Blood Oath

Chapter 10: What You Know Can Destroy You

A million thoughts raced through my head, married with a knot in my chest, my breath hitched, and my voice died in my throat as I stared back at the other person in the basement with me, a faint metallic smell almost suffocating the pungent one.

Her presence rendered me dumbstruck, but somehow a feeling of relief burst through me, yet many unanswered questions stirred in the air.

There, under the ambiance of one of the few lit corners of the basement, she was miserably motionless against the wall as if impaled to it.

Ava sat, camouflaged in the shadows, her signature stoic expression was now overwhelmed by a pained one.

Drinking in the sight, I dragged my unwilling and exhausted body forward till I was now face-to-face with her, and even still, she hadn’t moved a muscle since I laid eyes on her.

“I haven’t been completely honest with you.” She spoke in a low, guttural voice. Her bleak eyes were barely open as she blinked.

Something was off.

Her face was pale, she looked too frail to draw in her next breath, and was on the verge of passing out.

“Ava?” I worriedly called, terrified as my breathing soon became uneven.

In a dreadfully sluggish manner, she elevated her hand from her stomach and rested it on the side of my face.

Soon, my attention unconsciously traveled from her tousled brown hair to the gray tank top she wore.

And it was then I noticed the stains.

Blood.

There was a hole in her shirt, and around that area, blood had spread from a source, drenching the cotton material. Wide-eyed, I glommed at her, terror-stricken, while my trembling hands made it to her side.

Breaking her gaze from mine, she lowered her hand, her bloodied palm painting my cheek red.

“You should see the other guy... his life isn’t flashing before his eyes.” She found a way to make a quick-witted comment about her situation.

“Help!” I cried out, my voice reverberating off the concrete walls.

911. An idea came.

I roamed my hands through my pockets, “They took my new phone. Sh—”

“No, no. Ava! No, stay with me!” I was in a state of panic, tapping and shaking her violently.

When she was unresponsive, I lifted my hand and struck her right cheek with a blinding slap that swayed her face to the side as she jerked wide-awake, breathing heavily.

“Sweet mother of— Skylar, they took the silver bullets out of my legs but left the one in my stomach to prove a point.”

“A.. A point? You mean... b-bleed out?” I stumbled on my own words, discombobulated as I spoke.

“If those bastards wanted me dead, I think I’d be dead by now.” She groaned, a hand to her stomach as she straightened herself against the wall, slowly pointing her finger to an object in the distance, “I may need your help, and that fork.”

Following her request, I wobbled to my feet, retrieved the fork, and brought it to her. Without hesitation, she lifted the stained part of her shirt to expose a bullet wound in her abdomen with blood still gushing out. Irritated, I looked away from the sight.

“You need to get the bullet out to stop the bleeding, so the healing process can begin.” She whimpered, her chest heaving drastically.

“I don’t know if you know this about me, Ava, but I’m a Psychology major. Never exactly needed to use a fork surgically.” I confessed without control.

“My left arm’s dead weight, Sky. Open up the wound so I can get the bullet out.” She instructed.

Then, the air itself stilled, and the foul scent in the atmosphere grew thicker and thicker. Her eyes bore into mine in a quiet exchange.

Closing my eyes, I let out a dramatic sigh.

I knew exactly what had to be done.

The second my eyes blinked open again, my gaze met her bleeding abdomen as my trembling hands became stable again.

Plunging the fork into her flesh, I pushed it from side to side, grimacing as I incised an opening for her. Wincing, she dug her fingers into the wound, making a tearing sound as she pulled out a blood-stained bullet.

“Such precise dissection, Miss Sinclair. Sure you haven’t done this before?” She smiled, bringing the bullet to my eye level with a hand far more bloody than the bullet itself.

“Done what? Stab someone with a fork or help take a bullet out of a friend?” I questioned rhetorically.

“I’ve been called many things. Heartless. Backstabber. Tramp. And my personal favorite? Monster. But friend? That’s certainly a new one.” She jested unbelievably.

“We need to bandage up your—”

My countenance went from tiredly gleeful to entirely troubled when my eyes dropped to her stomach again, and I noticed the strangest thing.

The bullet wound had started to abnormally close up, like it was never there in the first place. Only the blood staining the sides stood as evidence of a past fatal wound.

I frowned. “Ava, your injury’s gone... Kind of like you were never even… shot. How’s that possible?”

Gently prodding where the injury once was, I stared down in disbelief. It was unsettling. Not even a scar was present.

This incident sent my mind into a chaotic train of curious thoughts that wrecked me whole.

“How did your injury heal so fast?” I asked, my brow furrowed in bewilderment.

“What if I told you everything you know about yourself is a lie cunningly crafted to protect you from who and what you are?” She met my question with one of her own.

With my sharp gaze still on her, I rose to my feet and stepped back with yet another question, “Where are you headed with this, Ava?”

Suddenly, she shot to her feet, pacing around the room like someone who hadn’t suffered from any deadly injuries moments ago.

In no time, she stopped in front of me, her eyes burning with a fierce look I’ve never seen on her, “Lycan. You know that word already. A mortal man plagued with a curse that transforms him and his sired lineage into beasts of the night. Werewolves.”

“What does that have to do with anything? And how are you able to walk? I thought you got shot twice in your legs.”

To say I was merely confused would be laughable. I was drowning in a sea of questions. The few scraps of seeming truth I held onto felt like cruel teases, and the fear of the unknown threatened to overwhelm me.

“I’m getting there, Skylar.” She relayed, frustrated, “You see, werewolves have a special ability that allows us to heal faster than the average human.”

“Us?” I was puzzled.

“Yes, us. We’re the same. You and I, Skylar, we’re werewolves.”

Either my ears betrayed me, or her words tore the fabric of what I believed was real.

I couldn’t accept it.

“I think you hit your head when you got shot.” I doubted, letting out a chuckle, “C’mon, we have to find a way out of here.”

Before I had the chance to walk away from her, she aggressively grabbed my shoulders, her eyes burning into mine with intense urgency as she launched into a rapid-fire explanation.

“And you’re not listening to me. I know you’re in denial right now, but think about it. Just now, how was I able to heal so quickly?”

“Why have you had an unexplainable rage your whole life? And why did you wake up the day after the party with mud all over you, and blood literally on your hands?”

“One answer. You’re not just angry…”

Her voice dropped, her tone final. “You’re a werewolf.”

The words struck me like lightning. I breathed in but couldn’t breathe out. Her explanations plummeted me into a spiral of shock.

“How did you—...” I tried to speak, but an unexpected interruption cut through the tension like a knife.

“Hello, ladies!”

That voice.

We both turned our heads—me and Ava—to find none other than Professor Adam standing a few feet away.

Gone was his signature hat and glasses. What remained was the coat; ominous as ever, his posture was casual, yet predatory.

“Treaty?” He bargained, holding up a brown paper bag in one hand, while in the other, he toyed with a small, gleaming silver knife.

A wave of fury surged in me, but Ava moved faster, her fury erupting before mine could even take form. She stormed toward him, her eyes maddened and blazing.

But he was ready.

With chilling precision, he raised the knife and pressed its sharp edge against her lower jaw, making Ava freeze in place.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” He warned, his voice cold and detached.

“Unlike my Asian counterpart, compassion really isn’t my strong suit. I’m not going to go easy on you. Try me, and three bullets won’t be the only thing going through you.”

He punctuated the threat by pressing the blade deeper into her skin, his other hand revealing what had been concealed beneath his coat.

A gun.

I stood there, baffled, my mind scrambling to make sense of what I was witnessing.

Ava slowly stepped back, a smirk creeping onto her lips despite the danger. Her hands lifted in mocking surrender.

He tossed the brown bag at her chest. “Wise choice.”

Then he looked at us both, the corners of his mouth twitching into something that wasn’t quite a smile.

“Follow me.” He ordered.

I turned to Ava. The look on her face said it all.

She knew it and so did I.

We weren’t just following him.

We were walking into a trap.