Chapter 31

Atwood

I wanted to go to Ruby’s play. It was really, truly all I wanted.

As I limp through woods with my blood dripping into the snow, she’s all I can think about.

Tamara and I were both dressed and heading out the door to go to Ruby’s play when they came in. Tamara looked so cute in her little blue dress and matching peacoat, holding a big bouquet to give Ruby after the play.

When they came in, however, I immediately ushered Tamara away so she wouldn’t have to see the blood.

“They came out of nowhere,” my pack member, Noah, said. “Ambushed us. We… We didn’t have time to shift.”

“Medics!” I screamed down the hallway. Frightened servants frantically ran to and fro. I don’t even think some of them knew where they were going in all of the commotion.

I ran up to Noah and helped him to lift Kayne onto the stretcher.

Kayne’s face… My best friend from childhood…

There was so much blood.

The medics rushed him away to the infirmary. Noah wasn’t so badly injured, but still needed to hold onto me for support as we followed closely behind.

I think a part of me knew it was over when I saw Kayne’s limp hand flop lifelessly over the edge of the stretcher, but I still had hope. I prayed that this was all just a nightmare, that I had just dozed off at my desk, that I would wake up and it would be time to go to the play with Tamara all over again like nothing ever happened.

It wasn’t a dream.

The medics tried their best to bring Kayne back. They tried everything in their power, but I think he was already dead by the time Noah dragged him in here.

When the last medic stopped pumping Kayne’s chest and turned to me, defeated, coated in my beta’s blood, I shoved past him and started trying to resuscitate him myself.

“Don’t you dare die,” I growled as I pumped his chest. “Don’t you dare. Don’t you dare, Kayne.”

My wolf stirred inside of me, stretching after his long nap and standing to his full height.

“My Lord!” the medic said, grabbing my shoulder. “His ribs, you’re breaking his ribs!”

I didn’t listen. My wolf threw his head back and howled inside of me as I put every ounce of my being into saving Kayne.

“Enough, Atwood!”

I stopped when I heard my mother’s voice, turning my head slowly to look into her wide eyes as she stood in the doorway.

“He’s gone,” she said softly. Despite all of my mother’s hardness, I knew that she loved Kayne, too, like her own son.

I turned back to look at Kayne.

His eyes were still open, looking at the ceiling. In death, he was as alert as ever.

My wolf took over.

The next thing I knew, I had shifted. The medics and my mother tried to block me in, but with one snarl escaping from my lips, they all thought better and moved out of my way. I ran through the hallways and out the door into the cold, where it had begun to snow.

I put my nose to the ground and sniffed, picking up the trail from which Noah brought Kayne. I followed it into the woods.

I don’t know how long I ran as I followed the trail. It could have been minutes, an hour, two hours. Soon enough, however, I found where they must have been attacked. It was in a clearing deep in the woods. The blood gave it away. It was still warm.

I picked up a new scent. A scent that wasn’t from Kayne or Noah; it was something foreign, something evil.

A Bear.

I quietly followed the trail this time, calculating my every move because the scent smelled fresh, like he had just passed through this way. If there was more than one, I knew I wouldn’t be able to take them on and would have to turn back.

But if there was only one… I could take him.

I was correct. There was only one.

I found him lumbering about like a fool, looking awfully pleased with himself after what he had done. He must have thought that he wouldn’t be tracked after attacking my men, that we would be too busy panicking to come look for him.

He was big, much bigger than me, but that only meant that I would be quicker. I focused my orange eyes on him, then I pounced.

I latched my teeth onto his neck. He yelped and rolled down a slope, bringing me with him only part of the way before he managed to shake me off. We circled each other for several eternal moments.

“You found me,” he said. “After I killed your beta.”

I didn’t respond.

He must have taken that as an opportunity to mock me further, because he spoke again. “Brave of you to come out here on your own. What if I’m not alone?”

I bared my fangs. “Only a fool on his own couldn’t manage to kill two men in their human forms,” I said.

We leaped at each other, colliding in the air in a mess of teeth and claws. I’m not sure who drew the first blood, but soon the entire snowy forest floor was soaked in red.

I went for his ear, just managing to catch it in my teeth and rip off a good chunk as he darted out of the way. I spat the flesh out onto the ground, snarling, and this time I quickly went for his belly while he was still reeling from his ear being ripped off.

I knocked him to the ground and was able to create a deep gash in his belly, but then he somehow managed to get his feet under me and kick me off. He pounced and pinned me to the ground, his teeth snapping at my throat as I tried desperately to wriggle away.

His leg was just in reach of my teeth. I bit down, hard, and he leaped off of me with a yelp as he held his bleeding leg above the ground.

I rolled over and stood, raising my hackles and baring my now-bloodied teeth as the Bear limped away helplessly, blood dripping from his leg and his abdomen. A cold, biting wind cut through the forest, sending up flurries of snow.

“Give up,” I snarled, stalking him like he was my prey.

He wavered due to the blood loss from his wounds. His shoulder dropped to the ground involuntarily as he grew weaker, but still he picked himself up and kept going.

“Give up, or fight back,” I said, circling him.

The Bear finally dropped to the ground, too weak to keep going. When I approached, however, I saw that he was… laughing.

“You Lycan are all the same,” he said. Blood spilled out of his mouth and onto the white snow as he looked up at me. “You only care for the pleasure of the hunt. That’s… That’s why we’re different.”

I placed my paw on his injured leg, pushing hard so that more blood spilled out. He writhed in agony and a weak howl escaped his throat.

“Elaborate,” I said in a mocking tone, lifting the pressure from his leg so he could speak.

He bared his fangs in an animalistic smile and looked up at me.

“The Bears only care for the kill.”

It happened in a flash. With what little strength he had left, he extended his claws and lunged at me, slashing my face. We fell backward together. My vision filled with a flash of light from the pain.

When I came to, his body lay limp on top of me. I pushed him off and shakily stood, looking down upon the dead Bear.

I threw my head back and howled. In the distance, back toward the castle, my pack members answered and I knew that they, too, had shifted.