“What are you talking about?” He was freaking me out even more than I was already.
“Kyran is going to have to forgive me too.”
“Alexis.” In my desperation, I grabbed his shirt and fisted my fingers in it. “You’re scaring me.”
His right hand reached up, his fingers gliding gently across my cheek. “Just remember two things, please. I’ll hold you in my heart forever—no matter what happens. And, given any other choice, I’d never force this on you. This was your decision to make, and I’m being forced to take it away from you. For that I’m deeply sorry, but I’d rather have you alive than not at all.”
Before I could ask what he meant by that, he pulled me to him and enfolded his arm around my waist. His lips grazed mine briefly before moving down to my jaw where he kissed a path to the base of my neck.
“Alexis, what are you—”
His canines dug into my skin before I could even react. A surge of heat coursed through my body the moment his incisors broke through, leaving me feeling faint and numb. I tried pushing him away, tried to fight the terror threatening to consume me, but Alexis was a lot stronger than I was, and he held his ground, digging farther than I thought was necessary. My limbs failed to work. I made several attempts to lift my arms to free myself from his grasp, but they felt as if they weighed a thousand pounds each.
“Alexis, it...hurts.” My vision blurred. I couldn’t move. I could no longer talk. The only thing I could do was lie stiffly in his arms as he held me to him and whispered, “Live a long and happy life, Marjorie.”
Something in me began to change. I couldn’t explain it, but I could feel it. Warmth spread through me, as if I was getting a fever, but that wasn’t all. My sense of hearing doubled in seconds. What I couldn’t hear moments before became suddenly, terrifyingly clear. And even though I couldn’t see very well, I could make out several tall forms enter the cave and head in our direction, the padding of their feet sounding loud to my ears. The continuous rhythm of their hearts making it easy for me to pinpoint their location.
“They’re here, Alexis.”
“I know, Princess.”
Before he could add anything more, they grabbed Alexis from behind and tossed him across the cave. He’d known they were coming and took it upon himself to change my life. Alexis had made the decision in a desperate attempt to save me and, though I should feel relieved, an overwhelming sense of fear took over me.
What was going to happen to him now?
The abruptness of the werewolf’s actions left me without the comfort of Alexi’s arms holding me up, so I fell sideways to the ground, aggravating my arm further with the impact. I craned my neck in order to see where Alexis was, but I couldn’t make him out among the shadows moving back and forth in my line of vision.
“Alexis?” I called out to him, but the only response I received were a series of low growls.
Check on her, one of the wolves said though he never actually spoke.
A huge hairy paw turned me around so that I lay on my back and inspected my neck. I could clearly feel his fingers nudging my skin.
He bit her, he said though his lips never moved.
I tried to make out faces, but all I could see were fuzzy images.
The alpha is not going to be happy about this, the wolf doing the inspection communicated to the others.
Take care of him, the other wolf ordered.
“No!” I shouted. Fighting to stay conscious, I slapped the wolf’s paws away and tried to sit up but a jolt of pain from the bite wound all the way down to my toes racked me.
“Leave her alone,” Alexis yelled somewhere nearby. He shouted something else but the words were drowned by the excited yips of the pack.
I turned my head to my left, the blurriness in my eyes making it difficult for me to make things out clearly. I could see the pack forming a circle around Alexis, boxing him in with nowhere to go. The Trackers, all in their wolf forms, were not at all intimidated by Alexis, and the second one of them struck him, a sense of doom washed over me.
They were quite impressive in size themselves, easily towering over Alexis. By their rank alone, I knew they were a force to be reckoned with. If Alexis didn’t get back up soon, there was a possibility that he could end up seriously hurt or worse.
“Please, don’t hurt him. I’ll go with you. I’ll do whatever you want. Just, please, don’t hurt him,” I pleaded to the Tracker still kneeling to my right.
It’s too late for that now, he communicated telepathically.
Tears of desperation blurred my vision even more. I could feel my body shutting down, my brain hammering against my skull, but I fought the need to lose consciousness. Alexis was in deep trouble and I wanted to save him.
Something in me shifted once more—I couldn’t identify what, but suddenly the strong coppery smell of blood filled my nostrils. Someone was hurt...bleeding, and I had a good idea who that was.
“Please,” I pleaded once more, but my words fell on deaf ears. As I laid there, watching each wolf take his turn pummeling Alexis, I could do nothing. “Please, stop.”
The wolf kneeling beside me inched closer so that he could draw me closer. Placing one hand to the back of my neck, he helped me to a sitting position before standing, picking me up along with him.
Your friend made a grave mistake by biting you. Now he has to pay.
“No,” I squeaked, but my protests went unanswered as he carried me out of the cave just as the smell of blood and the pack’s loud yips intensified. The last thing I heard before he rushed through the mouth of the cavern with me in his arms was the loud snap of what appeared to be bone.
Chapter Seventeen
“I believe a frontal attack would be beneficial and would give us the upper hand.” The sound of Bayard’s voice lulled me back to reality and the stinging, throbbing, white-hot pain I’d been avoiding by staying under for what seemed like an eternity now. I hadn’t been awake long enough to do anything but vomit a couple of times.
My stomach was practically pulled back to my spine, my face ached as if I’d been hit with a bat right on the nose, and my limbs lacked the strength to obey any mental commands.
“We have more than enough manpower,” Bayard continued.
“Timing is not appropriate. The change is almost upon Marjorie and when she finally awakes to the reality that awaits her, we will need to focus on keeping her here for the time being.”
“Do you think she will want to go back?”
I listened, ignoring my body’s desperate need to escape the torment it was under by giving in to unconsciousness. What were Bray and Bayard talking about? What reality? What change?
“If she is anything like me she will,” Bray said matter-of-factly.
“She is a lot like you,” Bayard retorted.
I open my eyes and fought through the haze. My body was covered in sweat and my head, oh, my head. It was heavy, and throbbed. I raised one hand to touch my face. I couldn’t understand why it felt as if it had been stapled on. Though I could glide my fingers across my skin, something wasn’t quite right.
“Water.” I looked around the room, surprised to find a tall, slender woman with black hair so long the tips reached all the way down to the floor, sitting on a chair next to the bed I was lying on. “Who are you?”
Movement. Feet running. People approaching.
“Hello, Princess. My name is Sabine.” She stood, reached for a pitcher, and poured water into a glass before strolling toward me. “I’m here to help in any way you require.”
The door to the room I was in opened and both Bayard and Bray rushed in.
“You are finally awake,” Bray ran to the bed. “You should not try to talk right now.” Placing his hands on my shoulders, he tried coaxing me back down on the bed, but I fought back.
“No. No. I don’t want to rest. I want to know what’s going on.”
Sabine offered me the glass of water. I took it and swallowed the liquid in one long gulp before
returning the glass back to her.
“Why am I in so much pain?”
“You are in the beginning throes of the change. I’m afraid the pain cannot be helped,” Sabine explained.
I turned my attention back to Bray. “Did you get to us in time?”
Bray looked momentarily taken aback. “Marjorie—”
“Where is Alexis?”
I glanced around the room again, trying to make out the familiarity in the furniture, but there wasn’t a single thing I recognized.
“Perhaps we can speak of this later,” Bray insisted as he attempted to get me to lie back down on the king size bed.
“Where is Alexis?” I slapped his hands away and jolted off the bed, stumbling as soon as my feet touched the wooden floor. Sabine took hold of my left arm to steady me.
“Princess, you should rest,” she advised.
I snapped out of her grasp and turned to face Bray. “Why won’t you answer my question? What happened back at the cave? Where is Alexis? Where are the Rousseaus?”
Bayard took a step forward. “Simone is here. She is resting in another room. The rest of the Rousseaus are still back at Wolf Creek Hollow.”
“Did you kill the alpha?”
Bray ran one hand over his face. “No. We managed to get to the Trackers in time to prevent your kidnapping, but the alpha was not at the scene.”
I’d asked the same question three times and it still went unanswered. What was wrong?
“Is Alexis okay?”
Bray walked around the bed to stand in front of me. He grabbed my hands in his and said, “No, Marjorie, he is not all right.”
I could see it in his eyes, but I didn’t want to hear it so I wiggled out of his grasp. “I need to see him.”
Bray reached for my arms and held me in place. “I am truly sorry, Marjorie.”
“No,” I whispered, shaking my head. “He’s fine.”
“He died in the cave,” Bayard added.
My knees buckled and I fell to the floor. “He’s not dead. He can’t be.” It had all happened too fast. Alexis might have been taken to the Gandillon compound. Maybe he was a prisoner like my mother, but still alive out there somewhere. But dead? No, he wasn’t dead.
Bray kneeled next to me. “He is. I am sorry. I arrived a minute too late.”
“It can’t be. He can’t be dead.” The searing pain was pushed to the back of my head because right then, I could only see the image of his bleeding body lying on the cave’s floor. “Did you see him? Can you confirm his death?” I glanced up at him expectantly.
His was an expression of deep sorrow and I knew then he was telling the truth. Alexis was dead and there was no turning back. Because of me, the Rousseaus had lost a family member and the guilt ate at me like a disease. “There was no life in his body when I arrived. I am sorry.”
I buried my face in my hands. “Oh, my God. This is my fault. He died because of me.”
Tears began to flow as reality finally began to sink in. Suddenly a lot of things made a whole lot more sense—Alexi’s insistence in asking for forgiveness. He knew he couldn’t fight the pack off or hide me in time to prevent them from finding me before Bray arrived, so he took matters into his own hands. He bit me to force the change and by doing so he signed his own death sentence.
“I’m sorry, Alexis,” I whispered into my hands. Alexis had made the ultimate sacrifice to give me a fighting chance, but I didn’t deserve it.
Bray drew me close as he embraced me. Grief burrowed its way into my heart. I’d suspected all along what had happened. I couldn’t forget what I’d heard moments before I passed out, but I’d hoped Alexis was safe somewhere with Kyran, where he belonged. Reality was too painful to bear.
Losing someone who I’d managed to get so close to in such a relatively short amount of time went beyond sadness. My heart was literally breaking into a million pieces, and I couldn’t control the feeling of helplessness, nor could I escape the despair.
I wanted my old life back. I wanted everyone involved in this war alive and safe. But that wasn’t to be. We were all stuck in this nightmare together so I cried. I sobbed into my hands. I wept through Bray picking me up and laying me gently on the bed. I whimpered until no more tears flowed and I finally gave into not only exhaustion, but the pain, and passed out, again.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Kristy Centeno is an author of paranormal romance, young adult, new adult, horror, and contemporary romance.
She has always had a passion for books and after years of being an avid reader, she decided to transform her desire to write into a reality and thus, her first novel was born. In her journey to create memorable reads, she has delved into several genres, creating fictional characters meant to entice readers and captivate the mind.
She is currently working on finishing off the Keeper Witches series among other projects, which include sequels to several of her published works. When she’s not busy taking care of her five children or holding down the fort, she finds time to sit and do what she loves the most: writing.
Website: http://booksbycenteno.com
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/KristyCenteno
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Blog: http://therightbook4u.blogspot.com
Linked In: www.linkedin.com/in/kristycenteno/
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Other books in the Secrets of the Moon Saga...
One important night from Kyran’s point of view...
For me...
....immortality is a curse....release is an impossibility...and love is the one thing I cannot have.
Hidden lies...hidden demons...hidden battles...All leading to the ultimate sacrifice....
Dark Side of the Moon Page 19
