed glass over the forest.
Below, the howling began. It wasn't the howl of wolves; it was the scream of men burning. The silver dust touched the shifters' fur and sizzled, forcing the change.
"Light them up!" Elara shouted.
Vethor opened his jaws. A stream of liquid fire poured into the silver cloud. The forest floor erupted in blinding white light.
In the flash, Elara saw them—hundreds of wolves half-turned into men, scrambling in the fire. But in the center, unaffected, stood the Alpha. He wasn't running. He was looking up.
And beside the Alpha, stepping out of the shadows, was Kael.
Elara’s heart stopped. The Alpha lunged, a blur of gray fur and teeth aimed at Kael’s throat.
Kael didn't dodge. He caught the thousand-pound beast in mid-air by the throat with one hand. The impact should have crushed him, but Kael didn't move. He slammed the Alpha into the ground, shaking the earth.
"Land!" Elara urged Vethor.
She had to get to him before he killed the Alpha. If the Alpha died, the pack would frenzy. If he submitted, the pack was theirs.
As Vethor crashed into the burning clearing, Elara slid off the saddle. Kael was standing over the broken form of the Alpha, a spear of pure shadow forming in his grip.
"Kael!" Elara screamed.
Kael looked up, his face a mask of ecstasy. "He challenged me."
"Don't kill him!" Elara sprinted across the ash. "We need the pack!"
Kael looked down at the Alpha, then at his own arm. His sleeve was torn, and black, smoking blood oozed from a jagged wound.
"He bit me," Kael said calmly.
The Alpha, groaning on the ground, began to shift. Bones cracked until a naked, bleeding man lay in the dirt, looking up at Kael with absolute horror.
"You..." the Alpha wheezed. "You taste of the Void."
Kael smiled, and the temperature in the burning forest dropped.
"And you taste like wet dog," Kael whispered, raising the shadow spear. "Beg."