Trinity stood frozen at the edge of the clearing, her breath hitching in her throat. She didn't have the full context—only the jagged, bloody aftermath. She saw the warriors, their clothes torn and faces grim, shifting back into human forms with hands that smoked and blistered from silver-burns. She saw them unchaining a heap of broken flesh that shouldn't have been alive, let alone changing. Then, she saw the wolf rise where George had been.
She moved forward, her boots crunching on the gravel, but the guards escorting her stepped in close. They were keeping her from the fray, their eyes darting nervously between the newly shifted defectives and the Alpha's porch.
Across the dirt, Alana was walking toward the circle. She wasn't shaken. She had a broad, joyous smile on her face—the look of a woman who had just won a prize at a fair.
"I did it," Alana announced, her voice trilling with a terrifying, offensive glee.
She reached out to step into the encirclement, but a shadow blocked her path. Ryan, now back in his human form and clad in tattered remains, shoved her back with a violent force that sent her reeling. One of the warriors caught her, snarling at Ryan, but Ryan didn't flinch. His hazel eyes were still glowing, the wolf's unsuppressed rage coiling just beneath his skin. He caught the scent of Trinity nearby—the familiar, sharp sweetness of her—but he didn't turn. He couldn't. If he looked away from the monster in front of him, he felt he might lose his grip on the monster within.
"How dare you!" Ryan shouted, his voice raw. "You don't come near us. You don't go near him!"
Trinity drifted closer, her heart hammering against her ribs.
"I do everything for my family!" Alana raged, her face flushing a deep, ugly red. "You do not get to speak to me like that. You are the trash we threw away. You don't know who my daughter is because you've never met her! She was supposed to be a wolf. My family was destroyed because of what you are! All our families are destroyed because of these... mistakes! And you curse me for wanting to fix my daughter? That mongrel should thank me! I have fixed him!"
"He didn't shift because you whipped him," Ryan spat. "All you did was nearly murder him. If it wasn't for us, he would be dead. Your plan would have killed him."
"What does it matter to go through a little pain to find acceptance?" Alana countered, her voice logic-strained and frantic.
Trinity felt her body begin to vibrate. A cold, dark switch flipped deep inside her—the dormant side that lived on blood and silence. Her blue eyes bled into a predatory gold. Like a shadow detaching from the ground, she moved.
She was a phantom. She blurred past the guards, her hand snapping out to grip the back of Alana's throat. With a vicious, bone-deep force, she slammed Alana into the ground. A sickening pop echoed as Alana's arm dislocated on impact. While Alana lay gasping, Trinity didn't hesitate. She drew back her foot and kicked Alana in the ribs with a sickening crunch of breaking bone.
Alana curled into a ball, but Trinity wasn't finished. She reached down, grabbing Alana by the hair, and hauled her back up to her feet.
Trinity's fingers tightened around Alana's throat. She could feel the esophagus creaking, the small bones of the neck beginning to crack under the strain. Alana's fingers clawed frantically at Trinity's hands, leaving thin, red streaks of blood along Trinity's skin. A wet, gargling noise erupted from Alana's throat, and tears began to spill from her wide, terrified eyes. Trinity watched the life begin to dim in her mother's gaze, her own grip only tightening.
"Stop trying to fix me," Trinity growled. "I'm not your daughter. With or without a wolf... I want you dead."
The escort warriors recovered from their shock, drawing their blades. They lunged, but Trinity sidestepped them as if they were children playing with sticks.
"Trinity! Trinity, stop! Stop, please!"
Boris rushed into the clearing. His heart was a battlefield. He stared at his mate, dying under the hands of his child. He wouldn't kill Trinity to save Alana, but the thought of killing Alana to save Trinity was just as agonizing. He was suspended in a hellish middle ground, unable to move against either half of his soul.
"Don't touch her!" Boris growled at the other warriors, his eyes turning a void-like black. "Trinity... you need to let go. She will be punished. But please, Trin... please!"
Trinity's grip slackened. Alana slipped through her fingers and collapsed into a heap on the dirt, gasping for air that wouldn't come.
Instead of moving toward his mate, Boris gripped the sides of Trinity's face. He held her cheeks tightly. "Breathe," he commanded softly. "You're not a monster."
Trinity collapsed against his chest, her body shaking with jagged, heavy sobs. "I'm sorry, Dad," she choked out.
The word hit Boris like a physical blow. Dad. He had waited so long to hear it, but to hear it now, whispered in the wreckage of a murder attempt, was crushing. He smoothed her hair with a trembling hand, a sweet, fatherly gesture as he held her tightly. In his heart, the choice was finally made. He chose her. He chose the girl who called him father, even if it meant letting the woman he loved fall into the dark.
"I hear there's been a bit of an interruption!"
Alpha Adrian stepped out onto the porch of his home. He looked down at the blood and the broken Beta female with mild, callous amusement.
"As unfortunate as this delay has been," Adrian said, his tone dripping with a dark glee, "it is an even day. We shall continue."
Authors note:
If you have any predictions for what you think is going to happen next. I'd love to hear it in the comment section below.! Don't forget to vote!