My Unfated Mate

Chapter Five

The weeks passed more quickly than Elen expected.

She had settled into the west wing of Drew’s mansion, which he had given her after she asked if she could remain there for a while. The arrangement was strange, but she had stopped questioning it. Drew rarely came to her side of the mansion, and Elen was perfectly content with the distance.

Most of her time was spent training.

Every morning, she pushed herself until her muscles ached. She practiced the techniques Greg had taught her, tested her newly awakened senses, and slowly learned how to move with the strength that had appeared after the severance was destroyed. Her body healed faster now, her reflexes were sharper, and she could hear things she had never noticed before.

But her wolf remained the strangest part of it all.

She could feel her presence constantly.

It was there, somewhere deep inside her, awake and watching, yet whenever Elen tried to reach for her, there was nothing.

She tried meditation.

She tried talking to her.

She tried shouting at her.

Nothing worked.

After several weeks, Elen was beginning to suspect her wolf was deliberately ignoring her.

One evening, after another exhausting training session, she dropped onto the floor and stared at the ceiling. Sweat dampened her hair, and her chest rose and fell rapidly as she tried to catch her breath.

“I have been trying to talk to you for weeks,” she muttered. “If you are going to live in my head, the least you can do is introduce yourself.”

Nothing.

Elen sighed.

“Fine. Ignore me.”

She closed her eyes.

For several seconds, nothing happened.

Then something stirred.

Elen’s eyes opened.

A strange sensation moved through her body.

Her heart slammed against her ribs.

She pushed herself upright just as another wave of energy rushed through her.

“What is happening?”

Her bones cracked.

Elen screamed.

Pain tore through her body as her limbs twisted beneath her. She fell forward, catching herself with her hands as her fingers changed, her nails lengthening into claws. Fur spread rapidly across her skin, thick and deep red, while her body reshaped itself with frightening speed.

Then, as suddenly as it had begun, everything stopped.

Elen remained frozen.

She was on four paws.

For several seconds, she could do nothing but stare.

Then she slowly turned toward the mirror.

A massive red wolf stared back at her.

Her fur was darker than blood beneath the dim training room lights, and her body was far larger than any ordinary wolf she had ever seen. There was something almost regal about her appearance, something that made Elen instinctively understand that this was not a normal transformation.

She took one cautious step toward the mirror.

A voice suddenly entered her mind.

“Finally.”

Elen nearly stumbled.

“You can talk?”

A sensation resembling amusement passed through her consciousness.

“I have always been able to talk.”

Elen stared at her reflection.

“Then why have you ignored me?”

“Because you were not ready.”

“I have been ready for weeks.”

“No. You have been impatient for weeks.”

Elen narrowed her eyes.

“Are you always this irritating?”

The wolf laughed inside her mind.

“I am beginning to understand why I like you.”

Despite herself, Elen smiled.

The amusement faded, replaced by something more solemn.

“There are things you need to understand about me.”

Elen became still.

“What things?”

“My name is Alpha Red.”

The name sent an inexplicable shiver through her.

“I am not an ordinary wolf, Elen. I existed long before the packs you know today. I was created by the Moon Goddess.”

Elen stared at the enormous wolf in the mirror.

“How old are you?”

“Old enough that your idea of history would barely scratch the surface.”

That answer only created more questions.

“What exactly are you?”

Alpha Red hesitated.

“Something you will understand eventually.”

Elen frowned.

“That sounds suspiciously like another way of saying you don’t want to tell me.”

“There are things that should be discovered rather than explained.”

Elen opened her mouth to argue, but Alpha Red continued.

“You have spent eighteen years without access to me. Your body is still learning what it means to possess its full strength. Do not rush what you do not yet understand.”

Elen looked down at her enormous paws.

She could feel the difference already.

Her senses were sharper. Her strength was immense. There was an instinctive connection between her and the world around her that she had never experienced before.

And beneath all of it was her magic.

She shifted back into human form, breathing heavily as she stared at her hands.

“My magic feels different too.”

“It is different.”

“I can feel it, but I don’t know how to use it.”

“You have only just begun to access it.”

Elen frowned.

“So I have all this power and no idea what to do with it.”

“That would be an accurate description.”

She sighed.

“Wonderful.”

For a while, she experimented with the strange energy moving beneath her skin. She could feel something vast inside her, something that responded when she focused, but she could not yet control it.

Then she noticed something else.

It was colder.

Quieter.

Separate from both her wolf and her magic.

Elen closed her eyes.

There it was again.

That strange energy she had felt since the night at the Storm Pack.

She had tried not to think about it.

Especially after the sunlight had burned her in Drew’s mansion.

She had spent weeks telling herself there had to be another explanation. Perhaps the severance had changed her body in some unexpected way. Perhaps her new abilities came with weaknesses she did not understand.

But deep down, she had already begun to suspect the truth.

“Alpha Red.”

“I feel it.”

Elen’s eyes opened.

“What is it?”

Alpha Red was silent.

“It isn’t wolf power,” she finally said.

“I know.”

“And it isn’t magic.”

Elen swallowed.

She already knew what was coming.

She remembered the curtains opening that morning. The sunlight touching her skin. The sudden burning pain. She remembered the fear that had followed, and the terrible suspicion she had refused to put into words.

“Then what is it?”

Alpha Red’s voice was quiet.

“Vampire power.”

Elen closed her eyes.

She did not scream.

She did not argue.

She simply stood there as the last excuse she had been holding onto disappeared.

“I knew it,” she whispered.

The confirmation felt worse than the suspicion.

Her mind returned to the night everything had changed. Drew’s claws. The blood. The strange energy entering her body. The severance breaking apart from within.

She opened her eyes.

“It came from Drew.”

“Yes.”

Elen looked down at her hands.

She had spent eighteen years hearing stories about vampires. She had grown up knowing what they were capable of, knowing what they had done to her family, knowing that they were creatures she should never trust.

And now one of them had left a part of himself inside her.

“Can I get rid of it?”

Alpha Red was quiet.

“I don’t know.”

Elen laughed bitterly.

“Of course you don’t.”

She walked toward the mirror and studied her reflection.

A werewolf.

A mage.

And now something else.

Something she had never wanted.

Something that had come from the one vampire she was supposed to stay away from.

Drew.

The thought of him made her jaw tighten.