Fangs On Ice

Chapter 2

CHAPTER TWO: The Pattern

I started watching him after that. Not in a creepy way. In a professional, I-am-concerned-about-my-patient way.

At least that was what I told myself when I found myself reviewing game footage at two in the morning.

The playoffs continued with the intensity of a war. The Reapers and Wolves split the first four games, and every match was uglier than the last. Viktor Soren seemed to have a personal vendetta against our team, targeting Dominic specifically with hits that skirted the edge of legal. But it was not just Dominic. Theo took a puck to the mask that left a dent deep enough to see from the stands. Jonas Varga, Dominic's younger brother and our newest rookie, got cross-checked into the boards so hard I heard the crack from the bench.

And yet.

Every single time I examined them, they were fine. Not just fine. Perfect. Injuries that should have taken weeks to heal disappeared in days. Cuts sealed overnight.

I was not imagining things.

"You are still here?" Sadie Park stuck her head into my office, her dark hair escaping from its clip. She was the team's head physician and my best friend at work, the only person who could match my stubbornness.

"It's almost midnight, Maren."

"I know. I'm just finishing up some notes."

She walked in and perched on the edge of my desk, glancing at the laptop screen where I had frozen on a frame from last week's game. Dominic, mid-collision, his face twisted in what looked like an animal snarl.

"That's a lot of notes about one player," she said.

"I am tracking injury patterns."

"Uh huh." She gave me a knowing look. "And these injury patterns require you to stare at Dominic Varga's face for hours?"

"It's not like that." I said almost too quickly, blushing like an i***t.

"It never is." She smiled, but then her expression shifted to something more serious. "Hey. Can I ask you something? Off the record?"

"Sure."

"Have you noticed anything... weird about this team?"

My heart skipped two beats. "Weird how?"

Sadie hesitated, choosing her words carefully. "I have been a sports physician for eight years. I know how fast professional athletes heal compared to regular people. But this team... it's beyond that. I ran bloodwork on Theo after that hit last week and his inflammation markers were completely normal. Like it never happened."

"Maybe he's just…"

"And Jonas had what looked like a spiral fracture in his wrist two days ago. I was ready to pull him from the lineup. But his X-rays this morning showed nothing. Zero signs of any damage."

I closed my laptop slowly. "What are you saying?"

"I don't know what I am saying. I am saying something doesn't add up, and I am too good at my job to pretend otherwise." She stood up and grabbed her bag. "Just... be careful, okay? I get a weird vibe from some of these guys. Like they are hiding something."

After she left, I sat in the dark of my office for a long time.

Sadie had noticed too. That meant I was not crazy. That meant something was actually happening.

I pulled up the injury reports for the entire roster, going back three seasons. Every player on the team had the same pattern. Impossible recovery times. Clean scans after brutal impacts. Medical anomalies that I had written off individually but together formed a picture I could not ignore.

The team was not normal.

And I needed to know why.

I waited until the building was empty before making my way to the equipment room. I told myself I was just checking inventory, but really I wanted to be alone somewhere I could think. The equipment room was in the basement, far from the main halls, and at midnight it would be completely deserted.

Or it should have been.

I heard the voices before I turned the corner. Low and urgent, too quiet to make out the words. I pressed myself against the wall and listened.

"... can't keep doing this, Dom. Viktor knows. He's testing us, pushing to see who breaks first."

I recognised the voice immediately. That was Theo, his usual joking tone replaced with something hard.

"I know." Dominic's voice, rough and tired. "But what do you want me to do? Challenge him in the middle of a playoff series? With cameras everywhere?"

"I want you to stop pretending this is just about hockey." A pause. "One of ours almost shifted on the ice last game. If that had been caught…"

"It wasn't."

"But it could have been. And then what? How do we explain to twenty thousand humans that our right winger just turned into a wolf?"

My breath stopped.

Wolf?

Did he just say turned into a wolf?

I must have made a sound because the voices cut off instantly. Footsteps moved toward the door, and I had maybe three seconds to decide whether to run or stay. I pressed myself deeper into the shadows and held my breath.

The door swung open.

Dominic stepped into the hallway, and his eyes found me immediately. Like he knew exactly where I was. Like he could smell me or hear my heartbeat or sense me in some way that should have been impossible.

Those eyes were gold. This time it was not my imagination. Gold like a predator, that had just found its prey.

"Maren," he said, and his voice was so gentle it scared me more than a growl would have. "We need to talk."

Without thinking,

I ran.