The Real Us (A world of werewolves series)

Chapter 20: When Hunters become the Hunted

When we finally reached the mansion, we headed inside and found half the wolves there were injured.

Thankfully none killed, but the place was a mess, smashed windows, furniture thrown about and trails of people’s blood that did not smell very nice.

Blaze was unharmed and hurried over as soon as he spotted us, “I’m so glad you’re back, Jason. We were attacked by hunters just after you left. It’s good to have you all back, but I’m not sure how safe it’s going to be for baby Adam.”

We all looked down at him as he smiled back at us, totally oblivious to what was happening around him.

“How did you get rid of them?” asked Jason as he took in our surroundings.

“Well, our wolves certainly fought hard as you can see. We managed to kill at least ten of them, and that’s when the others started to back off and left.”

Jason explained to him about our own incident last night, and Blaze nodded as though he had already assumed that’s what their next plan of action would have been.

I saw one of the wolves being stitched up along his arm by another and overheard him saying, “The f*****g idiots even tried to stake me like some bloody vampire!”

I couldn’t help but feel terrified by all this, the reason being what if they came for my son, would I be able to protect him? Would I have to die in order to do that? I didn’t want to die because if I died, then who would protect him?

“Earth to Josie, hey, are you listening?” Jason shook me, bringing me out of my dark thoughts.

“Sorry, just thinking about Adam that’s all,” I answered quietly, looking down at him, still smiling happily in his chair.

Jason took me into his arms and growled, “Don’t you worry, they’ll have to get through me first, and I’m not going to let that happen. I swear to you, I will keep you both safe and if something happens to me then Blaze and the others will protect you both before themselves, I promise.”

I looked up at him and replied sadly, “But I don’t want you to get hurt. I don’t want you to leave me and Adam, if you’re dead then what good are you to me?” a tear rolled down my cheek and I quickly wiped it on his shirt.

“Darling, I love you both with all my heart and there is no way I’m going down easy. Anyway, we have our werewolf strength and our wolf form and if anything goes wrong we can change and then make a run for it—“ I stopped him alarmed, “What about Adam, he doesn’t know how to change forms, and I am not leaving him-“

“Calm down, I have more wolf in me ok, and that allows me more abilities than the rest of you. I can get him to change, but for now, let’s stop worrying. They’re not here at the moment and we have some time to think of something,” he answered, and kissed me on the head.

Blaze and Jason spent the day in Blaze’s room making up some plan I guessed, while I sat with Jane and caught up with her.

She played with little Adam, who was on the floor trying to grab his toys. I looked around the place trying to figure out why I felt like something was very wrong, but before I could think any more about it, there was an almighty smash as the window right behind us shattered to the floor and flames spread across the room.

It took me a moment to realise why there were flames and smoke before I noticed the brick they had thrown through had paper wrapped around it that had been set alight before fizzling out.

By then, it had already done the job of catching fire to the carpet. I started to cough and couldn’t stop as I looked around frantically for Adam.

There was no sign of Jane either, so I figured she must have grabbed him and tried to find her.

Everyone was rushing around like crazy trying to escape and helping others.

“Josie, where’s Adam?” Jane screamed, as she almost crashed into me. My heart dropped when I realised she wasn’t holding him and I screamed back, “I don’t know. I thought you had him,” I started crying hysterically at the thought of my little boy lost somewhere in all of this.

I had to find him, so leaving Jane, I raced back in to the living room and searched as best I could through the thick black smoke, but there was no sign of him.

I prayed that Jason had him somehow and collapsed with grief when he came outside empty-handed looking as terrified as me for our son.

Jason came over and hugged me tight while I cried into his chest and then suddenly releasing me, he ran off into the forest as we all watched confused.

I chased after him as best I could and m-shifted to smell my way to him while trying not to trip up.

Jason was nowhere to be seen, but I could still smell his scent as I allowed my wolf to have even more control and followed it as best I could.

There was another smell in the air, the smell of human, almost odourless except for the strong smell of sweat as they had ran through here and were obviously who Jason must have been chasing.

I followed that smell and along that scent was faint wolf, not Jason, but another with a similar scent, too similar. It was my Adam.

I raced as fast as my legs would carry me with my heart burning from the effort, (and still hammering like crazy in my chest) never slowing down as I turned a corner and smashed straight into someone, knocking them hard onto the floor and landing on top.

“Jason, what are you doing here?” I panted, scrambling off him and getting ready to carry on.

He got up and gripped my arm, yanking me back, “it’s alright darling, they’re gone, they got away in a truck. They have Adam, but his alive, so we need to make a plan and fast. They won’t be stupid enough to keep him around for too long, knowing that his werewolf parents will be looking for him. Then again, they were stupid enough to bring stakes, so maybe we still have a good chance.”

He led me back through to what was our pack house, but now just a black charred mess as the pack huddled around it, miserable and scared.

I saw Marie among them for the first time in months. Both her legs were in plaster, her arm wrapped in a bandage and her face covered in bruises. I was shocked by her appearance.

After all this time healing, and she still looked bloody awful, he must not have allowed her to shift and heal.

Looking at Jason, I asked, “What did you do to her?”

He looked back at me confused, “Who?”

“Marie, what did you do to Marie?” he looked over at her and replied, “Nothing that you’ll want to know.”

Blaze and Jason got us all to gather around and explained what would happen. “There’s a location that we now know they go too often, thanks to help from Dominic's pack. This is where they usually make their plans or take a captured werewolf to be experimented on before being disposed off in an appalling way; this is where I expect they will take Adam, so we will start there first,” Blaze announced, while Jason stood beside him, arms folded and a cold face with an even icier and empty stare.

No one would guess his child had just been kidnapped.

We all set off to our cars, those who didn’t drive were given a lift as we followed Blaze’s SUV to another pack house he had in case of emergencies like this one.

The house was only a four-bedroom place that was nicely decorated in light colours of creams n browns and lots of pictures of the pack mates smiling and laughing together, although Jason only seemed to be smiling in one.

It was of him and Blaze together standing in front of the old pack house, arms wrapped around each other’s shoulders and taken four years ago by the look of the date scrawled underneath, yet they only looked about two years older now as I turned to follow them into the living room. The lovely perks of werewolf aging.

Gathered around the living room, we all waited for Blaze to explain what would happen next.

Jason drove us to this place with no name. All we had to go on was that it was unused and hidden among a load of overgrown bushes and a few trees alongside a quiet road called lane’s street, which we were pulling up to now.

Getting out of the car, we rushed up as quietly as we could to the building while Blaze and a few of the dominants from the pack took their places and hid until we would need them.

We got the heads-up from Jason that they were inside, thanks to his wolf hearing, that would always be there without him needing to m-shift.

We slid around the back of the building and were met by black iron gates that were padlocked.

Jason climbed up and over easily, making it look graceful and agile, but I was afraid of heights and certainly no good at climbing, (yeah, such a cool werewolf I know) so quickly taking off my clothes with Jason looking at me with his one eyebrow raised, I shifted as quickly as I could in a side bush and slipped through the gaps thankful that the wolf was so slender.

“Babe, you do know that when you change back, you’re going to be butt naked?” Jason asked, looking down at me and running his fingers through my thick black fur.

I growled at him that I didn’t give a s**t before trotting ahead of him and finding a back fire escape to the place.

Jason tried to open it but the damn thing was locked, typical, so climbing up a drain pipe he climbed through the boarded up window, smashing through it with his fist and disappeared inside.

It seemed like hours before he finally came and opened up the door for me. His knuckles were bleeding from the glass, but if it bothered him, he didn’t show it.

As I took in our surroundings, it reminded me very much of the place Angelo had taken me to, cold and empty, just a concrete floor and brick walls that looked as though they were ready to crumble at the slightest touch.

Suddenly, there was a piercing scream, Adam’s I realised and shot off into the dark mouldy hallway with Jason hissing at me not to get caught.

And there he was, my boy inside a big empty room, nothing except a cold metal table that he lay on naked except for his nappy that was now full and barely clinging to his tiny body.

He was shivering from the cold and surrounded by these monsters as they all whispered in hushed voices as to what to do with him.

I started to cry, but in my wolf form, it was whining that I couldn’t stop.

Jason caught up with me and took in what was going on, stroking my back while I whined softly.

I looked up at him as his fingers wrapped into my fur tight enough to hurt, and saw his eyes change back to their original yellow-gold as he lost control and started growling.

Before I could do anything, he had changed to his wolf form, not bothering to remove his clothes first.

He leapt free from his clothes and charged into the room, diving at the man who was about mid-forties with grey hair and holding a scalpel, I noticed with terror.

As he brought it down close to our son, Jason was on his back and tearing at his throat like a wolf with rabies.

People started screaming, but rather than run off scared, they grabbed the surgical tools on the side of the table and anything that would be helpful for them before lunging at Jason as he jumped away with a chunk of flesh in his mouth.

One young girl was the first to reach him and gasped when she saw the bloody chunk dripping onto the floor from the tight grip in his teeth.

Stopping dead, the others crashed into her and cursed before throwing her out of the way and ganging up on him.

I made my way quietly into the room as they stood shocked for a moment by Jason’s quick change to human form, their brains screaming at them that it was just a trick.

Now they really did know werewolves were real, I thought as a few of them scrambled to pick up the knives they’d dropped as they overcame the shock.

I admit I was shocked myself, seeing it for the first time from Jason. I had never seen any wolf change that quickly, not even Angelo had been that quick, but Jason didn’t look the least bit bothered nor did he look the slightest bit scared as they circled him.

He had the look of a man who was ready to die to protect his family. There were at least five women there and four men.

I saw a perfect plan form in my head. I gestured at him, (not without difficulty, and it was probably only thanks to him being more wolf that he was able to read me so easily) what I wanted him to do… distract them for me.

I knew it was our best shot against nine people with weapons, of course, there was still a big chance it wouldn’t work.

Jason had noticed my gestures, but he didn’t look at me directly or give me away to the others.

I knew he had understood the message when he looked at each woman in the eyes and smiled warmly at them.

I was expecting him to do something more, but shocking me and the men, all five women ran at Jason, dropping their weapons and pushing each other out of the way as they tried to hug him.

One girl who had mousy brown hair and wore glasses pouted miserably as she stood to the side, unable to get a look in.

I wasn’t sure what was going on but worked with it and let Jason know about her with another charade, just in case she decided to try and kill him again.

He turned and looked at her, walking over through the other girls, he grabbed her, began to kiss her and pressed himself against her, much to her delight.

I could feel the revulsion coming off him in waves, and at one point I was almost worried he would retch on her.

I took my chance as the girls waited for their turn and shifted before silently edging over to the men, who were almost mesmerised by the show in front of them.

I wrapped a hand around one man’s mouth, dragging him away before snapping his neck, (which Blaze had shown how to do) and holding in my scream at the sound of its crack. Silently, I laid him on the floor.

As I went for the next man, this one big and burly, I tried to figure out how on earth I would kill him. He was at least six foot four next to my five feet.

As I was thinking this through, I couldn’t help but become transfixed by Jason and the girls as he kissed a different girl, but slapped another’s hand away when she tried to touch him below the waist, doing all this without ever taking his lips away from the brunette.

I forced myself to focus and saw a big hunter’s knife lying on the tool table, grabbing it, I took a deep breath and ran at the burly man, shoving the knife in to his back and forcing it through his heart.

He screamed in pure agony, and I screamed with him as blood sprayed my face and covered my hands.

How the f**k did Jason do this was my last thought before the man collapsed onto the floor, his body falling away from the knife.

I looked over at little Adam, who had cried himself to sleep.

I ran back and got Jason’s light blue top off the floor and wrapped it around Adam’s small cold body.

As I took a moment to think, I looked back at the room and saw everyone just how they had been, Jason kissing the girls and the men watching transfixed.

How had they not noticed me stabbing the life from their friend? Why weren’t they rushing at me with their weapons and trying to kill me? I couldn’t understand it, but I had no time to dwell on it.

I could see Jason was getting angry and frustrated, so running back over I picked up the knife and repeated what I had done to the burly man until the only ones left were the girls going crazy for Jason.

He looked up at me mid-kiss with a girl, saw that I had done my job and then snapped the girls’ neck, letting her drop to the floor without so much as a glance at her body as he stepped over it and started for the one with the glasses.

She suddenly came back to herself and started screaming and backing away from him. He didn’t get very far as her other female companions jumped at him, clawing and punching. One of them began to bite down on his arm before being slung onto the floor by my feet.

I didn’t allow my human mind to enter me or give her the chance to look into my eyes and make me think twice, just brought down the knife and aimed for her heart. Jason wasn’t as kind with death.

He had pinned all three of the remaining girls left with just one arm against the wall and as they struggled he snapped the girl closest to his hand’s, fingers, all four at the same time.

I had to close my eyes and ears as she screamed the place down, it certainly made the others stop struggling against him.

“Pass me the blade, babe,” he shouted over the screams of the broken fingers girl.

“Are you...uhhh...sure?” Ok, I was no hard arsed werewolf, in fact, I can admit that right then I was damn right petrified of my own mate.

It was one thing to see him torture someone through a window of a room, but quite another to be in the same room and helping him.

He gave me that icy cold look of his, so reluctantly I handed him the bloodied knife and quickly stepped back when one of the girls tried to bite at me.

Needless to say, Jason started with her first while I closed my eyes, but nothing could block out the screams.

“Babe, it’s alright. I’m done now.” Jason shook me, but I still didn’t open my eyes. I was too scared of what I’d see lying in front of me.

“Come on darling, I’m sorry, but they had to pay for what they did, if it wasn’t them it would have been Adam,” he whispered, pulling me into a hug with us both butt naked and covered in blood.

I opened my eyes and looked up at his. They were warm and full of love again as he stared back and kissed me softly on the lips.

“You’re right,” I answered, and looked at the dead girls.

What used to be girls was now one big bloody mess, intestines were among the blood and gore and tangled limbs. A leg that was still hanging by a thread of flesh to the body was covered in gash wounds with toes missing, the stumps still pumping blood all over the floor so dark it was almost black.

Suddenly, the scent of it all filled my nose, no need to m-shift in order to smell the stench of bloody death.

Gagging, I turned and vomited, and couldn’t stop until there was nothing left. Jason came over beside me and rubbed my back until I was done.

He didn’t say anything. I don’t think he knew what to say because this was normal for him, and he hardly ever thought like a normal human.

Once I’d recovered, we went and picked up Adam, who had amazingly slept through the whole thing, though he woke up as soon as Jason cradled him into his chest.

Looking up at his daddy, he gave a big bright smile and started gurgling and tugging at the wolf paw necklace Jason wore. Something I’d bought as an inside joke.

We left the place with Jason in just his trousers and blood as Adam was still wrapped in his top, and me in wolf form again as I didn’t feel like being caught naked, but unfortunately having my fur covered in sticky blood which was kind of gross and uncomfortable.

Blaze and the other wolves came rushing from their places when we gave them the all clear, circling Jason and checking over Adam.

“I’m glad you’re both alright, we were just about to come inside just in case something had gone wrong, but I knew Jason wouldn’t let us down,” Blaze grinned, and pulled us both in to a big hug once I’d shifted and dressed, Adam getting crushed with us and laughing as he pulled my hair hard enough to make me yelp.