Page 161 of Wereball: Hate At First Text
“C, now, damn it! He’s not going to kill me. I’m his best friend,” I semi-yelled without averting my eyes from Logan.
“He might not. But this isn’t him anymore. Last time he?—”
I jerked my hand, the missing tips of my fingers a reminder. “Last time was different. That was after it murdered Daniel.”
My best friend was still somewhere in there. He hadn’t transformed fully yet.
“Hello there, Lucien.” At that name, Logan’s head snapped toward me.
Haunted, crimson-red eyes assessed the situation with cold disinterest.
“Mate left Lucien,” Logan said simply, with that distorted voice.
A split second later, blood spilled from the cracks over Logan’s arms and shoulders, all the red veins thickening until they popped.
Lucien didn’t appear with the sickening sound of broken bones and wolf growls like a normal werewolf’s shift.
No.
Because Logan wasn’t a werewolf.
One moment, the human form was standing there. A second later, his shadow expanded across the grass expanded. Two ears rose onto the top of the head as a muzzle formed and elongated.
A creature clawed its way out of the human body, still standing on two legs, as if it had been hiding right underneath the flesh. It was an odd, terrifying sight to witness.
We stood there looking up at the creature in front of us. Still. Unmoving.
For supernatural people, they were all pretty shocked to see proof of a further supernatural phenomenon.
My twin’s mate hid her head in the crook of Callum’s neck, his arms a safety belt around her. The other girl hovered protectively over the idiot on the ground, my fist imprinted into his cheek, but color had bled out of her face like a candle that had been snuffed.
Callum and I had only seen Lucien three times.
Once, inside a cage, foaming and headbutting the bars as a pup.
The second, when it murdered Daniel.
The third time? Two weeks ago.My dad and Logan’s dad had evacuated half the campus—and only yesterday had all the trees been replanted.
Logan never left it out. It was always locked away in the deepest recesses of Logan. Isolated. Lonely.Unstable.
“Lucien…need…find…mate,” the creature huffed with a strong, odd accent.
The voice was almost hypnotic, not as deep as one would imagine. I’d always told Logan it reminded me of a young anaconda with the capacity to speak to humans.
“Mate mine. Mate going no any-wheres.”His voice vibrated, filling the surroundings with fear and awe. “Lucien go find mate.”
He threw his muzzle in the air and let out a primal sound, howling deeply into the dark belly of the night. It was an unearthly howl. A howl that no werewolf could make.
My twin’s mate slapped her palms over her ears. The other girl stumbled back as if Lucien’s growl had physically struck her.
His giant head snapped back down, lips retracting over terrible fangs.
It hunched, back curved, its long black tail whipping the night as beastly clawed fingers curled. And then it bolted.
The pounding of its stride caused tremors and shivers, both on the ground and in our hearts.
Once it had left, the night sky seemed less dark, the pale moon peeking back out from the clouds like it was letting out a sigh of relief.
“What…” the one girl breathed out, kneeling on the ground. “What the heck was that thing?”
“Alycan,” I muttered, one hand clutching both her hands.
“Alycan?” Callum’s mate parroted, voice muffled in his chest. “That can’t be. They don’t exist.”
“Oh, but they do.” I paused, eyes on the two freshly toppled pines. “And it won’t stop until it finds its mate.”
The End. For Now.
