Chapter 7: First Blood
363 Words
Maya didn’t listen.
The second Kade left, she slipped out of the room. The bond screamed at her to stay, to be safe, but fear for him was stronger. If rogues were attacking because of her, she wasn’t hiding like a coward.
The halls were empty. Everyone was at the south border. She followed the sound of voices, of snarls and shifting feet, until she reached the courtyard wall.
What she saw made her freeze.
Kade was in the center of it all, fighting three wolves at once. His movements were brutal, precise. Blood sprayed across the stone, but none of it was his. The pack stood around in a circle, watching, waiting.
“Alpha!” someone shouted. “Another one coming from the trees!”
Maya’s head snapped up just in time to see a massive black wolf launching at Kade’s back.
“No!”
She didn’t think. She ran.
Her body moved faster than it ever had before. She hit the wolf mid-air, knocking it off course. They rolled across the ground, snarling, clawing. Pain exploded in her shoulder as claws raked her skin.
But it didn’t stop her.
Something inside her snapped awake. Hot. Wild. Hungry.
Her vision blurred, bones shifted, and suddenly the world looked different. Lower. Sharper. She was on four legs now, fur bristling, teeth bared.
Maya had shifted.
The black wolf reared back in shock, but she didn’t give it time. She lunged, clamping her jaws around its throat and tearing.
Warm blood filled her mouth.
Silence fell over the courtyard.
When Maya shifted back, she was on her knees, naked and shaking, covered in blood that wasn’t hers. The pain hit her then, and she gasped.
Kade was in front of her in an instant, pulling her into his arms.
“You fought,” he said, voice rough. Pride and fear mixed in his eyes. “You shifted.”
Maya looked down at her hands. They were trembling.
“I killed him,” she whispered.
Kade cupped her face. “You survived.”
The pack was staring. No longer with doubt.
Now they were afraid.
And maybe, just maybe, they were starting to respect her.
- Writer
