Chapter One
1624 Words
The Kill
"Don't look away."
The voice was like grinding stones. Lyra's knees hit the dirt, but she didn't feel the impact. She only felt the cold barrel of the silence pressing against her neck. Ten feet away, a man was screaming. It wasn't a long scream. It was short, wet, and ended with a sound like a dry branch snapping in winter.
Darius Blackthorn wiped his blade on the grass. He didn't look at the body. He looked at the line of men standing in the shadows. They were all twice Lyra's size. They were all trembling.
"Is there anyone else?" Darius asked.
Nobody moved.
Lyra tried to breathe. Her lungs felt like they were full of broken glass. She had just wanted to cut through the woods to get to the main road. She wasn't supposed to be here. She wasn't supposed to see the Alpha of the most violent pack in the North execute his own brother.
She shifted her weight, trying to slide back into the brush. A twig snapped.
In a heartbeat, the world tilted.
Darius didn't run. He blurred. One second he was standing over the corpse, and the next, a hand like a vice was clamped around Lyra's throat, pinning her against a tree. The bark bit into her spine.
"A rat," Darius hissed.
His face was inches from hers. He looked human, but he wasn't. His eyes were shifting. The brown was dissolving into a gold so bright it seemed to burn from the inside.
"Please," Lyra gasped. "I didn't see... I didn't see anything."
"You're lying."
His grip tightened. Lyra's vision started to go blurry. She reached up, her fingers clawing at his wrist, trying to pry him off. The moment her skin touched his, a jolt of pure fire slammed through her. It wasn't pain. It was worse. It was a hunger. It felt like her soul was trying to leap out of her chest and crawl into his.
Darius flinched. He let go of her as if she had turned into red-hot iron. He stumbled back, his breath coming in jagged, ragged bursts.
"What did you do?" he roared.
The other wolves were moving now, closing in. Their eyes were all changing. The air was heavy, vibrating with a low, collective growl that made the marrow in Lyra's bones ache.
"I didn't do anything!" Lyra scrambled to her feet, her head spinning. "Stay away from me!"
Darius looked at his hand. He looked back at her. The gold in his eyes was gone, replaced by a terrifying, hollowed-out black. He looked sick. He looked like he wanted to vomit and kill her at the same time.
"Kaelen," Darius said. His voice was barely a whisper.
A tall man with a scar running through his eyebrow stepped forward. "Alpha? Should I finish it?"
Kaelen drew a handgun from a holster at his hip. He didn't hesitate. He aimed it right between Lyra's eyes.
"No." Darius stepped in front of the barrel. "Touch her, and I'll tear your heart out through your throat."
The clearing went dead silent. The wolves stared at their leader. Darius was the man who killed without thinking. He was the man who had just ended his own bloodline for a minor betrayal. And now he was standing before a human girl.
"She's a witness," Kaelen said, his voice hard. "She's a human. You know the law, Darius."
"I know the law." Darius turned around. He looked at Lyra. His hand was shaking. He reached out, his thumb brushing her bottom lip. The contact made her knees buckle. "She's not a witness. She's mine."
"Mine."
The word felt like a death sentence.
"Get in the car," Darius ordered.
"No," Lyra said. She felt the anger finally bubbling up through the fear. "I'm going home. You can't just-"
Darius grabbed her arm. He wasn't gentle. He hauled her toward the black SUV idling at the edge of the clearing. "You don't have a home anymore. You have a cage. Move."
He threw her into the back seat and slammed the door. The child locks clicked. It was a small, plastic sound, but to Lyra, it sounded like a coffin being nailed shut.
Darius climbed in beside her. He didn't look at her. He stared straight ahead at the back of the driver's head.
"Drive," he told Kaelen.
The SUV lurched forward, bouncing over roots and rocks. Lyra pressed herself against the door, as far away from Darius as she could get. Her heart was beating so fast she thought she might have a heart attack right there on the leather seats.
"Where are you taking me?"
"The Peaks," Darius said.
"I have a life. I have a job. People will look for me."
Darius finally turned his head. He looked at her with a bored, cold expression. "No, they won't. You're an orphan, Lyra. You work at a diner where the manager doesn't even know your last name. You're a ghost. You've been a ghost your whole life."
Lyra felt the blood drain from her face. "How do you know my name?"
"I knew it the second I smelled you." He leaned in closer. The scent of him-pine and blood and something ancient-filled her lungs. "But there's something else. Something that shouldn't be there."
He reached out and grabbed her hand, flipping it over. He stared at her palm.
"You smell like rot," he whispered. "You smell like the end of the world."
"I don't know what you're talking about." Lyra tried to pull her hand away, but he held it tight. "Let me go. Please."
"I can't." Darius looked out the window as the trees began to thin, revealing the jagged, snow-capped mountains ahead. "The bond won't let me. And neither will the prophecy."
The SUV began to climb. The road was narrow, a ribbon of asphalt clinging to the cliff's edge. Below them, the forest looked like a dark, hungry ocean.
They reached the gates twenty minutes later. Huge, wrought-iron bars that looked like they belonged to a fortress, not a house. Guards stood at the entrance, all of them armed, all of them watching the car with hungry, predatory eyes.
The house was a monstrosity of glass and black stone. It looked cold. It looked like a place where things went to die.
Kaelen stopped the car and got out. He opened Darius's door.
Darius stepped out and then reached back in, grabbing Lyra's waist and pulling her out like a rag doll. He didn't let her feet touch the ground for more than a second before he started dragging her toward the massive front doors.
"Wait!" Lyra struggled, kicking at his shins. "Let me go!"
Darius stopped. He turned her around and pinned her against the cold stone of the entryway. He leaned down, his face inches from hers.
"Listen to me," he hissed. "My pack wants you dead. My Second wants to skin you. The only reason you are still breathing is that I haven't decided if I want to kiss you or kill you yet. So shut up. Walk. And maybe you'll live through the night."
He let go of her. Lyra stood there, shaking. She looked at the gates behind her. They were closed. She looked at the wolves standing around the driveway. They were waiting.
She didn't have a choice.
She walked into the house.
The foyer was huge, lit by a chandelier that looked like a bone. The floor was white marble, polished so bright it looked like ice.
"Upstairs," Darius said, gesturing to a wide staircase. "Third door on the right. Don't try the windows. They're reinforced. Don't try the door. Kaelen will be outside it."
"Are you going to keep me here forever?" Lyra asked. Her voice cracked.
Darius walked over to a sideboard and poured himself a glass of amber liquid. He downed it in one go.
"I'm keeping you here until I figure out why the moon thinks a human girl is my mate," he said. "And why are you carrying a curse that makes my wolf want to rip its own skin off?"
"I'm not a curse," Lyra said, her voice growing stronger. "I'm just a girl."
Darius laughed. It was a short, bitter sound.
"No, Lyra. You're not."
He walked toward her, stopping just at the edge of her personal space. He didn't touch her, but she could feel the heat radiating off him.
"Start praying," he said.
"To whom?"
"To whatever god you think is still listening. Because when the full moon hits tomorrow night, I won't be the one in control. And my wolf... he doesn't care about prophecies. He wants to feed."
He turned and walked away, leaving her standing alone in the cold, white hall.
Lyra ran up the stairs. She found the room. It was beautiful. It was a nightmare. A massive bed with black silk sheets. A balcony she couldn't open—a bathroom filled with expensive soaps that smelled like roses and ash.
She sat on the edge of the bed and buried her face in her hands.
Then, she heard it.
Lyra.
She froze. The voice didn't come from the hall. It didn't come from the window.
It came from inside her head.
Wake up, little monster. The hunt is starting.
Lyra looked at her hands. In the dim light of the room, the veins in her wrists looked darker. They weren't blue. They were black. And they were moving.
She screamed, but no sound came out.
Outside, in the distance, a wolf howled. It wasn't a howl of a hunter. It was a howl of fear.
The Blood Moon was coming. And Lyra Vale was no longer human.
- Writer
