The alphas had not been keeping the town or pack as they should have been. Money went into the pack house and lands, with little returning to build up everything else. I’d always known the school was a pile of crap that needed to be demolished, but I hadn’t really seen it everywhere else. No doubt because most of the time, my focus had been on hiding and surviving.

I was seeing it all with new eyes today, and I was determined that this time, Torma would change for the better. If it was the last thing I did.

As Shadow and I stepped into the pack lands for what would probably be the last time, my power spilled from me, washing across my form until I was over six-feet of badass winged wolf-phoenix. Shadow followed my lead, his Anubis beast form making an appearance, and I had no idea what the shifters thought when we strolled into the main street, the ground literally trembling beneath our feet.

Did we look like gods to them? Their awed and fearful expressions said yes.

One could grow addicted to that sort of power, if one hadn’t seen firsthand what craving power could do to a being. I would never be Dannie. I refused. Thank the gods for my friends and family, who would keep me in check if I ever lost sight of that.

“What’s your plan, little wolf?” Shadow rumbled at my side as gasps and cries rang out around us. Seemed the townsfolk were not sure what to do about the twin Egyptian-looking gods, covered in flames, standing in the middle of the main street.

“It’s time to call the Torma pack to their final meeting,” I replied, in an almost as impressive rumble of a voice.

I tilted my head back and howled. It was the howl I’d accessed that first night I’d shifted, when I’d called the Shadow Beast. A howl that was connected to my Nexus side, even if I hadn’t known it all the way back then. It was also a howl connected to the shifters, and with it, I could call and control the packs.

Shadow had the same ability, of course, since he’d kind of created shifters, but this was my fight. My true mate stood at my side, and not in my way.

By the time my howl had died off, shifters were already making their way toward where we stood in the middle of the street. There were thousands of them, my call leaving no stone unturned, as even ones I hadn’t seen for years found their way to where we waited.