Page 77 of Her Feral Beasts

As big as Scythe is, Dad is bigger, and I get the feeling he mightalwaysbe. I train with Dad twice a day and he is really the devil in the ring. “I’m making a monster out of you, pup,” he says, smashing my jaw with a hammer until my wolf fangs come out. “No beast except me will ever be able to beat you.” We’ll spar for a bit and then he’ll proceed to beat the shit out of me. I heal fast, and we’ll do it all over again in a few days.

I’m proud to say that it’s working. Even though I’m only eleven, they have to put me with the teenage fighters because the other pups can’t keep up with me and my sharp claws and teeth. Because it’s not only Scythe who’s tall now.

I make them into meat if Reuben doesn’t pull me out of the ring. My dad laughs when that happens and pats me on the head. It’s the only time he smiles at me and makes me feel warm inside my heart.

Scythe and Dad disappear for longer periods of time between my fights now. My mum pouts at them when they leave, but dad ignores her. I think maybe Scythe is fighting people too. He has pretty good reflexes because sharks have natural brutal instincts, but he never returns with bruises and broken bones like I always do.

But if it isn’t fighting, what else is it? Scythe won’t tell me, but hedoesshare his secret money. He stashes the green notes away under the floorboards of his bedroom and uses it to buy his mum special creams for her dry skin and the food she likes, but we have to hide that from the other two parents.

Tonight’s parent-fight is about something to do with Scythe because he sits on the couch pretending to watchHome and Away,but his shoulders are all tense and his hands are in fists, thick blue veins popping up all over his forearms.

“He’s ours!” my mum screams. “I won’t share—”

Dad backhands mum so hard she crashes to the floor with a yelp. I try to go to her, but Scythe clamps a hand on mine so tightly that I grumble under my breath and settle back on the couch. Mum is also a fighter, so she shakes herself and climbs to her feet. Her cheek is bright red, but she holds her ground and I’m proud of her.

“He’s taking the client, and that’s that,” Dad snarls. “Let’s go, you two.”

It’s a Saturday, so I have a fight today. I pick up my backpack and see that, weirdly, Scythe also pulls his school bag over his shoulder, but it has no books in it. He’s allowed to go to school for now, but Dad says it will be his last year because ‘he might get ideas’.

But when we get to the ring, in an abandoned warehouse on the outskirts of the city, Dad sits me down by the ring and goes off with Scythe. As I smear globs of Vaseline on my cheeks for the fight, I curiously watch them walk over to an anima/animus couple in the corner. The anima runs her hand down Scythe’s arm and then touches the strands of his silver hair, smiling at him. She and Scythe are the same height, and I think the smile on her face is sort of ugly. The man is looking at Scythe like he’s prey, and I don’t like that at all. Before I know it, Scythe is walking off with them, his hand white around the strap of his backpack. I’m about to get up and see where they’re going—I’m angry now and I don’t even know why—but Dad returns and what he says to me makes me forget what I saw. “Listen, pup. You’re going to rip out his throat tonight.”

“W-What?” I stammer.

He gives me a look of feral warning that promises pain if I question him again. “Remember how I taught you about the arteries in the body?”

I list them off on my fingers. “Carotid, jugular—”

“Yeah, yeah. Those ones. You’re going to rip out the ones in the neck. Quickly and properly, but only in the third round. You understand me?”

I look over at the fifteen-year-old boy I’m supposed to fight today. He’s a python shifter (only the non-venomous snakes are allowed to fight), big and brawny, with meaty fists. It might even be a tough fight.

“That’ll kill him, Dad.”

“Yeah, it will, but it’ll get us a lot of money.” He catches someone’s eye in the crowd and gives them a nod. I look over and see a tall man dressed in all black. He makes my skin go bumpy and I know him right away—the King of the Serpent Court.

Dad grips my shoulder painfully. “Do you understand me, pup? Toy with him for the first two rounds, then bring out your fangs like we practised, and tear out his neck.”

I run my tongue over my teeth. One of them is loose because my baby teeth are still coming out. I’m collecting them for the tooth fairy, even though I know it’s Scythe who puts the coins under my pillow. He told me his mum knows the tooth fairy from under the sea, and I think Lily knows lots of weird and pretty people just like her, so he’s probably telling the truth.

“Okay, Dad,” I say.

When I do as I’m told, it’s messy and tastes yuck. Someone screams, but it’s not me. All I do is stare at the python and the colour spreading across the floor. My red crayons are not as bright as this. Red traffic lights are not as bright as this either. Then my dad is steering me away, and it’s the first time in my memory that he hugs me.

Chapter35

Aurelia

Tonight, I dream of Savage again, and what I see chills me to the bone. It’s disturbing, to say the least, and I’m still processing what this means: that I’m seeing Savage’s memories.

The worst of our kind make money fighting their pups in cage matches. I’ve seen teenagers fight, but never a child. I know beasts fight to the death, too, but making pups and cubs do that?

Savage killed and maimed people and just continues to live his life. I’m not sure what happened to his parents, but I have a feeling I won’t like the answer.

The next morning is Saturday, and that means I have to see the bastard lion again.

After our previous altercation, my skin is positively itching at the thought of going back in there for another one-on-one session.

But as I come out of the shower to grab my clothes, I open my underwear drawer and stare.

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