Otatso Wetlands Break free and leave us in ruins

Something passed through the pale of Mahler's gaze, something as loveless as the rest of him. Something cold and hard. An equally icy weight dropped into her stomach with the realization that she might have to fight him to protect Stag, but he turned to Zane instead.
She would fight him to protect Stag, she knew. She would lay down her life if she must. Not for the reasons Mahler assumed, despite the blip in her animal brain that marked Stag as not only a potential candidate, but possibly the very best one—she needed more than that to overlook his age, his friendship with her daughter, his status as Mahler's adopted son, although she suspected he no longer felt the same way about the iron general as he did when he was younger, before the betrayal. She would lay down her life for Stag because he was the only wolf in recent memory who had shown her any loyalty at all.
Wylla knew when the insufferable Mahler went for the equally insufferable Zane that she should turn and run, take Stag away from this bloodbath. Take him away before Mahler turned fangs upon him. She wondered if he would, if he really felt that he owned her so thoroughly that he would ignore that she was a thinking and feeling creature and try to win her with brute strength. Would he then use that brute strength against her to force her to his will?
The thought made her sick to her stomach.
Yet knowing they should get out of here and actually getting her feet to move were two entirely different things. Wylla was rooted in place, transfixed, almost curious to know how Mahler would fight for her now, if Stag's heart held as much hurt and hate for the man as hers did, and what bullshit Mahler would come up with to justify his actions, because she had already offered him this when she asked him to come away with her and rebuild from scratch.
He had as good as slapped her in the face, then.
What would he have to say for himself, now?