Chapter 146

The sensations slowed enough for me to get a better sense of my surroundings. Enough that my cheeks heated with embarrassment. Jack’s wide-eyed gaze met mine, then he spun around.

Matt handed me his t-shirt, and a pair of track pants. I pulled them both on, even though they were much too big on me. I had to roll up the bottoms of the pants to make them shorter. Matt got dressed too, and Jack turned around.

“I’m going to fucking kill you,” Jack snarled, taking a step toward Matt.

Matt didn’t try to defend himself. “I don’t understand how this is possible,” he muttered, looking at Jack. He reached for his shoulders and shook him a bit. “How the fuck is this possible?”

Jack’s face reddened. “The prophecy.”

“What prophecy?” he shouted.

I stared down at my hands as a surge of anger rolled through me. Claws appeared, and I scrambled back in the bed. “Oh my God,” I said through a mouthful of teeth. “Oh my God.”

Jack took a step away from me, Matt took a step forward. “Celeste,” he said. “You have to breathe. You need to calm down.”

He started to show me, taking elaborate calming breaths. I copied him, and eventually my heart rate slowed, and the claws and teeth retracted.

“What’s happening to me?” Somewhere, in the back of my mind, I knew, but the rational part of me couldn’t accept it. None of this made any sense.

Jack scowled. “Celeste, you’ve turned.”

“What?”

Matt put his hand on my arm and gave it a gentle squeeze. “I don’t know how this is possible, but your brother’s right. You’re a wolf. That voice you hear in your head…”

I nodded. The voice was a steady presence. I was trying to ignore it, forget it was there, but I felt it at the back of my mind, anyway.

“That’s your wolf,” he said. “You’re hearing your wolf.”

I got up off the bed and backed away toward the door. Matt followed me, his hands held up. “It’s okay, Celeste.”

“It’s not true. It can’t be true.”

“It is,” Jack said, his tone final.

I turned and ran. I didn’t know what else to do.

I couldn’t think, could barely hear. The only sound in my head was the growling, and the snarling, and the soft, purring. Everything all at once. My wolf rose to the surface, demanding I change. Demanding that I run and feel the wind in my fur.

“Celeste, wait!” Matt called.

I could hear them following me. Jack was a lot slower than Matt, but they were both coming for me. I had to get away. None of this could be true. None of it. It shouldn’t be possible. Humans didn’t just turn into werewolves.

I tore the back door open and ran across the deck. The stairs down to the grass were narrow, and I jumped instead of taking them. I landed easily on my bare feet and ran across the lawn. A part of me, the human part, told me to stop running. That Matt was just trying to help me. That I should go back and let him.

The animalistic part of me, that new instinct that reared up with every step, told me to run. To howl. To give myself over to my wolf entirely. And I didn’t know how to control it, that instinct. My emotions were all too much, and it drove me further.

I entered the treeline, my breaths coming fast. My claws appeared, and the trees rose above me. Despite the darkness, I could see in great detail. Each individual tree. The chipmunk that tore across the ground a few feet ahead.

I could see and hear so much, and yet I didn’t see him coming. One moment I was running, and the next I was being tackled to the ground.

I hit the ground hard, grunting. A hand came around my mouth, and a heavy body pressed me down onto the forest floor.

“Shut up,” a familiar voice hissed.

I writhed in his grip, but he was too strong for me. Too big. “Sorry,” he whispered in my ear, his voice like silk. “This might hurt a little.”

One minute I was thrashing on the ground, then I felt a sharp pain, and darkness came over me.

~

I groaned. A dull pain throbbed in my skull. When I opened my eyes, the overhead light was near-blinding, and I shied away from it.

Memories slowly filtered back in. Sleeping with Matt. The pain and the voice in my head. Jack bursting into our room. And then what they had said about me, that I was a wolf. It all felt like a dream. Just a weird fever dream.

For a moment, I thought I was back in my room. That I had dreamed it all, and I’d wake up to a few texts from Matt. He’d thank me for going to the party with him and say he wanted to see me that day. Sabrina didn’t die. We never had to go away. And I never turned into something I didn’t understand.

When I opened my eyes again, though, I wasn't in my room. I wasn’t even somewhere I recognized. The room was small and dull. The walls were gray concrete, as well as the floors. There was a sink and a toilet in the far corner, open to the rest of the room. A single wooden chair was set near the narrow bed.

I tried to sit up, but something prevented me from moving. I tried to pull up my arms, and then my legs, but I couldn’t move them. My heart rate faltered, then took off. I was cuffed to the bed–both my hands and feet. I struggled to get up, but I couldn’t loosen them.

A scream curdled its way up my throat as I remembered the last thing. Alyx’s breath on my neck, and his voice in my ear. Then the pain. I screamed and tore at the binds. I don’t know how much time passed, but I eventually collapsed back onto the bed in exhaustion.

Panic had my heart galloping in my chest. What did he want with me? What was he going to do to me?

I tried to tell myself that Matt and Jack were coming for me, but how would they find me? I didn’t even know where I was.

Sometime later, the door opened, and Alyx walked in. A boy who looked shockingly like him followed at a sedate pace, closing the door behind him.

“Ah, you’re awake.” Alyx pulled the chair closer to me and sat down. The boy who had to be his brother leaned against the wall and watched me with a curious expression.

“Why am I here?” I asked, my voice hoarse.

Alyx grinned. “What, you haven’t guessed yet? Your brother really did keep you in the dark.”

“They’re coming for you. Matt and Jack. They’ll find me.” His eyes flashed gold, and I reared back. There was nowhere I could go, but I put as much distance between us as I could.

Alyx laughed, and a shiver ran through me. “I hope they do. I have some unfinished business with the both of them.”

“Why are you doing this?” I said, my voice breaking. “Please, just let me go.”

Alyx leaned back in his seat, a mean smile on his face. “I’m afraid I can’t do that. But don’t worry, we’re not going to hurt you. You’re too important.”

“I don’t understand.”

Alyx’s smile widened. “Poor Celeste. Very soon you will.”