First Born: Werewolf Saga, #4

By Steven E. Wedel

Almost fifteen years after the civil war between shapeshifters, Joey Woodman has been living an easy, protected life as the only living naturally born werewolf. But when Thomas McGrath, now a Pack assassin, goes rogue and decides to settle an old score, Joey, Thomas, and Skandar, the last surviving Old One, find themselves captives to a sadistic clan leader who is part of a coalition seeking to take control of the Pack.

 

Kelley, Jenny, and Cerdwyn coordinate a rescue plan that has to take into account not just the shapeshifters opposing them, but also zealous humans seeking to destroy the creatures they see as abominations. They must also organize the defense of their home once they learn of an imminent attack by at least two other clans. While they prepare for battle, a rescue party searches the Louisiana swamps for their missing friends.

 

Can Joey overcome his sheltered upbringing and become the leader others expect hime to be?

 

If you enjoyed the intricate worldbuilding and thrilling action of The Otherworld series by Kelley Armstrong, you will love The Werewolf Saga and First Born by Steven E. Wedel.

• Language: English
• Publisher: MoonHowler Press
• Release date: Oct 3, 2023
• ISBN: 9798223873037

Steven E. Wedel

Steven E. Wedel lives with his dogs, Bear and Sweet Pea, and his cat, Cleo. A lifelong Oklahoman, he grew up in Enid and now lives in Midwest City, with numerous addresses in between. He is the author of over 35 books under his name and two pseudonyms, but still has to rely on his day job of teaching high school English to keep himself and his furry dependents eating in air-conditioned comfort. Steven has four grown children and three grandsons. Be sure to visit him online and sign up for his newsletter.

Book preview

First Born

The Werewolf Saga Book 4

Steven E. Wedel

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MoonHowler Press

Copyright © 2023 by Steven E. Wedel

All rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except as permitted by U.S. copyright law. For permission requests, contact [include publisher/author contact info].

The story, all names, characters, and incidents portrayed in this production are fictitious. No identification with actual persons (living or deceased), places, buildings, and products is intended or should be inferred.

First edition 2023

Contents

1.Sam

2.Joey

3.Skandar

4.Joey

5.Skandar

6.Thomas

7.Joey

8.Kelley

9.Thomas

10.Joey

11.Skandar

12.Thomas

13.Joey

14.Kelley

15.Joey

16.Cerdwyn

17.Thomas

18.Joey

19.Thomas

20.Joey

21.Mark

22.Jenny

23.Skandar

24.Joey

25.Jenny

26.Joey

27.Kelley

28.Jenny

29.Joey

30.Jenny

31.Cerdwyn

32.Kelley

33.Thomas

34.Jenny

35.Joey

36.Anthony

37.Joey

38.Jenny

39.Luke

40.Joey

41.Randy

42.Thomas

43.Jenny

44.Randy

45.Skandar

46.Cerdwyn

47.Joey

48.Kelley

49.Randy

50.Joey

51.Jenny

About the Author

Also By Steven E. Wedel

Chapter 1

Sam

Cicadas chittered in the trees, one after another, singing a song of twilight in the deep woods of Tennessee. A gentle autumn breeze fingered the crisp, dry leaves clinging to the branches of the hardwood trees, pulling some off their hosts to flutter to the soft earth below. Raccoons, opossums, bats, owls, and other night creatures moved through the fading light in search of shelter or food, life or death.

There was a flutter of wings and the scream of a rabbit. The man sitting on a rock under the branches of a white sycamore tree smiled as the little animal’s cries were silenced and the wings of an owl flapped away in the night. Something died so something better could live. That’s the way the world worked. The strong consumed the weak. It’s how it had to be.

Sam Carter pulled a small folding knife from his pocket and turned to the sycamore’s smooth white trunk. As the light faded, he worked at carving letters into the wood, leaving a mystery for those who would soon come after him.

By claw and by tooth

By the light of the moon

You’ll fear the truth

We’ll see you soon

When he was finished, evening had faded into darkness. He put the small ivory-handled knife back into the pocket of his faded jeans, then thoughtfully ran stubby fingers through a thick beard that had a good deal of gray in it these days. His long hair was pulled back in a tail that hung between his shoulder blades. He could smell fire and hear a woman’s voice rising and falling in the cadence of an old ghost story. The woman … she was the prize.

Sam waited and the night grew darker. There was laughter after the story, then adult voices wrapping up the day’s activities and sending children to their sleeping bags. It was unusual for an entire family to come camping so deep in the Smokies. Usually, Sam only encountered pairs of men, sometimes a man and woman, all from cities, all thinking they could test their woodsmanship in the dark forest. None suspecting what really roamed among the trees.

With a deep sigh and broad grin, Sam began unbuttoning his grime-slick flannel shirt. It had been red-and-black checkered once, and that pattern was still visible in a few places, but mostly it was black from him wiping his hands on it. He had lived in these woods for a long time. Ever since the big fight some fifteen years ago. It would be time to move on after this. A couple of grown men found dead on a camping trip was one thing. An entire family? That was something else. And what he planned to do to that pretty young mother …

Sam folded his dirty shirt, used one foot to push boots off the other foot, and then slipped out of his jeans, which he folded and carefully placed on top of his shirt. He’d heard once that in Europe there was a belief that finding and hiding his clothes was a way to trap such as he was. That was stupid superstition, of course, but he still wanted to know his clothes safely awaited his return.

Standing up, totally naked, Sam Carter stretched, his arms out from his sides, his face upturned and bathed in silvery moonlight. His teeth gleamed brightly in his beard as he grinned. Mentally, he called the wolf within.

The change began in his arms. They thickened with muscle while more hair than he already had sprouted from his pores. His throat and neck throbbed, pulsing with the coming change before exploding, lengthening, becoming thicker and hairier while his face stretched, the bones crackling beneath skin that darkened with new fur. As the change swept over his lower body, Sam dropped to his hands and knees. He raised his face to the moon again and called out in a voice that transformed from a human shout of exaltation to a bestial howl that echoed through the forest. With new eyes and new, boundless strength and energy, he sprinted between the trees toward the smell of the smoldering campfire. Toward the smell of humans. The smell of meat. And the woman.

They had camped in a little clearing where a stream curved around the north edge. Their tent was blue and green, dome-shaped. A blue plastic ice chest hung suspended about fifteen feet above the camp to keep the forest animals out of their food supply. The fire they had sat around was nothing but glowing embers.

Sam hesitated a moment at the edge of the clearing, but his desires drove him on almost as if they were whipping him. He wanted the blood. He could almost taste it already. The blood and the lust. He would kill the man first, of course.

The tent’s door was unzipped and Sam registered that was a stupid thing. Just before he pushed his head through the opening he heard the woman ask, Tommy, what’s that smell?

The woman was prettier up close. She had pale skin, one bare arm decorated with tattoos of flowers, thick pecan-brown hair, and deep brown eyes that bulged from their sockets as she took in the massive, slavering wolf that stepped through the flap of her tent. Her mate was sitting up slowly, but the woman’s scream jerked him into motion.

He was too late. The only sound he made was a gurgling as the life flowed from his torn throat. His blue eyes glazed quickly and Sam considered feeding on him, just a little, while the woman and the girl screamed.

The girl …

Something was wrong about that. Sam swung his gaze around the tent, taking in the figures, mother clutching daughter and fumbling under a blanket for something. There had been two children, he remembered. A girl and a boy just a little bigger than the child screaming and clinging to her mother. Where was he?

The woman pulled a semi-automatic handgun from beneath a blanket as her husband’s gurgling ceased. Sam lunged forward and clamped his jaws around her wrist. She screamed and fired a shot. He felt the bullet burn a trail across his hip, but the woman dropped the gun, her scream now one of pain.

Nothing compared to what’s coming.

With merciless force, Sam ripped the girl from her mother’s grasp and shook her like a rag doll. He heard the bones breaking and tasted blood as his teeth penetrated the tender young flesh. Brown hair whipped around his face as he shook the corpse, lifeless arms and legs flailing and brushing the close walls of the tent.

The mother, maddened by the murder of her child, attacked Sam, pounding him with useless fists, blood flying from her bitten wrist. Sam dropped the dead child and advanced on the woman, ignoring her blows, stepping over her, forcing her back and down until she was on her back, then he settled his weight over her. She continued to scream and hit him, tears running down her face, until her strength was gone.

She lay still, weeping, saying the word Rose over and over. The child’s name, Sam guessed.

He licked a salty tear from her cheek. She continued to sob.

Sam let his wolf shape slip. Not all the way. He held it halfway, so that he was in the shape of a wolfman, a bi-pedal monster most people had only seen in bad horror movies. He grinned at the woman, and her screaming started again, but more intense. The rage was gone. She was beyond fear. She screamed in pure terror now.

Sam felt his penis engorging.

With huge, claw-like hands, he ripped away the woman’s T-shirt and shorts. She struggled, but it was the resistance of an infant toward an adult. Sam pinned her shoulders to the floor of the tent. He knew how big he was in this shape. He knew what it would do to this small woman.

He pushed into her and her screams found yet another tone.

She had gone into shock by the time he finished. She lay motionless beneath him, their thighs slick with warm blood as he filled her with his seed. Sam studied her face for a moment. She was beautiful again now that she was relaxed. Her eyes, wet with tears, were soft and distant. Her head was turned to the side, making it easy for the wolf’s teeth to find the throat and the jugular that pulsed there.

Sam released her from her misery, then raised his bloody face and howled in triumph. He stood up, ripping through the fabric of the tent, letting it flutter and fall around him. There was the boy to think of. He hoped the kid had heard what he’d done. Maybe he had run away. Maybe there would be a chase, although it would be a brief one. Maybe –

There was a flash of light ahead and to his right, something punched into his gut, then he heard the loud crack of a rifle. Sam groaned as he doubled over and dropped to his knees, the shredded tent and its gruesome contents all around him.

In this state, half man and half wolf, he was vulnerable to any kind of weapon, just like a regular human. He knew that. Had known that. And yet, he believed he was completely alone in the forest except for the child that had been out of the tent for some reason. Had the child shot him?

His abdomen burned. He had been shot before, though never while in this state of the transformation. Bullets hurt, but they never felt like this. Was it because he was neither man nor wolf? Or was it something else? Something worse.

Blood flowed over the hands he held clasped over the wound. A stick broke as someone came closer. Someone too heavy to be a little boy. Sam raised his gaze from his bloody hands to see the shape of a man enter the clearing. He held a rifle loosely in his left hand. As he neared the glow of the fire’s embers, Sam realized the man was naked, with a thick black goatee and shaggy black hair that brushed his shoulders.

I know you, Sam wheezed as the man stepped within a few feet of him and stopped, studying him. Assassin. He raised his bloody hands, palms outstretched toward the newcomer. You kill your own kind. Blood dripped from the bottoms of his hands and ran down his arms. His entire torso felt like it was on fire. His legs throbbed with pain. Silver? he asked, struggling to make sound come from his mouth. Sam looked at his hands again and saw that they were completely human now. Loose wolf hair clung to the sticky blood.

Silver, the man confirmed. Then he bent and carefully placed his rifle on the ground. He winced with pain as his body contorted into the same half-wolf state Sam had just recently been in. The man leaned in close and in a whispery growl he said into Sam’s ear, Die, motherfucker.

Large, strong, hairy hands clamped around Sam’s head and twisted quickly, lifting as they did. There was a moment of blinding pain, and then Sam had the sensation of flying as his head was thrown aside. He didn’t feel the thump as his head landed on the soft grass, but as it rolled he saw his body, on its knees, fountaining blood into the night air while the assassin, already fully human again, bent to pick up his rifle.

Sam Carter died.

The man who had shot him straightened, looked around, and shook his head, then turned and walked away from the camp, following the trail the dead werewolf had made as he raced toward his prey.

Nocturnal animals resumed their activities now that the screams and gunshot had faded. Furry things moved along the ground while winged things hunted from the air. The smell of blood hung heavy in the camp, a magnet to natural predators and scavengers.

Behind the wide elm tree where he’d gone to urinate, an eight-year-old boy stood wide-eyed and trembling in terror. His bladder had released again, soaking the front of his red shorts, but he didn’t know it. He only knew what he had heard. What he had seen.

Chapter 2

Joey

Joey Woodman stood at the window of the Montana home where he’d been born. He watched snow cascade from the night sky to cover the yard. There was about an inch of snow on the ground already and another inch was called for in the forecast, but it wouldn’t stay around for long. October was still too early for real snowstorms, even on the high prairie. Joey sipped from a heavy ceramic mug of coffee, letting the steam and aroma waft around his face. His eyes were fixed on the old oak tree off to one side of the front yard.

They were married there. Made up their own vows. No minister.

Joey smiled, but it was a sad smile. He’d heard the story. His dad had wanted a minister and a ceremony. Mom had not. She was pregnant, hunted, scared, and wanted to keep a very low profile. His father had spoken often of his wife while he and Joey were on the run with Kiona Brokentooth. He told Joey that Shara had been headstrong and didn’t like to share what she was doing with her husband. Chris had wanted to help her, but she pushed him away. And then she’d run off to Mexico with another werewolf without even making sure her husband was dead.

They hadn’t always fought, of course. Joey remembered many instances of love between his parents right here in the house he was in. Kisses under mistletoe hung over the doorway into the kitchen, snowball fights outside, movie nights with VHS tapes and enough popcorn to make his stomach hurt. He would fall asleep on the sofa or floor and sometimes wake up to catch his parents kissing. There were the looks that passed between them often. His mother might have been secretive about some things, but they had loved each other. Joey knew that.

Maybe that’s why this modest farmhouse felt like home. This was a house filled with ghosts, but they made for good company when Joey needed to wallow in pity over all he’d lost. It was his sanctuary. He came here when he felt melancholy or suffocated by the protection of the Pack.

Fenris’s sprawling, modern house, now owned by Othala Enterprises, with Kelley Stone as chief executive officer, was too big, too bright, too busy. It was a base of operations with beds, not a home. There were always people – shapeshifters – coming and going, making reports, asking for advice, just seeking the company of others. Most of the time, that was great. Joey enjoyed the activity and his modest role in the Pack and the Council he had helped to establish. But sometimes he just had to get away from it all. Everyone did.

His phone buzzed in his pocket and Joey let the curtain fall into place, hiding the white world outside as he pulled it from his jeans. He opened his text messages and read the simple message, Carter eliminated. He texted back, asking if it had been done today. The response was, Two nights ago. Joey gritted his teeth and refrained from demanding to know why he hadn’t been told the job was done within a few hours of its completion. It wouldn’t do any good. Instead, he sent a thank-you and slipped his phone back into his pocket. There wouldn’t be a reply. He knew that.

Joey put a John Wayne western movie – Red River – in the DVD player and turned on the television. He settled onto the sofa. Both his parents had loved John Wayne movies. The opening music played as the menu showed on the screen, but Joey wasn’t looking at it. Instead, he was looking at the framed picture on his coffee table. It was a photograph of his mom and dad, not long after they’d said their vows under the oak tree. They were standing there with the trunk of the tree behind them. It was summer and the grass was green. They were smiling. Dad had his arm around Mom’s shoulders and she had an arm across his lower back.

He’d found the original photo in an album when he came to the house not long after the Minnesota incident that had claimed both his parents. It was a small, square, faded photograph taken with some kind of obsolete camera. But the Pack was a network of experts, and Joey had found someone with the Photoshop skills to scan and restore the photo, then enlarge it so he could reprint it.

There weren’t a lot of pictures of his parents. Not together or separate. It seemed strange to him. Smartphones had not been invented when he was a child, but the technology had been available for most of his life now, and all around him, everyone was always taking pictures, documenting everything. But in the old days, that just hadn’t been the case. Many of the other photos in the album had been blurry and useless, or they’d been baby pictures of himself. The only other really good picture he had was of himself and his mom when she was pregnant with Morrigan. Ulrik had taken that one on his estate in Mexico.

Josef Ulrik.

He had been here, in this house. He –

Joey’s phone rang. The movie had started without him hitting the play button. He muted the TV with one hand while pulling his phone from his pocket with the other. The caller ID made him smile.

Hello, beautiful, he said when he answered.

I hate driving in the snow, Jenny said. I’m half a mile from your gate. You better open it, and you better have hot coffee waiting on me.

You’re here? Joey asked.

Don’t sound so happy about it, Jenny said.

I’m … it’s okay, Joey said. You know the gate code.

It’s cold and I don’t want to open the window. Just open the damn gate, Joey. And be happy to see me, she said, then hung up on him.

Joey sighed and glanced at the screen of the television, where John Wayne and hired men were branding cattle. Jenny was not a fan of westerns. He turned the movie off and returned to the window without his coffee mug. He pushed the curtain aside and saw the glow of her headlights approaching. He reached over and punched the gate code into the console beside the front door. A hundred yards from the house, floodlights came on over the steel gate. A moment later, the gate began rolling back on its track.

Jenny’s gray Jeep blasted through the opening, snow flying away from its tires as she made her way up the driveway toward the house. Shaking his head but grinning, Joey entered the code to close the gate. Jenny got out of the Jeep wearing tight, faded jeans, knee-high boots, and only a light jacket over a thin sweater. She carried a gray canvas overnight bag in one hand and had a purse slung over her shoulder. She hunched against the cold as she shuffled quickly through the snow to the porch. Joey opened the front door and let her inside.

It’s cold up here! she blurted as she slipped into his waiting arms.

It is, Joey agreed, kissing the top of her head, tasting melted snow. He held her tightly, letting her soft feminine scent envelop him. She dropped her bag and put both arms around him.

I missed you, she said into his chest.

He kissed her again. Is that why you came?

I knew how you were feeling, Jenny said. I saw it in your eyes and heard it in your voice. You wanted to be alone, but you also needed someone. You’ve had your alone time.

He laughed softly. He couldn’t argue with her. Once upon a time, a bad man pole vaulted over the fence to try to kill me, he said.

I know, Jenny murmured. I don’t really like being here.

Joey rested his cheek on the top of her head. He understood her. While this house held almost exclusively good memories for him, this area was the opposite for Jenny. After Joey had bitten Jenny at school one day, not knowing that he was a werewolf, Fenris had made his move, trying to take him before Shara could relocate again. In the process, he had kidnapped Jenny and killed her parents. Jenny had forgiven Joey for his role in that, but he knew he would forever feel guilty about it.

You came anyway, he said into her hair. You could have just called. Or sent someone else.

You would have lied to me on the phone and said everything was fine Jenny argued.

Everything is fine, Joey said.

And who would I send to get snowed in with my mate in a lonely house in the middle of nowhere? she asked.

Joey only laughed again. I missed you, he said.

She tilted her head to look up at him, her eyes wide and serious. Did you really?

Yes, he admitted. I miss her. Both of them, but Mom more, if I’m being honest. Is that bad?

No, Jenny said. I think boys get more attached to their moms and girls get more attached to their dads.

Watching her lips move was too much. Joey bent his head and kissed away any further words she might have said. She moved a hand up and put it on his neck as her lips parted for his tongue. The kiss was deep and warm and Joey was glad she was there.

I wanted hot coffee, Jenny said when the kiss broke apart. Her voice was thick and husky with desire. But I’ll take this. The hand that wasn’t on his neck slid down Joey’s torso to cup his groin. He felt himself stirring to life immediately.

I’ll stir your hot coffee with that, he promised. Jenny laughed at the stupid line and Joey kissed her again, then led her into the downstairs bedroom his parents had once shared. The bed was old, but the mattress was new and the blankets were warm, and then too hot for the heat the couple generated.

When they were spent, they lay naked, Jenny nestled against Joey’s side, one slender leg draped over his, her hand on his chest, her fingers gently pulling at the light tuft of hair growing there. The musky smell of their love filled the room.

Did you eat? Joey asked.

No.

Are you hungry?

Not really. Just tired now. Will you pull up the blanket?

Joey covered them. Jenny’s fingers slowed, then stopped. Her breathing became deep and heavy. Outside the curtained window, Joey knew the snow was still falling. He tried not to think about his parents in this room. He tried to clear his head of them altogether, but as he drifted toward sleep, he saw again his naked mother tied to a stone altar, his father rushing to save her before the silver knife came down …

Joey awoke with a start, his heart racing and sweat covering his face. The room was dark and silent the way a place can only be silent when surrounded by snow. But then the sound of his cell phone pierced the darkness. Joey scrambled off the bed while Jenny cursed quietly and rolled away from him. Joey grabbed his discarded jeans and fished the phone from his pocket, not even looking to see who was calling as he slid the green light to take the call.

Hello, he gasped.

It’s Kelley, a female voice said. Did Jenny get there okay?

Yeah. She just got here, he said, and he knew that there was a tracker on Jenny’s Jeep and that Kelley already knew that she was there and had probably allowed them time for what they’d just done before she called. Is that all? he asked.

No, Kelley answered, her smoky voice very serious. We have a problem with our cleaner.

What problem? Joey asked.

He didn’t clean up after himself, for one thing, Kelley said. But worse than that, he was seen.

He was … seen? Joey asked. He should have called after the text. He should have demanded more information. The man’s past made others tread lightly with him, and Joey cursed himself for being one of those.

He’s becoming a liability, Joey, Kelley said.

He’s definitely slipping, Joey agreed.

I’m going to fly up tomorrow and we’ll talk about the details, Kelley said. We’re still collecting information on our end. Hopefully I’ll have more. We’re trying to get the police report, but it’s already hit the local news.

Shit.

Deep shit, Joey, she confirmed. I’ll see you around lunchtime. The phone went silent.

Joey sat heavily on the bed, suddenly cold. He lay down and pulled up the blankets. Jenny rolled over and snuggled him again.

That was Kelley, she said.

Yeah.

Bad news?

Yeah. She’ll be here tomorrow.

"Put the phone down and