Chapter.2
1806 Words
Sera's P.O.V
Panic was buried into my chest.
My lungs burned as I fought for air. Fear froze me from where I stood the moment those red eyes caught me through the dark.
It stood impossibly still. Being pinned down by its bloody red eyes that twisted my stomach in dread. Its stare pinned me in place harder than claws ever could. Like something massive was crushing the air from my lungs.
The other wolves close to it were completely still too. BROWN. GREY. DARK GOLD. Each is massive enough to make any sane person instantly take several steps back. The kind of size you'd hardly see in ordinary werewolf packs. Just one look at them told me that these weren’t ordinary wolves.
Aside from the black wolf. They looked almost insignificant.
"Tala," I called out through my mind. Even inside my own head I sounded terrified. "Tala. Say something. Anything. Please."
Silence.
Tala. My wolf who once spent twenty minutes describing how amazing it would feel to get caught in the rain by a prince said nothing. If even Tala had nothing to say. Then we were in really real danger. Tala always had something to say. The fact that she didn't meant that she too was terrified.
The knife was still in my grip. Feeling the handle digging into my palm. My grip tightening so hard that my hand began to ache.
The small bag hanging at my hip held my only hope of salvation. Most of them anyway. Enough to save William. To make this whole reckless journey worth it.
"Don't run. Running might trigger them." I thought this to myself.
Even my wolf knew this already. You do not turn your back on a predator or in this case, predators. You shouldn't run from something that could cover ground faster than your brain can think, towards the decision to flee. I stayed completely still.
Then the massive black wolf's nostrils flared slowly. Fear sank deep into my bones.
Is it smelling my scent? Even from this distance. I had never felt so exposed before. Every carefully built wall I kept around myself meant nothing out here on foreign ground in the middle of the woods.
"We should never have come here." Tala finally spoke. Her voice was so small I could barely recognise it.
"OH, so now you decide to talk." I shot back at her.
"I'm sorry Sera. I was just—"
"Not now Tala. Please."
I began standing up from my crouch. Slowly. Deliberately. No sudden movements. No aggression. I kept my free hand open and visible at my side to show them that I wasn't a threat.
The other wolves responded immediately. The grey one took a half step forward. A low growl erupted from it.
Terror rooted me to the spot.
The black wolf still didn't move. No growl. No warning. Nothing. It simply watched me with those burning red eyes. Completely still. Its silence terrified me more than even violence. The wolf wasn't reacting to me at all. It was doing something far more unsettling.
Maybe it was deciding whether I was worth killing.
Then my phone buzzed inside my jacket pocket. The sound shattered the silence.
Every eye now is more focused on my direction. The grey wolf's half step became a full step forward. The dark gold one dropped lower. Its broad shoulders rising. Even the black wolf's ears shifted.
"We're dead." Tala panicked.
My heart hammering against my chest. So loud that maybe they too could hear it. I didn't reach for my phone. I didn't move a single muscle. I stood there with the vibration humming against my hip pocket and told myself firmly that I was not going to die tonight because someone had terrible timing.
The buzzing stopped. Time slowed into something unbearable.
The black wolf's eyes hadn't left me once.
Then something changed in the way he was standing. A subtle shift in his weight. Small. Almost lazy. Only something truly dangerous would move that calmly.
He turned its head slightly to the left. I didn't catch what happened between him and the other wolves. Maybe some kind of signal. But whatever it was, the grey wolf and the dark gold one began moving immediately .
The grey one moved to the left. The dark gold to the right. Spreading out. Flanking positions.
"They are herding us." Tala said. The personal she usually carried was completely gone. What was left was pure instinct of fear.
Both sides were cornered. The brown one too was now behind us. It hasn't moved yet. Didn't need to. It's already blocking my back.
I'm now seeing it clearly.
Three directions sealed. One remaining gap straight ahead. Directly towards the black wolf which didn't feel like a gap at all.
I looked back at those red eyes. And in that moment. Panic decided for me.
I ran. My body moved before my brain could think.
Every rational thought I had screamed at me not to. Every single thing I knew about my wolf instinct had told me to stand still and calm. To not give them a reason for me to run. But something deeper than rational thought took over me.
Instinct forced me to look back at the black wolf mid-stride. It took one slow step toward forward and then just. Sprinted.
I turned my head forward again and ran faster into the darkness of the woods.
I sprinted like death itself was behind me. Some tree branches caught my jacket. My hair. The exposed skin of my hands as I continued running.
My sneakers match the wet ground hard and unevenly with every step I took. But still. I didn't look back. Looking back felt like surrendering and would cost me half a second. And half a second was already more than I had.
Behind me. I heard movements.
Not heavy crashing footsteps. Not snarling. Just motion. Fast. Fluid. And horribly effortless. The way a river moves over a rock. Like the ground itself was cooperating with whatever was chasing me.
"Faster." Tala urged. For the first time in a while. Tala sounded terrified. "Faster Sera. Fas—"
Pain exploded through my left shoulder.
It hit my left shoulder and sent me twisting sideways off my feet. The earth rushed towards me.
The impact on my knees. Then my hands. And finally my head. The knife skidded out of my grip and disappeared somewhere within the dark undergrowth.
The pain exploded throughout my body. I tried to push myself up immediately. Got to one knee on my right. Then one of my hands pressed into the cold mud. Then—.
Suddenly. A heavy paw came down between my shoulder blades and pressed me flat.
I hit the ground face-first. The back of my head against the cold wet earth. My breath was punched out of my lungs during the impact. The bag was still on my hip. I could feel it was still there. William still has a chance. I focused on that one small fact and tried to think past the heavyweight pinning me down.
"Be calm." I thought to myself. "Panic won't save me."
The grey wolf's paw held me down. Didn't move a muscle.
I turned my head towards my left side. Just enough to see who is approaching me with heavy-sounding footsteps.
The black wolf was approaching me and stopped a few feet away.
It was closer now. Its crushing presence and dagger-like fangs were impossible to ignore. The night’s darkness gathered around it in silent worship.
Its bloody red eyes stared down at my face.
And the expression in those eyes. It held an expression that showed something more. The look in its eyes unsettled me. It wasn't the cold calculation of a predator over a prey?
It was something that I can't quite name. Something that even made the very hair on my body stand. A shift so subtle I almost convinced myself I imagined it. I try not to though.
Because in that same moment. I felt it. Something strange radiating from it.
Then something that felt like a rumble vibrated through the ground. Not a growl. Something much heavier than that. Something that moved through the ground and vibrated in my bones in a way that felt unnaturally heavy.
Then the transformation of the black wolf began. It was sudden. Violent. Inevitable. Like a downpour of rain.
Bones snapped violently into new shapes. The massive black frame collapsed inward and rebuilt itself upright in what felt like a split second. Its dark fur had disappeared. The beast had disappeared. Leaving behind a terrifying looking man.
I had never in my life seen a build like his. He was impossibly wide. A heavy mass of pure muscle. Black hair slightly disheveled from the shift fell across his fore head. Razor-sharp jawline. And his eyes. Even in his human form. It hadn't changed its red glow.
Still bloody red. Still burning. Still fixed directly on me.
He stood there in the dark without uttering a single word for a long moment. Looking down at where I was pinned against the cold wet ground. Like my fate rested entirely on his next thought.
"Move her to the cell sanctum at the Lycian estate. Secure and cage her for questioning. I'll be the one to personally deal with her." he spoke. His voice was low but carried power. The kind of voice that had never once needed to be raised to be obeyed.
Defeat settled heavily in my chest. Ma
king me think back to my sick brother lying on the bed in our pack dorm.
"I'm so sorry William" I thought in my mind while thinking of him.
- Writer
