The Bite of Revenge

Chapter 6

"Girl, you sleep like the dead," Taylor said as I finally opened my eyes, "I've been trying to wake you up for almost an hour."

"Csn you blame me?" I asked as I rolled out of bed and stretched like a cat in the sun, "I had a pretty stressful day yesterday with all that talk about the Argents and supernatural creatures roaming around, I think I deserve a good night's sleep."

"Well hurry up," Taylor said, heading for the door, "we need to be at the training grounds in ten minutes and Derrek will be pissed if we're late." I immediately started scrambling around my room and finally found a t-shirt and a pair of leggings. When I finally made it downstairs, Taylor and Alison were already waiting for me.

"You're going to need these," Alison said, handing me me a waterbottle and protein bar, "Derrek tends to push us to the limit during training, so you need to keep your energy up."

"Thanks," I said appreciatively as we headed out the door. As we headed towards the main compound, I couldn't help but think about the dream I had last night night. "Why would Lupa want me to keep our conversation a secret?" I wondered to myself, "is she worried that jealousy might arise if I told someone?" But after thinking it over, I concluded that I shouldn't question the intentions of a goddess and that I should have faith in whatever was thrown my way.

We managed to reach the training grounds with five minutes to spare and as Derrek led everyone in warm up stretches, Taylor leaned towards me and whispered, "are you okay, Anna? you seemed a little distracted on the way over here."

"I'm fine," I whispered as I stretched my left arm over the front of my body, but before I could say more, Derrek had joined us.

"You ladies have anything to share with the rest of the group?" he asked, crossing his arms.

"No sir," Taylor answered, promptly standing at attention.

"Then I suggest you keep your whispered conversations to yourselves," Derrek said, "that is, unless you want to do extra laps?" We both shook our heads quickly and as he walked away, Taylor turned to me and mouthed werewolf and pointed to her ear to indicate that Derrek had heard her whispered concern. I nodded and for the rest of the morning, we did endurance training in silence and when we were finally allowed a break, my whole body was screaming in pain.

"You weren't kidding about pushing us to the limit," I said as Taylor, Alison, and I sat off to the side, "I feel like my whole body's on fire."

"Just be thankful that endurance training is over," Taylor said with a groan, "next we have combat training with Peter."

"I hope it's less painful than endurance training," I grumbled as I took a sip of water. I then noticed that my body seemed to be recovering more quickly than was normal, but I just chalked it up to just taking a break. "By the way, what's combat training like?"

"You'll see," Taylor answered, nodding towards the direction of the locker rooms, "here comes Peter now." I looked towards the direction she indicated and saw Peter, who was wearing a gray muscle shirt, gray sweatpants, and dark blue sneakers, walking towards us and she was right, the man was good-looking, for a forty-six-year-old anyway, and I couldn't help but notice that all the girls in our group were practically drooling when he stopped in front of us.

"I know you guys are probably tired from this morning, so I'll only keep you for an hour," Peter said with an exasperated sigh, I could tell he was really annoyed, "so today I want to analyze your strengths and then tomorrow I want you to better hone your abilitties." He then looked directly at me and continued, "Anastasia, would you join me please?" Everyone stared at me as I walked to the front of the group, but before I could make it to where Peter was standing, I sensed movement on my right and I whirled around and managed to grab Peter's arm before his fist connected with my face. He tried to do the same thing with his other fist, but I managed to grab that one too. Just as he tried to pull away from me, I managed to spin him around and get him in a headlock. "Impressive," Peter whispered, "but do you think you can hold onto me?" I then heard a deep growl deep in his throat, I realized he was about to shift, so without putting much thought into it, I jumped on his back, wrapped my legs around his waist, and rocked backwards, all in one motion, causing Peter to loose his balance and fall backward with me underneath him.

Unfortunately, this didn't deter him from shifting, but i was determined to keep him in a headlock, so without thinking about it, I started to shift too and it was like a bunch of fire ants were crawling all over my body and finally, after about a minute, Peter eventually tapped my arm, indicating that he yielded. I rolled onto my knees and let him go and as I looked around, everyone was looking at me in stunned silence. "Did your parents ever tell you it's rude to stare?" I growled and everyone immediately looked away. I then glanced back at Peter, who had just gotten back to his feet and was looking at me with pride.

"You see that ladies and gentlemen?" he asked, nodding in my direction, "that's a true fighter right there, I expect you all to learn from Anastasia and take notes. That's all for today, dissmissed."

"Damn girl," Taylor said as we headed for the locker room, "you did't tell us you could fight like that."

"I didn't know that I could fight like that," I said, still reeling from all the adrenaline running through my veins like caffeine, "I guess it was instinct?"

"Instinct my ass," Alison said with a laugh, "you should've seen the look on Derrek's face when you took Peter to the ground, the guy was literally in tears he was laughing so hard."

"Yeah, but you guys didn't see the looks on everyone else's faces when I let Peter go," I said with a frown, "it was like they were scared of me or something." By now we had reached the door of the girl's locker room and when we entered, everyone got quiet and as Taylor, Alison, and I walked by, nobody made eye contact with me and I could literrally smell the fear in the room as if it were a pile of dirty laundry festering in a corner of the room. "See what I mean?" I asked when we got outside, "it was like they were waiting for a bomb to go off or something."

"They're just not used to seeing a real live hell hound," Taylor said with a shrug, "keep in mind that nobody has seen a hell hound shift before, so it might freak them out a bit."

"It wasn't like that," I interjected as we headed back to the house, "when I reprimanded them for staring at me, they immediately looked away as if I weregoing to take them to the ground."

"You shouldn't worry about it too much," Alison said kindly, by now we had made it back to the house just as Peter was leaving.

"Anastasia," he said with a nod and a smile, "ladies." With that, he was walking down the street with all three of us starring after him with our mouths hanging open in shocked silence.

"What the hell was that about?" I finally asked when we entered the house, "I'm guessing Peter doesn't usually make house calls?"

"Only if has to," Taylor answered, "but it's usually to talk to my dad if he's home." She then led Alison and I to the back of the house to find Mr. Harrison in his office. When we entered, he looked up and smiled.

"Mr. Hale was just telling me how well you did at training today, Anna," Mr. Harrison said proudly, "he also told me that you would make a damn good bounty hunter, his words, not mine."

"Thank you, Mr. Harrison," I said appreciatively, "but I still have a lot to learn."

"That's another thing that I wanted to talk to you about," Mr. Harrison said, leaning forward in his chair, "Mr. Hale is insisting that you, Anna, be put in the intermediate combat training class, and what he has told me, I have to agree with him."

"With all due respect Mr. Harrison, I feel like that would be unfair to the other students who've been here longer than I have," I said respectively, "I came here to learn and I don't feel right taking that opportunity away from the other students who have worked hard to get here."

"I appreciate and understand your concern, Anna," Mr. Harrison said with a sigh, "but if you know Peter Hale as much as I do, then you would know that he can be extremely stubborn and persistent when he wants to be and doesn't take "no" for an answer."

"Couldn't you just explain to him that I literally just got here yesterday?"

"I tried that already, but Peter insisted that you be placed in the intermediate class, saying that you had real potential and believe me, he doesn't say that very often." I realized that there was no point in arguing and after thanking Mr. Harrison again, Taylor, Alison, and I headed back to the main part of the house.

"My dad's right you know," Taylor said as we all headed upstairs cleaned up and changed, "Peter doesn't usually go around praising students. The fact that you impressed him on your very first day of training is a serious accomplishment, you be proud." I could only nod as I headed into my room while Taylor and Alison headed further down the hall. As I headed into my bathroom, I couldn't help but wonder if my dream with Lupa last night had anything to do with my unexpected burst of strength during combat training today.

"It's just a coincidence," I thought as I stripped off my clothes and got into the shower, "right?" The hot water felt good on my bare skin and when I reluctantly got out, I glanced in the mirror over the sink and just for a second, I swear I saw my eyes flash red-orange. I looked again more closely, but my eyes were just their normal brown. "It was probably just a trick of the light," I thought as i put on a clean t-dhirt and jeans, "wolf eyes aren't usually the color of fire anyway."

"You looked freaked," Alison commented as I joined her and Taylor in the kitchen for lunch, "you feeling okay?"

"What color are hell hound eyes?" I asked as I sat down at the island and grabbed a sandwich from a plate.

"Golden yellow, why?"

"Just curious." No way was I going to tell them that my eyes might be a different color, they would think I was crazy.

"I was just telling Alison that my dad took care of our letters of resignation," Taylor said, rolling her eyes, "and lets just say that Connor is not happy."

"What makes you say that?" I asked, raising my eyebrows at her.

"Both him and Viktor have been blowing up my phone since 8am this morning," Taylor answered, "and they've been leaving some nasty and threatening voice mails as well." I then pulled out my phone and saw I had received numerous calls from Connor and Viktor as well. I then listened to a few of the voice mails, at first they started out being polite and trying to convince me to come back, but after a while, the voice mails started to become more threatening and went as far as threatening to sue me and ruin my life.

"This is harassment," I finally said after a while, "how is this even legal?"

"It's not," Taylor answered with a sigh, "my dad suspected something like this might happen, so he's going to get both our phones deactivated and provide us with state-of-the-art company phones that the Argents can't trace."

"And what about our camping trip on the Fourth of July?" I asked incredulously, "with everything that's been going the Argents, is it even still safe to go?"

"My dad has agreed to let us go, but on one condition."

"Which is?"

"Peter and Derrek have to go with us." I raised me eyebrows at this and Taylor continued, "the fact that you, me, and Alison are the only hell hound known to the Argents, my dad doesn't want to take any chances, so he's entrusted Peter and Derrek to be our body gaurds."

"This is going to be a nightmare," I muttered, "I understand that the Hales are there for our protection, but I get the feeling that they don't get along very well."

"They don't," Alison said with a sigh, "nobody knows why, but I suspect it's some kind of jealousy thing, considering Peter is head of the bounty hunter unit while Derrek is his second in command."

"Honestly, I'm surprised that both of them agreed to join us on our trip at all," Taylor said, "most of the time, they can't stand to be in the same room with each other."

"They're grown-ass men," I said, "both of them need to grow a pair and get over it."

"Try telling that to a couple of grown-ass werewolves," Taylor said, rolling her eyes, "the last time they had an argument, it took three werewolves and a werecoyote to break them apart and it wasn't a pretty sight."

"So what happens if they get into another argument while we're on our trip?" I asked, "no offense Taylor, but it seems like that having the two Hale men in close proximity to each other is not a good idea."

"I told my dad the same thing, but he said that me made swear that they would be on their best behavior." I was a little skepticle, but I took her word for it and for the rest of the day, Taylor gave me and Alison a tour of The Bone Yard, explaining that every supernatural knew about this place and that if they needed to find it, they could simply follow their supernatural instincts. "It's like when birds fly south for the winter," Taylor explained as we walked through the park where I first met Peter the day before, "every supernatural creature can find this place in their time of need."

"What if the Argents were to find this place?" I asked as we headed back to the house, "they are;t stupid, they have to suspect that something like the Bone Yard exists right?"

"Not exactly," Taylor answered, "you see, The Bone Yard was designed by a very powerful coven of witches many years ago and through the years, the spell that were cast in order to hide The Bone Yard grew stronger to the point where not even a mere human could find it even if they tried." When we finally got back to house, it was almost dinner time, so Alison's mom mad her famous chili and when we were filled to bursting, Taylor, Alison, and I decided to head to bed early in order to be up tomorrow for training.

"I here in the intermediate combat class they do target training," Alison said excitedly, "and that Peter is more patient than Derrek."

"I'll let you know if it's true," I said with a laugh, "I just wish we were in the same class though."

"Trust me, you're better off in the intermediate class," Taylor said with a sigh, "Derrek teaches the beginner combat class and he's a f*****g nightmare."

"How so?"

"All he does is yell at you and if you make even one slip-up, he embarrasses you in front of the whole class. One time, one of the young werewolves lost control and lunged at Derrek and the poor kid was slammed so hard on the floor, I swear I heard bones break, but luckily the kid healed and was okay."

"If that's how Derrek's like, how's his uncle any different?" I asked, by now we had reached the top of the stairs.

"Isaak, one of Peter's students, told me that Peter encourages his students to learn from their mistakes and if they loose control, think of these three words: alpha, beta, omega over and over again until they calm down," Taylor answered, rolling her eyes, "personally, I rather just go to my happy place." After that, we all said good-night and headed to our designated rooms. I immediately changed into my pajamas and I was asleep before my head even hit the pillow.