SHADOW OF THE WHITE WOLF

Vaelora POV: The first time I understood fear was the day I heard my parents’ hushed whispers in the corridor outside my room. I was only ten years old at the time, and I had not officially gotten my wolf yet. Not that I was supposed to until I clocked eighteen, in accordance with the laws of nature and the traditions of the werewolves. Yet, I had powers, unnatural ones that weren't peculiar to my kind; distance meant nothing to me as I could hear everything, see clearly even in the dark, and smell everything even as far as a 100miles away, I heal quickly too, and the worse, I could manipulate the mind. I remembered a time when I was seven, I had saw a white pet wolf, who bit a kid. The owner child laughed so hard, poking fun at the other kid that was bitten, and I had muttered "if only you'd turn on your owner." And it did. It bit so hard, that it leached on to the flesh refusing to let go. The pet wolf was killed to save the boy from it grip. Seeing the blood and deep gash, I'd frozen that day. I'd desperately prayed that I didn't do that. Later that evening, while I was alone with my nanny, I looked her straight in the eyes, and muttered, "give me meat," and like one possessed she brought the entire meat dish to my table. A dish I was never allowed to have! The revelations of the power I wielded at such tender age, felt so abnormal, so scary. Horrified by it, I had kept all that secret buried deep inside me, even away from my parents who saw my existence itself was an abomination on it's own. But do I blame them? No. Do I hate them? Maybe. Maybe because they'd treated me no better than anyone else in the pack had. With detest. Truthfully, I was a wolf who shouldn't have existed, who shouldn't have lived. And my parents made sure to remind me of that every single day. They isolated me, with no friends, away from relatives, and with minimal participation in pack's activities. And even though I had lived within a pack, I felt like an outcast. A total stranger. Finally hours earlier, I had done the unforgivable worse! I had shifted! Shifted fully and prematurely right there in front of half the entire pack, after being triggered by someone far older than me. Five years older. Stella! ***** **** ***** Few Hours Ago: The Sentinel’s daughter, Stella. Stella's mother was the Luna’s closest friend, and that alone had filled her with a sense of authority she did not deserve. She was a bully, the kind who thrived on breaking those weaker than her. And she had been assigned to train me; teach me defense techniques, they said. Help me survive until I came of age and have my wolf. But instead, she beat me. Her fists struck me without restraint, each blow followed the other as it landed harsh and cruel against my cheeks, until my lips would split open, and I was certain a bruise would bloom across my eye by morning. My trainer watched it all and said nothing, turning a blind eye as though my suffering didn't matter. Like it was absolutely normal. I'd beared the beatings, sucked in the blood from my cracked lips as I stood back up each time, knowing I'd heal before morning. Although that never took away the pain I felt, but the pain of knowing my parents would never noticed was what always shattered me. Not that anybody care enough to either. I was already disliked among my peers, and that made it only worse. They'd jeered mockingly at me as Stella turned me to her punch-practice bag. They believed I had everything handed to me; being the daughter of the pack's Beta and a Gamma from powerful bloodlines, and a grand-heiress to the two strongest families second only to the Alpha. To them, I was a girl born with a golden spoon, while they clawed their way toward recognition, and that made them hatefully jealous. If only they knew. If only they saw the truth, that the image they painted of me was nothing close to my reality. That I was nothing, that I meant nothing even to my parents. “Block the f*****g blow, you i***t!” Stella’s voice rang out just before her fist connected again, sending me stumbling, almost flying across the field. And that's when it happened. I felt rage surged through me, sudden and uncontrollable. I felt my bones cracked as I lost total control of my body, muscles twisting and reshaping as something extremely powerful forced its way to the surface. I had shifted! Not partially, but fully shift into a wolf in broad daylight..! That alone was unnatural. But what made it unforgivable was the color. My wolf was white. Pure haunting white! A gasp rippled through the courtyard. Stella froze mouth slightly agap. Blinded by rage and sudden bloodthirst, I lunged at her, teeth bared, claws ready to tear apart, but before I could reach her, a brown-furred wolf slammed into me, pinning me to the ground with a snarl. “Vaelora!” The voice echoed in my head. “You must cling to your humanity!” it said. Mother! She had mind-linked me. My very first mind-linked communication as a wolf. I felt elated. With every ounce of strength I had, I forced myself back to the surface of my sanity, dragging my consciousness out of the wolf’s grip until I collapsed into my human form, gasping, sweat and strands of fur clinging to my skin. “Mom…” I began weakly. But the look on her face stopped me cold. It wasn’t pride, joy or relief. It was nothing close to what I'd expected... It was horror. Pure horror etched across every part of her face. For a flicker of a second, I saw her fingers trembled as she hurriedly clenched them to hid it. When it happened in the courtyard, I had expected something different. Pride, maybe. Acceptance. I had imagined my parents smiling at my defiance, my mom especially. I'd daydreamed of my trainer acknowledgment, the pack howls of celebration of the youngest werewolf in history. The child in me had somehow hoped they would let go of some superstitious beliefs and embrace my nature if they finally found out. But I was so wrong! I had the wrong hope, dreamt the wrong dreams. Because in that very exact moment, everything began to fall apart for me, my family, and my pack! ***** **** ***** Everyone and everything had fallen into silence as they stared at me. Training weapons stilled mid-air. Conversations and laughters died down on people's lips. And one by one, every eye turned toward me with the very same expression... Fear. Stella shuffled two feet away from me visibly trembling. Even my mother looked at me like I was something… wrong. She dragged me home, her grip tight and trembling, ignoring the stares that followed us. I met father's disappointed look by the porch, as he followed behind as my mum dragged me inside the house. Without a word, she shoved me into my room and locked the door. Now, I sat on the floor with my back pressed against it, listening. “What do we do?” my mother whispered, her voice thick with panic. “We cannot hand her over.” “Nyxara, we have to,” my father replied, his voice smaller than I had ever heard it. “You saw it too. Half the pack witnessed her shift.” “We still can’t just hand her over to them!” “We’ve been hiding her condition since birth!” His voice rose, strained. “Don’t you understand? If we refuse, the Alpha will execute all of us.” “She did not choose this,” my mother hissed. “She is our daughter, Matt.” “She’s a curse!” my father snapped. Those words struck like a blade to my chest. I didn’t move. I couldn’t breathe. I simply listened still. I listened to the uneven rhythm of both my parents’ heartbeats. Then my nose picked up the sharp and sudden smell of blood. It smelt fresh. But whose? I felt my fangs as it try to elongate. I was thirsty. “Nyxara,” my father said sharply, snapped me back to sanity, “you’re hurting yourself. Retract your claws.” The blood... it's Mother's. Was I just thirsty for my own mother's blood!? “Do not touch me, Matt,” Mother snapped. “I would rather die than watch our ten-year-old daughter be executed.” Executed. The word echoed in my skull, over and over again. I heard footsteps thundered down the staircase. A door slammed violently, shaking the walls before silence swallowed everything whole again. And in that silence, realization came crashing down on me. I was going to die.