Defiance: The Hybrid's Tale

Nathan Underhill.

I stomped my way up the staircase, skipping several steps until I reached the second floor. With the music still blaring out throughout the mansion, I lost the trail of Joshua’s muffled cries. Come on, Nate! Focus! I did not want to bring Fenrus forward any more than I wanted, but I had no choice. Even sniffing the air did no good. The dozens of mutts trampling around the place, overpowered Joshua’s scent.

“Let me take over.” Fenrus offered, so I took it. The darkened hallway lit up as my eyesight improved. “There!” Suddenly, Joshua’s cries for help caught my ears.

Rushing past several drunk-of-their-ass teenagers, Fenrus ran down the long hallway until my friend’s screams grew louder. Joshua, hold on. Please, just a little longer. How could I have left him all alone in a house filled with drunk and horny werewolves? Fuck, how could I have been so stupid? A werewolf’s restraint usually diminished when they consumed too much alcohol. Anything could have happened to Joshua, especially if one of those werewolves didn’t take no for an answer.

As Fenrus rushed down the hallway, he pushed open several doors. After several ‘fuck-you’s’ and screams from horny couples getting-it-on in the upstairs guestrooms, he finally pushed open the right door. The scene in front of us made our blood boil. A fucking jock was busy pinning Joshua down onto a bed. Joshua, flailing about, tried desperately to escape, but the brute had him pinned down.

I pushed forward, taking control away from Fenrus before he went on a rampage.

Before the fucker could get his dick out of his pants, I rushed forward, grabbed the cunt by the throat, and threw him across the room. The brute slammed into the opposite wall. I turned to Joshua while he lay sobbing on the bed. He still had his underwear on. Thank the goddess! Nothing worse happened. Even though the experience must have been horrific already.

I slowly approached Joshua, placing my hand on his shoulder. The moment I did, Joshua flinched and screamed, “Please! Don’t!” His words ripped my guts out. How could I have let this happen? I should have stayed by his side.

“Joshua, it’s alright. I’m here for you,” I reassured him. “Come on. We have to get out of here. Can you stand?”

Joshua’s tear-soaked blue eyes shot up to mine and before I could react, he threw his arms around me. “Thank you for saving me,” he sniffed, while hugging me tighter.

“You don’t need to. I shouldn’t have stormed off and left you alone.”

Joshua let go of me and pulled his pants up. “It’s not your fault... I shouldn’t have made out with the guy. We kissed and things got too intense. I said no but...” Joshua broke down crying. But he didn’t need to continue.

I growled and glared at the asshole’s crumbled form lying on the ground passed out. I wanted to rip his throat out, but it was imperative to get Joshua out of this place. The party sucked big time. I wrapped my arm gently around Joshua’s shoulder and led him out of the room before the dick woke up and got other ideas. As we walked out of the room, Maisie rushed up to us. Her eyes found Joshua’s disheveled and broken appearance. Joshua kept his eyes locked on the floor while keeping his arms wrapped around his body.

“What happened?” asked Maisie. She looked visibly shaken by Joshua’s appearance.

I glanced back at the room. “One of your pack members just tried to rape my friend.” I hissed. “We’re getting out of here before I break the fucker’s neck.”

A loud growl escaped from the room. I quickly pushed Joshua into Maisie’s arms before an enormous mass of muscles slammed into me. I tried to gain my footing, but the guy pushed me down the hallway until my back hit the railing. The railing suddenly gave way, and we fell until my back hit the stone-cold floor. The asshole came crashing down on a couch.

“Fuck my luck,” I groaned. “My back!” A bolt of searing heat shot through my spine as I stumbled to my feet.

Before I could shake off the throbbing pain in my head, the jock tackled me to the floor and started punching me in the face.

"Fuck this! Let me kill this fucker!” Fenrus howled.

After a punch or two to my face, I retaliated with a punch to his nose and throat. Then I left-hooked him with my elbow, sending the jock crashing to the floor. The jock coughed while staggering to his feet, while I did the same. Suddenly, the music stopped, and a deafening silence fell around me.

A glint of silver caught my eye.

A familiar onyx necklace hung from the jock’s right ring finger.

My hand instantly rose to my neck.

Oh, fuck no.

The jock raised the necklace to his face before his nose flared up. His eyes shot at me, as did the rest of the partygoers. All the wolves’ eyes lit up. A choir of growls filled the living room. Oh, great! My worst nightmare just came true!

A few seconds later, they launched at their prey—me. The first few I successfully dodged, but my luck had to run out, eventually. As I fought several of the pack members to the ground, two fully shifted wolves caught me off guard. One bit through the leather armor on my right shoulder and the other clamped down on my left hip. I yelped out in pain as their teeth dug into my flesh. They began playing tug of war with my body. I gripped both of the mutts on their heads and sent electricity into their skulls. With a loud bang and a flash of light, they howled out and collapsed onto the floor.

“Did you just—”

“No. I just tasered their asses,” I huffed out, clutching the bite wound on my bleeding abdomen. “They’ll wake up in the morning with a massive headache.”

Before the rest of the pack could rip me apart, an arm wrapped around me and my vision shifted into darkness.

***

The next thing I knew, I fell to the ground. After what felt like hours, the tingling of wet grass on my face brought me to my senses. I glanced around. The dense canopy overhead shrouded us in darkness, but I could make out that we were in the middle of a clearing close to my house. The same clearing where I saved Joshua from the Hunters. Through the darkness, I saw Joshua leaning up against a tree, huffing and puffing as if he had just run a marathon.

“Are you fricking crazy? You could have killed yourself, Joshua!” I hissed while stumbling to my feet. I had to clamp down on my jaw to prevent me from crying out in pain. “Teleporting all the way from the party till here—”

“I didn’t have a choice, all right? I couldn’t watch as they tried to rip you apart. It was my fault... I shouldn’t have forced you to come to the party,” he sniffed while walking over to me.

“Don’t even go there. It wasn’t only your fault. Let’s just say it was bad luck and let’s call it a draw. Besides, we have to get back to my home before the pack tries to harm my family.”

I tried to walk fast but my body had other ideas. My limbs weighed me down. I couldn’t feel them. A cold sweat rippled through my body, making my teeth clatter. Something warm and sticky stuck between my toes in my boots. I could only assume that it was from all the blood that seeped into my shoes from the gaping wound on my hip. Goddess, I was bleeding to death. Before I could wallow in my predicament, a flint of white caught the corner of my eye. The white stag from a few weeks back, I assumed, walked out from behind a tree. It was still as majestic as the first time I saw it. The stag’s antlers sat on its head, a crown fit for a king. Its coat, white and slick, simmered in the moonlight that beamed through the treetops.

Joshua and I stood mesmerized by its beauty. I didn’t want to move, afraid that I might scare the stag off, but instead, it sauntered up to me without a single hint of fright in its bones. The stag stared at me; I got the feeling that it wanted something from me, so I did the only thing that I could without scaring it off. I slowly lifted my blood-soaked hand and reached out. The stag didn’t move an inch but kept staring at my hand with its big brown eyes.

The moment I touched the stag’s muscled jaw, my mind-link flooded open and visions swarmed into my head. It wasn’t like before. The staggering pain didn’t come, but the minds of all the forest creatures whirled around in my head. The stag connected me to all of them. It was incredible. A wave of energy enveloped my tired body, numbing the pain in my shoulder and hip. Before I knew it, the feeling had disappeared. Fenrus howled at its loss. I too cried out in a whimper. The stag bowed before me, and then it ran off into the bowels of the forest.

Joshua walked up to me and whispered, “What the hell just happened?”

I had no answer to Joshua’s question, only a hunch. My mind couldn’t comprehend what just happened, but one thing I knew for sure. That stag wasn’t an ordinary being, it was ancient—godlike. With a tremor in my voice, I replied, “I think we just met the Spirit of the Forest.”

“What!?” Joshua’s jaw hit his throat. “That can’t be... why?”

I shook my head. “I have no idea.”

A gasp slipped from Joshua’s mouth when he cast a light spell, lighting up the surrounding area. “Look!” He lifted a patch of ripped leather covering the bite wound on my right shoulder and then exposed the one on my left hip. They were already healed. Light pink scarring was left as a reminder of what happened.

“The stag, he healed me,” I said.

“Well, it seems the Spirit of the Forest has found you worthy?”

I scoffed. “For what?”

“Who knows? It has never shown itself to anyone but you. My mother spent years trying to find the spirit but never succeeded. You’re lucky.”

What did the stag want from me? I was no one special. I wasn’t some chosen one with an epic destiny that could change the world. I was just an unlucky fucker who just pissed off a massive pack of mutts, who were probably on their way to my home.

“Mom and Lilly! They’re in trouble!” Fenrus suddenly yipped out.

“Fuck, let’s go.”

I shifted into my wolf form and then nipped on Joshua’s leg to get onto my back. With a yelp and a glare, he clambered onto my back and then gripped onto the sides of my neck. Not a second to waste, I rushed off toward my house with Joshua’s shrieks echoing throughout the silent forest.