“How?” he tried to ask.
“How did I escape your mind control? Well, that is easy: no natural werewolf can be controlled by a mind bender. I tried it on my father once, it did not work. I tried it on others too, it never worked. So you see Aron, you fell into your own trap. Instead of you controlling me, it was I who controlled you, not through bending your thoughts, but by acting as you wished. A natural wolf’s thoughts cannot be read by a mindbender. What you saw in mine, were only things I put in yours.”
“You tricked me, but you know that if you kill me, you will die too.” he said as his mouth was beginning to heal.
“I know!” she replied.
“Then you won’t do this! I may not have controlled your mind, but I know how much you love life and you never actually got the chance to live a full one. You always died far too soon and you think that is unfair. You won’t kill me!” he continued.
“You are right! I do love life, I love living, especially now that I have for what to live, but if you do not die, I will have no life to return to.”
“No!” he screamed. “No! No!” he continued yelling as a wave of pain pierced his mind. Aron’s body began to age. His skin turned wrinkled, his hair grew white. The man fell on his knees while cracks began to grow around his head. “What’s happening to me? What are you doing?” he asked exhausted as he was being turned into a ghost of what he used to be.
“I am breaking you into tiny pieces. Nothing will be left of you other than a pile of ash, just like it happens to any unnatural werewolf.” replied Ava.
“You fool, we will both perish!” he yelled one last time and then broke down into thousands of glass pieces which eventually turned into ash.
Jonathan and the other hybrids arrived at the steel bars and at the gate where they were met by monster werewolves which they killed. They made their way through the corridor, while killing other beasts. Fists were flying through the air, blood was spilled, fangs were shown, but the hybrids did not need to change, for they were now stronger than any other creature. They pierced through the chest cavities of the monsters and squashed their hearts, turning them into ash. When they got into the room, they saw Ava lying on the floor with eyes closed and not breathing.
“Ava!” screamed Jonathan. “Wake up, come one, wake up! Her heart is not beating.” He then bled his palm giving her his blood. “Come on love! You drank this before. You will be fine just like before. Come on, respond!”
“We are too late!” said Radu, the second born of the twins.
“No!” yelled the man. “She will be alright!”
“She is dead, there is no heart beat!” said the hybrid mother.
“Please sister, don’t leave us now, not again, please!” said Radu as tears were running down his face.
Then, Jonathan began to feel something strange as he was holding Ava in his arms. The woman’s body was about to change. He placed her body back on the floor, gently and moved a bit away to allow her enough space to shape shift. As clothes were being torn apart, a beautiful red wolf emerged from underneath them. Her fur was thick and long. Her eyes were brown. She got up, howled, and then moved next to Jonathan and he got to her level, moving his hands on her face.
“I knew you were going to be alright. I could not lose you!” said the man.
“They found her!” said Rene while still in Paris, hunting werewolves with the hybrids.
“She is alive!” said Aiko, while in Tokyo with the hybrids, right after they killed a group of five monsters.
“She turned into a wolf and the other mind bender is dead!” said Ria as she was resting with the hybrids after a day of non-stop fighting with beasts.
Jonathan and the other hybrids were guided by Ava to the same apartment where she stayed for the past two days. There, they found Constantine in the same place where she had left him. The wolf turned back into human shape and she put some clothes on her while the hybrids were still trying to comprehend the situation.
“What happened to him?” asked Jonathan.
“I broke his protective shield. His mind is now being flooded with images of his victims. All the ghosts of the dracos he created and died because of him are hunting him now. His worst fear was that he was going to be tortured and that he would die at the hands of a draco. Now his past is here to engulf him in his worst nightmare. And you,” looking at Jonathan, “you only make it worse for showing yourself to him.”
Jonathan than turned toward her and put his hands on her. “You could have died. You should have died. Why? How come you are still alive? Vladimir explained it all. Did he lie?”
“No! That was probably the only thing true that he said in his life. I knew I could have lost my life which is why I guided you to where I was. When Constantine’s protection barrier broke, the last ounce of the curse that froze werewolves and that did not allow me to turn disappeared. And I knew that you would do anything to keep me alive.”
“So you relied on me arriving there in time to give you my blood.” he added.
“Yes!” she said.
“That was insanity. What if the plan would not have worked?” he yelled.
“I had to take that chance! Constantine would not open up to me whenever I wanted. I had to earn his trust and create an environment for him to feel safe, while Aron had to reach that point when he would be vulnerable. There was no other way.”
“You could have sent some sort of message to us earlier.” said Jonathan.
“I did as I saw fit to have the least amount of casualties.”
“Your independence is sometimes insane.” added Jonathan.
“It is, but you already knew that. And, if you were in my shoes, you would have done the same thing. You would have tried to limit the situations in which someone could get hurt as much as you could.”
“Is there anyone else who feels a bit awkward here?” asked Radu. “And, um, just a question: you are a hybrid like us now, aren’t you? But, if so, why has your body changed into that of a wolf and not into something more similar to ours?”
“I, can control into what my body changes.” replied Ava.
“Wow, that’s cool. Can I have some of whatever it is you are having?” asked Radu.
Ava’s twin brothers were only nineteen years old in 1699. When they froze into werewolf shape, while they observed humans from afar, they did not get the chance to actually act as humans so, even though they were now over three hundred years old, their minds and bodies were still of nineteen year olds.
“What do you want to do with him?” asked Ava while looking at Jonathan. “You can kill him if you want to. You can do whatever you want with him.”
“He wanted an empire, he wanted an army, now let’s show him how everything he created is being destroyed, once more. His Order was forgotten, now he can watch as his werewolves are being hunted.” replied Jonathan. “Are there more werewolves in this city?”
“Yes, there are!” answered Ava.
“Then let’s finish the bastards! Guide us to where they are!”
added Jonathan.
“I can find all of them now! I’ll guide you to those in this city and I will let dracos know where the rest are so they can get out of their path.”
“You can do that?” asked Radu. “Again, can I have some of whatever makes you what you are?”
“I cannot get into the minds of so many creatures at the same time. But I know where they all are as Constantine gave me all that information already. I can do it gradually, one draco at a time.”
“Well, then Aya” referring to the hybrid mother “stay with Ava just in case someone might come with wrong intentions here and I will go hunt the rest with Stefan and Radu.”
“OK, I will do so.”
While the mind bender was letting dracos know where the werewolves were, the hybrids were hunting everyone they could find. It took Ava almost a day to finish and, when she did, she left with the hybrids in pursuit of the monsters. A week after they left London, they had killed al
most all of them. Now, they had to find Cristian who was scared and who was hiding.
The doctor managed to board a plane and head to the United States, to Washington. He was not under the compulsion of Constantine since the duke began to be hunted by his own past. Cristian contemplated to go back to Brasov for a while, but he decided it would be best to stay away from his wife, the werewolf bound witch. She lied to him of her identity, she lied about her real motives for being close to him. Constantine took pleasure in telling him of the offer Ileana made to him and in convincing him that the woman felt no love whatsoever for him, that their marriage was just a lie, just a way to get close to his research. Cristian was crushed to find out of such betrayal for he really had genuine and deep feelings for the witch. He tried to keep her out of the sight of werewolves only to realize that she was connected to them. Unfortunately, the man did not get to know that, even though her research was crucial to her, she also had feelings for him. And Constantine never confessed that Ileana was bound to him, so, one way or another, her path would have crossed the duke’s even if she would not have married Cristian.
The doctor landed in Washington where he turned eleven men into werewolves. His only goal was to stay alive and he turned the werewolves for protection. “Power grows where there are more!” he thought.
He even tried calling Ileana a few times, but, every time the phone would ring he would end the call before she could answer. He had so much to tell her, so many questions and yet he never had the courage to actually speak. Then, he finally dared to say a few words.
“Hello!” she said, from the other side of the world, but there was silence. “Is it you, Cristian?” she asked.
“I want to know if…” he said, but before he could continue the sentence, a hand grabbed him from behind while another man plucked the phone from his hand. The man who grabbed him was Jonathan and the one who took his phone was Stefan. His eleven werewolves were all killed and he was brought back to London, before Constantine.
“This is the last remaining of the werewolves you sired.” said Jonathan to the man who was now strapped to a chair. “Look at him and see what the result of all your actions is!” said Jonathan as he held Cristian in front of the duke who was unable to even utter a word.
“Please, don’t do this! All I did was because I was sired to him. I did not try to harm any of you in any way since I escaped the sire! Please! I swear I will never go against you!” pleaded Cristian.
“Even if I were to believe you would do as you say, you still can’t live. Unlike the natural werewolves, unlike the hybrids, you prey on humans, you cannot control your desire for human flesh.”
“They are insignificant!” screamed Cristian.
“As I said, you cannot control yourself, no one like you can control the hunger!” replied Jonathan as he pushed his hand inside the chest of the doctor and squashed his heart. Cristian turned into a pile of ash before Constantine’s eyes. Next, the duke himself was turned into dust. And then there was silence.
The hybrids were all standing in the living room. The two wolf pups, which were now human, were with a draco who was taking care of them until the whole ordeal was over. The hybrid mother, Aya, did not want her children to witness such violence.
“So, what happens now?” asked Radu.
“Now we live brother!” answered Ava. “We finally get to live just like anybody else.”
“After more than three hundred years, we are free! So now we live!” said Jonathan.
Chapter 11
It’s time to live!
There was a moment of silence and then everybody started laughing, cheering, and applauding. They were happy. No more being frozen into wolf shape, no more being under threat from someone in the Order of Constantine, no more murderous werewolves, no more psychopath mindbender. Even Vladimir was gone as his spirit caved. They all reminisced of their loved ones who were dead, they had tears in their eyes, but they were grateful that they were not alone for, in the three centuries of being alive, their bonds were stronger than even life itself.
Aiko and Masaru planned a trip all over the globe. Chen felt a gap in his life since his child died and decided it was time to adopt as he felt he still had a lot of love to give as a father. Ria and Alex wanted to track down their last living relatives to see if they are alright. Alex did not see his mother since he was turned, he craved to see her again and even Ria wanted to connect with her for she never knew what it was to have a mother.
Stefan and Radu were not thrilled at the idea that they could finally grow. They would not die, but they would become adults and the wolf pups could also age. The aging process would stop at some point, but at least they would not stay children for an eternity. The hybrids all had plans for starting a new life.
Mark and Rene moved back to Paris and they soon had exciting news to share with the rest. The two were about to become parents and there was nothing that gave them more joy than the idea of bringing a new life in a world with no threat to those like them.
Jonathan and Ava embarked on a journey to find all dracos, even those who had already turned human, and try to help them in any way that they could. Being turned by Constantines, being experimented on, being used by them, then being hunted by werewolves was not easy for any of them. Jonathan and Ava hoped they could help dracos get adjusted to the new life they had. And, the two finally got the chance to live the life they wanted.
Other books by Maria Cristina Sburlea
300 Years of Sin series
Vol. 1: 19/21 (2013)
Vol. 2: Age of extinction (2013)
Vol. 3: Birth of sin (2014)
Creatures of Darkness and Light series
Vol.1: Titans, humans, and the beasts (2013)
Vol. 2: In Roman times: empires and madness (2014)
Vol 3: The Dark Ages (2014/2015)
Vol 4 (2015)
Follow me! Follow me down! (2013, short story)
That's my boy (2014, dark fantasy)
Connect with the author
Goodreads:
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/7094980.M_C_Sburlea
Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/MariaCristinaSburlea
Age of Extinction (300 Years of Sin Book 2) Page 12
