Fight for Me

Yesterday

Layla

The moment I wake up in the dark woods, I already know what happened. -I died.

The memories come rushing back to me, -the attack, I shot Nick, Samantha slit my throat. I didn’t even feel it. And I definitely didn’t expect Samantha to have turned out to be such a psycho.

Standing up I see the blood splatters all over my clothes and sigh with deep annoyance.

There is no way to deceive how I can come back from this.

Crap! I just need to find my body, get the hell out of here, and leave Shadow Moon pack as quickly as possible.

In about ten minutes of walking, in what I hope is the right direction, I hear a sudden soft crunch noise behind me.

Looking back, my heart literally skips a beat as I see the shadow shifting out from behind a tree. I can see his face much more clearly than before. That handsome resemblance to the painting I saw that day. Dark brown eyes, short black hair, tall and big. He looks like he could be a whole ten years older than Nick. But then again, that’s probably a whole lot more in werewolf-years.

Though, one thing is clear, he looks exactly like he’s portrait. Not having aged one bit in all this time.

But there is something strange though. Something missing. Something I thought would be present when I saw him. But I can’t ‘sense’ it.

He smiles at me, showing me all his teeth, as he continues to walk a circle around me.

“I knew it.” He says in that deep tone of his.

Only then do I realize I’ve been following him with my gaze. -He knows I can see him now.

Dammit!

I barely take a step back, when he suddenly lunges at me and tackles me to the ground.

I kick, push, claw even, just to get him off of me. But all the while, he laughs as he pins me to the ground.

He pins my arms above me and grinds his body against me as he buries his face into my neck.

“Mmmhhh.” He groans against my neck. “I can’t even remember how long it’s been since I’ve felt the touch of someone else.”

I feel a rough, but warm wetness coating my cheek. And seeing his face coming into view, I grasp that he’s licking me.

Disgusted at feeling his hard-on against me, I kick my knee up and shove him over me. I must say, I'm glad I'm wearing pants.

I jump up and just run. I don’t care where to, I just run. I need to get away from him. From Alpha Jax.

Ben told me about the previous alpha of the Shadow Moon pack, and from what I could gather, he is not a nice man.

Panting as I sprint through the trees, I can hear his heavy foot falls not that far behind me.

My body suddenly slams to the ground and I groan in pain.

Strange. I didn’t know I could feel pain here.

Looking over my shoulder I see him letting go of my ankle, and with a swift swing, he slaps me hard across the face with his back-hand.

The sudden headache pushes against my skull and make my ears ring.

That hurt a lot more than I thought it would.

“You damn bitch.” He says with a sinister laugh.

“Aaaahhh!” I can’t help scream when I feel him roughly pulling me up by my hair.

He rattles me, causing another whimper to escape my cut lip.

“Mmmhhhhh. I always loved the sound of screams.”

And suddenly, his other hand grips my throat in a tightening hold.

I try pulling at his fingers, but his grip in my hair holds me still and looking straight into those ominous eyes.

But he suddenly lets go as he shoves me hard against a tree, I feel my breath leaving my lungs as I crouch on the ground.

“No, no no. I gotta savour this. I can’t let my impulses get the better of me. Someone’s gotta pay for trapping me here.” He says to himself as he grips the back of his head with his hands and paces in front of me.

He kneels down in front of me as I still struggle for air.

“I’m gonna make you suffer.” He promises as he caresses my cheek, but squeezes my chin painfully hard.

My whimpers has him laughing again.

“You’ll pay for putting me here.”

“I-,…I didn’t put you here.” I try to speak up.

But he just laughs. “Yeah, but your kind did.”

I look at him confused, and he doesn’t hesitate to elaborate.

“You’re a celestial." He states firmly. "Not at all as holy as the name implies.” He continues, but I also hear the sound of him unbuckling his belt, which has me frozen in place. “That damn woman cursed me here. How the fuck was I supposed to know the town-chief’s wife was a celestial.” He pulls the belt from the loops in his pants with a loud swooshing sound. He bends down and grabs my hands as he wraps the belt around my wrists. “Just because I pillaged their pathetic little town and burnt it to the gr-“

But then I slam my tied fists against his face before he could fully tighten the belt. I throw it off, and just run, seeing him already getting up with such a livid look, I know he’ll have no problem making my suffering much more painful.

I run and just keep on running, through the trees, the slopes and little hills. These woods seem somewhat familiar, but the ever present darkness makes it challenging to really find your way. Which benefits me in the least, hearing Alpha Jax’s footsteps farther away.

Just as I run past a massive fallen tree trunk, I immediately slip behind a mound and crouch. A mound which seems to be near a riverbank, -the river on the far end of the pack’s border.

Crap! I’m on the other end of the woods near the border. How will I find my body now? It may take me forever, especially with this jerk chasing me. Was he really going to rape me just there, just like that? A shiver runs through me at the thought.

That’s when I hear his voice echo through the trees.

“There’s no point in hiding.” I hear soft crunches of dried leaves and twigs as he slowly creeps in circles, probably trying to figure out which direction I’m in. “You can’t go anywhere. If you can’t find your body.” He says with a soft but audible chuckle. “That’s how it works, right?”

He knows. Crap. He must know where my body is, if he hadn’t hidden it.

“I’ve been here alone for so long, just getting glimpses of the real world. I noticed that those,…..’openings’ only happened when death was near. But every time I see people die and their souls pass through to here and just disappear, I get dragged back as well. It fucking pisses me off! I can’t even take over someone’s body.” He continues his monologue quite frustratingly.

“I know you’re a celestial. I saw your eyes. Just like hers.”

My eyes?

“You’re kind brought me here. You can take me back.”

That’s what he wants?

“That’s it. That’s all you have to do. I promise, I won’t hurt you.”

I don’t even need to have caught a glimpse of his smirk to know that he’s lying.

But what he wants is impossible. As little as I may know about this place and what I am, I do know that this place is just an astral form of the real one. Nothing here is physical. So even if he could get back, he has no physical and living body to return to.

Though, that is not something I would tell an a-hole like him.

“YOU CAN’T HIDE FOREVER!” He shouts, frightening me, but I was quick to cover my mouth and catching the yelp that almost got loose.

His sudden sinister and very loud laughter has my already racing heartbeat speeding up.

“Then again, we have all the time in the world.” That’s when I realize his voice is getting closer.

“Do you know the stories I was told as a kid, of your kind?” His voice gets closer, which has me squeezing my mouth harder, hoping to soften my breathing. “Our hunters used to hunt down your kind. And do you know what they did then? They would tie you up and bury you alive. Deep into the ground. Or thrown into the ocean. So no one would hear you. Or whatever curses you speak over people.”

He starts laughing again. By the tree right behind me. It has me holding my breath now. I carefully reach out for a rock lying to my side.

“They told us that’s why you all went extinct. But I always thought those were just stories.”

That’s when a hand slips around me, pulling me up by the neck. But I instantly hit him against his head with the rock in my hand.

“Ahh!” He grunts out as he grips the side of his head, as blood drips through the slips of his fingers.

Though, through all this, I just stare at him. Something seems off. He’s an alpha. Yet, with a simple knock on the head, he’s whining like a baby.

As he looks up, I get a glimpse of his face, but he quickly looks down.

“You bitch!” He shouts as he wipes his blood off his face, though not looking straight at me.

It’s like he’s avoiding my gaze, and with the clench in his jaw, it’s clear that he’s angry because of it.

I take a step forward, and with his instant retreat, I know something is wrong.

“You’re afraid of me.”

“The fuck I am!” He lunges at me, shoving me against a tree, focusing on his hold around my neck.

Feeling my throat constricting, I push at his face, trying to force distance between us.

And the moment his eyes meet mine, he goes stiff and I use the distraction to put my own skills to good use. I don’t even know why I’ve been acting so helpless all this time.

Shoving him off of me, I stare at him again, but this time with realization.

“You have no wolf.” That's what was missing.

He grunts out annoyed and lunges at me again, but this time I give him a sturdy left hook, which has him head-butting the ground.

“You’re just a man.” I tell myself. “Not even.”

But he gets up again, looking at me with so much anger, I’m certain that vein in his neck will pop soon. He stalks towards me, but avoids direct eye contact. His calm actions has me confused. He slowly, but firmly traps me in a tight hold against a tree. And before I can slip out of his hold, he uses his heavy weight against me.

“Don’t you see?” He talks as he forces me to look into his neck. “It’s fate that we found each other.” His voice almost sounds gentle. “I found you,….and you brought me back here-.” That’s when I feel him fumbling with my pants and hear him unbuttoning the top. “-to my pack.” He whispers in my ear.

I thrash in his hold, but with his body pressed hardly against mine, I can barely move.

“Let go of me.”

I feel him trying to shove my pants down as I hear his breathing growing heavier in my ear. His hardening manhood digging into my core as he forces a leg between my thighs.

“You can be my Luna.” He bites my ear hard, which has me practically screaming and thrashing against him again. But with what little space I have, it’s useless.

“I said let go of m-.” I grunt out, but he shuts me up as he slams his mouth on mine.

I panic as I feel him licking my lips, trying to force his tongue in. I try pulling my face away from him, but he gets a firm grip on my lip as he bites it hard. I instinctively yelp, and he immediately shoves his tongue in. His kisses are wet and rough as our teeth clash, and I immediately get nauseated. I bite down hard on whatever lip I can get. He lets out a loud groan and roughly shoves my head against the tree with that firm grip of his on my throat. Both our faces smeared in each other’s blood.

Slightly out of it, from the pain in the back of my head, it takes me a second to realize he’s shoving his hand down my pants and in my underwear. He immediately thrusts his fingers inside me and I shriek from the pain and disgust rushing through me. I clench my fists so tightly, I can feel my nails digging in and releasing blood.

I try thrashing again, but my arms are trapped between us, and it seems to just add to the pain. I can hear his laboured breathing growing louder in my ear as he grinds his hard-on against me, all the while violating me.

I don’t bother stopping the tears from flowing down my cheeks.

I’m not afraid. I’m not afraid of him. He’s nothing. That’s all I keep chanting in my mind, trying to find some strength in this ordeal. He’s the one that’s afraid of me.

That’s when realization hits me. –He’s afraid of me. Because I’m a,….Celestial. Just like the woman that cursed him here. Which means, I can curse him too. But how? How!?

Frustration grows in me and I rather focus all my strength on getting my arms free. Then a sudden sharp but warm sensation washes over my wrist. Strange. I manage to slowly slip my arms upwards and towards his neck, his grunting urging me on. Just as he’s in my reach, I claw at his neck and he hisses, though, still not relenting, as if turned on more.

Finally pulling my arms free, I grip his face with my bloody hands, trying to push him away from me. Groaning in annoyance, he finally pulls his hand from my pants and slams me harder against the tree, tightening his grip on my throat. But I don’t stop. I use all my strength to try and push him off, and we suddenly make eye contact. He’s staring at me through the gaps between my bloody fingers, though, he seems worried and angry at the same time.

I’m so sick of this man. He’s been terrorizing me almost my whole life.

“Just die!”

And suddenly, I see my blood on his face slightly shimmering, as if it has glitter in it.

What’s happening? Is this it? But nothing is happening.

But that’s when it hits me. -He can’t die. Because he’s already dead. This is just his soul trapped here.

“Suffer.” I say sternly, feeling a sudden surge of power flowing through me. Looking into his eyes, it feels like I have a grasp on his gaze, like I can see right into his soul. -How dark and twisted it actually is.

His eyes widen and he suddenly pushes away from me, looking at me like a bruised and enraged slave. Though, for some reason still staring straight into my eyes, as if not being able to look away.

My blood on his face still glimmering, and I then hear a whimper coming from him.

If this is working, then I’m not going to stop now. This douche deserves hell.

I straighten up and slowly but loudly speak. “Suffer every ounce of pain you have ever caused, never to be seen or heard,……by anyone again.”

His eyes suddenly widen before he falls to his knees and looks away from my gaze, as if forcefully released from it.

Immediately he starts shrieking like a wounded animal, gripping his head as if wanting to pull his hair out. He picks up the rock near his knee, and repeatedly hits himself across the head, trying to kill whatever is torturing him. The sound of bones cracking can be heard, mixed with his whimpering as he starts to claw at his arms and legs, ripping his skin open. He falls to the ground and claws at his chest, still screaming.

All of a sudden, his body starts glowing an odd orange tone. And it takes another few seconds to realize he’s burning from the inside out, when budding black spots appear on parts of his skin, sending smoke and the smell of burnt flesh into the air. He releases an ear-piercing shriek, which no doubt shattered his voice-box as he continues to thrash on the ground. The burning blackness hurriedly eats away at his flesh, and soon he subsides and goes limp, his mouth still wide open from his continued screams before they went silent.

The sudden silence makes things clear. -He’s dead.

As if magic, the smoke continues to eat away at whatever is left. Disintegrating and evaporating as ash into the wind, until there was absolutely nothing left.

Another warm sensation brushes my wrist, distracting me from the horrible scene I had just witnessed.

Though, I won’t say I feel sorry for him. If he suffered pain he caused others, then I must say it was over too quickly. He couldn’t even endure all of it, and yet he had the nerve to have dealt it to others.

Okay. Now I need to find my body. I still have a whole lot of drama to deal with when I get back. We’re still in the middle of a rogue attack. And I shot Nick, not that that stopped him from trying to catch me. Dangit.

I release a heavy sigh. I look around at the similar trees. I’m gonna have to start somewhere anyway. I turn to the side and start walking. I feel the feeling on my wrist getting slightly warmer again. Strange.

Taking a slight turn, I walk deeper into the woods. But then the feeling in my wrist gets cooler.

What is this anyway?

Out of curiosity, I start swaying my arm around, swaying it from side to side. And oddly, it gets warmer and colder in specific directions.

I huff out, exhausted. As crazy as this may sound, I guess I’m going to be playing a game of ‘hot and cold’ with my wrist as my guide.

So I start walking in the direction my hand starts feeling warmer and warmer. Oddly, as warm as it’s getting, it’s not getting uncomfortable or burning in any way. It just feels like tingles.

After about thirty minutes of playing tracker with my arm, I eventually spot my body. I run to it and lean down.

Okay. This is it. It’s now or never. I don’t know how much time passed that side, but I’m sure it’s not much. I take a deep breath. I just need to get out Shadow Moon pack, before anyone sees me.

I reach down and touch my body, feeling it dragging me in and back.

And that’s when I’m suddenly gasping for the living life of me, trying to get air in me as if I’ve never had any. Gripping my bloody throat, I notice someone’s warm arms wrapped around me. Without looking up, I can already guess who it is.

Crap. I need to get away from here.

I try pushing at him, to get away. But of course that doesn’t work. I’m still trying to catch my breath.

And when I do look up, I’m faced with a number of eyes on me, and I’m faced with the reality. –They all saw. I must leave. Now!

I lamely try to crawl back, but suddenly my face is being cradled into a chest, Nick’s. And all I hear are muffled words, as my ears are covered too.

But suddenly, I’m lifted up, and in Nick’s arms.

It’s over. I can’t get out of this. They all saw. Not only that, but this whole attack happened because of me, and let’s not forget the fact that I shot Nick. Everyone probably hates me. I’m so screwed.

I just lie limp in his arms, trying to prepare myself for my fate.