Moondance Pack - A Collection of Novelettes

6. Beyond her First Shift - Abduction

*POV Charles*

The forest’s dim light barely hid the panic in Gabriel’s shout, jolting my senses awake.

“Sh!t,” Gabriel’s shout pierced the air as his form blurred into the shadow of a wolf. “Charles, hurry,” he commanded, the raw edge in his voice mirroring the gravity of the situation.

I watched, grounded in my immortal form, as the rest of the pack seamlessly transitioned into their wolves. But it didn’t matter. I kept up easily, racing through the thick brush with them.

Suddenly, we burst into the clearing, leaves swirling around us. A sudden dread clawed through my chest as if a long-dormant beast stirred to life with a fearful roar. Lila and Crimson, their visages etched with tears, stood as harbingers of the nightmare that unfolded before us—Marisol was missing.

As they shifted back to their human form, a torrent of raw emotions broke free. Their faces twisted in anguish, and their eyes glistened with unshed tears.

Matthew’s despair tore through the silence. “Where is she?” he bellowed, the raw pain in his voice resonating with my swirling chaos.

It was Lila who broke the silence, her voice a haunted whisper. “A witch took her, dragged her into a portal.” Her eyes, filled with unspoken apologies, met mine. “I... I couldn’t move. I’m so sorry...”

Disbelief, fear, and confusion filled the air, silent but overwhelming. It was within this storm that Eliza arrived, her presence a beacon of calm. She surveyed our surroundings, her senses attuned to the remnants of the witch’s passage.

“I need to see,” I demanded, my voice betraying the urgency of my request. Though hesitant, Crimson reached out, touching the catalyst that unveiled the harrowing vision—a woman cloaked in white, her malevolence palpable, dragging Marisol into the unknown. The witch’s triumphant sneer was a sight all too familiar.

“Celeste,” I cursed the name a venomous whisper against the backdrop of our desperation.

Realizing a familiar enemy abducted, Marisol sent panic through me. Thinking of her, alive and now in dark hands, was unbearable.

#

A dark specter from my past now fully materialized into our present turmoil. Eliza’s stance froze, her eyes widening, mirroring the dread swiftly taking root. She turned to me, her expression etched with shock and inquiry.

“Mambo Celeste?” Eliza’s voice trembled slightly.

The name echoed through the clearing, stirring a palpable sense of unease.

“Why does that name ring a bell?” Solstace turned to face me. His usually calm and assessing eyes now bore into me with an intensity that felt like the weight of centuries bearing down. The question, simple yet loaded with the weight of unspoken accusations, hung in the air, a challenge laid bare.

In response to his query, I nodded toward Crimson, signaling her to share the image of Celeste with me.

The sight of the woman in white, radiating evil, made Solstace overreact. A low growl emanated from him, his reaction visceral, as the image solidified his understanding of the enemy we faced. The growl gave way to a sharp intake of breath as he opened his eyes, the weight of the revelation evident in his gaze.

“Damn,” Solstace gritted. “This is the witch,” he stated, more to himself than to us, a declaration of the reality we now faced.

Crimson withdrew her hand, her role as the conduit momentarily over, but the intensity in the clearing remained, charged with the energy of the revelation she had facilitated. Solstace turned towards me, the earlier hostility replaced by a shared acknowledgment of Celeste’s threat.

“What did you do with that witch?” Solstace’s demand came not as a question but as an accusation. His voice was rough, eyes searching mine for a truth he wasn’t sure he wanted to uncover.

Tension spiked, threatening our shaky unity. Solstace’s gaze, now sharpened with anger and betrayal, locked onto mine. Eliza wore a look of worry, her concern for the implications of my past dealings with Celeste etched clearly across her face.

I took a deep breath, centuries heavy on my shoulders, and faced them, the truth of my past with Celeste looming large between us. “Years ago, Celeste crossed my path, young and striking.”

The air seemed to thicken as I spoke. The history I had long buried now clawed its way to the surface, and its relevance to our current predicament was undeniable.

“Early on, Celeste craved the power she thought she deserved. She started exploring the dark arts and voodoo to gain more power. At that point, I told her we would part ways. I didn’t want to be involved in that.” I sighed.

Looking at the moon, I continued, “Over time, we clashed more, hate growing with each refusal. I thought we had seen the last of each other decades ago. I was wrong.”

Eliza’s look softened, understanding but still worried about what was at stake. “And now she has Marisol,” she whispered, the realization hitting us all with renewed force. “She’s using her against you, Charles.”

“Charles, this changes everything,” Gabriel said, his voice laced with a newfound resolve. “We’re not just fighting for Marisol’s return now. We’re facing a darkness ready to swallow us whole.”

I nodded, the weight of his words settling over me. “Indeed, it does, Gabriel. Celeste has declared war. We’ll fight with everything we’ve got. Saving Marisol is all that matters to me. She is my raison d’être [my reason for being].”

“Let’s continue this conversation at the Packhouse,” Gabriel instructed us.

#

Matthew marched ahead, each step heavy, echoing the tumult of rage and despair roiling within him as if his very footsteps could stomp out the turmoil. The silence that enveloped us was broken only by the crunch of leaves underfoot until Matthew’s restraint finally snapped, his anger finding its mark on me.

“You,” he spat, his voice seething with accusation, “you put my baby in harm’s way. How could you not see this coming? “

The weight of his words struck deep, each syllable echoing the fear gnawing at my heart. Yet, the urgency of our mission to the pack house left no room for personal grievances to fester. “Matthew, if I’d known Celeste was a threat, I’d have done everything to stop her.”

Our arrival at the pack house brought a reprieve from the brewing conflict, the structure standing as a silent sentinel amidst the chaos of our lives. Once inside, gathered in the familiarity of the living space, I found myself surrounded by concerned, if not outright accusatory, gazes.

It was Solstace who broke the tense silence. “She’s the one,” he began, his voice heavy with revelation. “Years ago, she and Zoltan told me the hybrid could save my species.”

Eliza added, “Celeste is a powerful Mambo. Her being here isn’t an accident.”

The pieces of a puzzle we hadn’t realized were connected fell into place, yet Gabriel, leaning against the wall with a furrowed brow, voiced the confusion we all felt. “But how does everything connect? She’s in all our stories...”

I pondered his words, a sinking feeling in my stomach. “Taking Marisol must be her revenge on me, pulling us into her game for reasons we don’t understand yet.”

The room fell into a contemplative silence, each of us lost in our thoughts, grappling with the implications of Celeste’s actions.

The fire of Matthew’s anger had cooled, leaving in its wake a steel-hard resolve. His eyes were now sharp, determined in the heat of his earlier fury. “So, what’s our plan? How do we save her and stop Celeste for good?”