Torn between Wolves & Myths (Book 2)

Liv opened her eyes and looked straight in the emerald green ones of Caden who was laying on top of her. One of his arms was wrapped around her waist as the other hand was planted next to her head so he wouldn’t collapse on her. Her heart was beating in her throat as she felt herself getting lost in his eyes. The effect this male had on her was downright troubling, but she couldn’t break his stare or deny how good it felt for him to touch her. A dull and weird feeling started to form where he was touching her as his scent was slowly getting stronger. It was something woodsy with another scent mixed in it, but she couldn’t make out what.

“Get off her!” Fare snarled.

Liv’s eyes snapped to Fare who was standing next to them, breaking whatever, it was that had been holding her locked in Caden’s eyes. Caden growled, making the feeling vibrate through her body as he was still laying on top of her. Liv cursed herself for allowing her to get lost in whatever she saw in his eyes, and recollected herself.

“Careful, pup.” Caden snarled back with his dominance clear in his voice.

“Get off me, Caden.” Liv spoke before Fare could answer. Caden’s eyes snapped back to her. A muscle ticked in his jaw before he did as she asked.

“Caden!” Ben called from the woods as he and Rev dragged a male, clearly a wolf, between them from out of the woods. Ben holding a rifle in his other hand. She got up from the ground, when the smell of blood filled her nose. Her head snapped to the cabin where she saw Malik holding his side. His hand was covered with blood as were the porch steps. Without a word she ran towards him, Fare was immediately behind her. Caden followed as well, why was beyond her, but she didn’t care about that right now.

Malik groaned as she moved his hand and saw the blood spilling out of the bullet wound. It was an ugly wound and he was losing too much blood. She had never seen someone lose that much blood from just a bullet wound. It was like an artery was hit!

“What the...” She whispered.

“A ripper bullet.” Her gaze was pulled to Caden as he got closer. Fare growled lowly as Caden walked past him. The latter not giving a damn about it as he crouched down next to her and leaned over her. He reached underneath Malik, who screamed at the pain of being moved.

“Caden.” Liv warned as she heard her friend scream. Caden didn’t heed her though, he pulled out something from underneath Malik and opened his hand to show a bullet with hundreds of tiny spikes. “A specially designed bullet to make as much damage as possible. As soon as the bullet enters the body hundreds of tiny barbs, coated with aconite, are ejected. Ripping open the flesh as the bullet makes its way inside of the body. The hundreds of tiny wounds are immediately infected with aconite, making sure the wounds become worse and cannot close.” He said as he gently wiped over the wound and showed the tiny cuts along the edge of the wound, making Malik scream. She immediately grabbed his wrist and pulled his hand away from her pack member. He met her gaze and pulled his hand away.

“He needs a Doc.” Fare said.

“It’ll be too late.” Caden said as he looked at the bullet in his palm. The silver was slowly burning his skin, but he didn’t seem to care. “The aconite is too strong to be treated. He’s dying.” An intense fear came over Liv. It felt like her throat was closing up and she couldn’t breathe. She almost collapsed to the side and had to place her hand on the porch step next to her to keep herself upright. A tear rolled down Malik’s face and she knew that a part of the fear was coming from him through the pack bond. She took a deep breath as she focused on her own emotions. She couldn’t let him die. Not when she just had him back.

The color was rapidly fading from his skin as his screams started to get worse.

“There must be something we can do!” Fare spoke, but it sounded distant in her ears as the power inside of her started to hum. It was the same feeling she had felt when she had healed the kids. Just like that time she knew what she had to do, she just hoped that she was strong enough to do it.

“There isn’t anything that can be-”

Caden’s sentence was cut off as Liv moved her hands to Maliks wounds. He screamed as she placed her hand on the entry and exit wound, but the hum of her power was stronger.

She couldn’t lose him.

Allowing her power to the surface, it felt like electricity ran down her hands and entered the wounds through her hands. Malik trashed and screamed again. A tear rolled down her cheek as she forced her eyes closed at the pain she felt coming from him. Willing her power to heal him she started to feel his wounds close underneath her hands.

“Give up, abomination princess. He’s a dead male.” A new voice filled her ears, but she forced herself not to listen to it. The only thing she focused on was her power that was starting to drain her energy.

“What do you expect that is going to happen? Moonbloods can’t heal wounds. Don’t pretend that you’re so special.” Ben snarled something at the wolf that had shot Malik, making him laugh.

Liv tried her best to ignore him, but it was getting harder for her to keep her mind focused on the power that was starting to waver and thrash against her hold. She was getting too weak, but Malik wasn’t completely healed yet. A strangled breath left her as a headache started to fill her head. The power started to pull back as her strength faded. She was too drained to hold on. She released another strangled breath when she forced herself to relax, her power something dim inside of her now, right before the wrong words filled her ears. “He is going to die, just like that traitor you called mother. At least she was properly tortured for her crime of producing the abomination you are.”

As if her rational mind was blasted away, her eyes snapped open at the same time as her head snapped to the wolf, who instantly screamed.

Caden clenched his jaw as he saw the white circle around her limbal ring disappear and the red color around her pupil took over.

She got up as she held her eyes on the wolf.

“Liv don’t-” Her eyes briefly snapped to Caden who immediately stopped talking and groaned as her power took ahold of him next.

Liv walked past him to the wolf, who was now looking at her with big eyes. Her power took hold of him as soon as their eyes met and he screamed once more as he thrashed in the hold of Ben and Rev.

“What the...” Fare’s whisper filled her ears, but somehow, she didn’t hear it. She was acting on instinct only, and her instinct right now was to kill the mother fucker who just tried to kill her pack member and disrespected her dead mother.

“Let him go.” Her voice was dark. It was the same voice she had when the power took over her body when she helped Caden kill King. “Liv, you can’t...” Her eyes snapped to Ben who instantly screamed as well before he fell on the ground, releasing the wolf who had peed himself out of fear for her.

“Please, Liv-” Rev tried, but his words fell on deaf ears as well before he too felt what her power could do.

As soon as the wolf was free, he shifted and turned, before he hightailed back into the woods. Her eyes snapped to him, but her power couldn’t reach him as he was too far away. She pushed herself off the ground and ran after him with a speed that shouldn’t be possible in her human body.

Everything passed her in a haze as her eyes only focused on the wolf that was running for his life. Nothing could stop her from killing her prey. Anyone who tried would find the same fate as the wolf.

The wolf was about to jump over a boulder when her power blasted towards him again and found its mark. A yelp left the wolf before he started to howl and trash on the ground. She stopped running in an instant and the force of it buried her feet a little in the soil, making her need to step out of the holes she made before she could walk further. All the while she kept her eyes on the thrashing wolf who was starting to bleed from his nose, ears and eyes. She walked closer as her power willed the wolf to shift back into his human skin. The sound of bones breaking unwillingly filled her ears, before they started to pierce his skin. The howls of pain changed into screams soon after, before a naked male with a shattered body laid on the ground in front of her. She growled as he looked up at her, and grabbed his throat before pulling him up like he weighed nothing. He grabbed her wrist with both hands as he struggled to breathe. She pulled him closer to him as she placed her other hand on the back of his neck and forced her power into him again. He trashed in her arms as he screamed.

“At least I tortured you properly for the crimes you have committed against me.” She snarled through her teeth, using some of his words against him.

“Long-” He started to stammer as he forced himself to look in her eyes and not scream. “Live-” She already knew what he was going to say and allowed her nails to elongate and pierce his skin.

“Don’t!” Caden yelled, but the scream of the wolf was the only thing that filled her ears, along with one word, “Lycaon!”, right before she pulled his throat out of his body. A gurgling sound came from him, before his body went limp and quiet. A growl left her again as she threw his body against the boulder he wanted to jump over and ripped his throat in half, before dropping the halves to the ground.

A sigh filled her ears and her head immediately snapped to Caden who screamed as her power hit him and fell to his knees. She took a few steps toward him as the power kept pushing into him, but no scream left his mouth as her power built. She pushed more towards him, but still no scream. Instead, he pushed himself up to his feet and met her gaze with nothing more than clenched fists and a clenched jaw. Another growl left her as she took big steps towards him and started to attack him. Caden evaded her arm as he grabbed the other and turned it on her back as he stepped in close, making their bodies meet. She wanted to use her other arm and legs to release herself when he pushed her backwards with a force that caused a small whimper to come from her as her back clashed with a tree. Caden used the momentum to open his mouth and briefly show her his six elongated teeth, before he moved to the side of her neck. Like a bucket of cold water, the realization of what he was going to do hit her and caused her power to blast him backwards and her rational mind to return as she fell to her hands and knees.

Rapid breaths left her as she looked at the soil underneath her hands. Her head hurt like a bitch and she had never felt this drained before. Her eyes shifted to the blood that was coating her hands, before she looked at the body of the wolf she had tortured and killed. What the fuck happened to her for her to go that far?

The whole time she was present, it was her doing everything, but it also wasn’t. Her instinct was driving her like a car and she couldn’t even think about what she was doing. It was the same thing that happened to her when King was close to kill Caden.

Caden...

Her head snapped to the sound of movement in front of her. Caden met her gaze as he sat up and released a relieved breath as he saw the white ring separating the red in her iris from the limbal ring. “Welcome back.”

“What the hell happened to me?” Her voice sounded as drained as she felt right now.

“The same thing that happened to you when you helped me kill King.” That confirmed what she also knew already.

“Which is?!” She asked irritated as she moved to sit on her ass in a clumsy way. “Whatever it is never happened to me before the time we killed King.” A muscle ticked in his jaw as he got up from the ground with a serious look in his eyes and walked towards her. “Because it couldn’t.” He spoke. “It’s called the Moonrage- an uncontrollable power only possessed by the strongest Moonbloods. If your emotions run too high the full force of the power takes over and you act on instinct only.” That didn’t sound familiar at all... “The power attacks everyone who meets your gaze or if you will it to a specific being. The only one other Moonblood that has ever been able to access it is Psophis. You are able to access it now that you finally reconnected with the wolf, because of that, you now have the strength you needed to activate it.” He added. A shiver ran down her spine as she looked at her bloody hands. “But I didn’t activate it...”

“Not intentionally no, that’s not possible. The rage only comes when the emotions you feel become too much to bear.”

She swallowed as she looked at the body of the wolf.

“How do you know all this?” She whispered as she looked back at Caden. “My mother was a Moonblood, remember? She taught me about it.”

“Oh.” It was the only thing she could say. She never learned about any of this from her mother. She never learned anything she needed to know.

He sighed as he held out his hand towards her. “Come with me.” She looked at his hand before she met his gaze. “And go where?”

“A place you should have learned about a long time ago.” He said as he still held out his hand towards her.

“Why?”

“Don’t you want some answers?”

She gulped as she looked at his hand again. She truly didn’t want to go with him, but something inside of her told her to take his hand. If this was a trick, she was going to kill herself...

A little reluctant she took his hand with hers and he pulled her up. She wobbled a little, making him place his other hand on her other arm as well. “Can you walk?” She nodded as the smell of blood filled her nose. Liv looked at the hand that was on her upper arm and saw the blood coating his still closed fist. He released her other hand and was about to pull away his fist as well, when she stopped him by grabbing his wrist and turning his palm up. Caden didn’t stop her from opening his hand and revealing the ripper bullet. He had once again wounded himself enough for her power to be close to ineffective on him, but the aconite on the bullet isn’t. Yet, he doesn’t seem affected by the poison that was strong enough to almost kill Malik. Just like he wasn’t the time she shot him in her motel room.

“You’re immune.” Their gazes met, before he gave her a single nod. “How?”

“I’ve been immune ever since my birth. Aconite doesn’t kill me or hurt me and silver only burns me to a point where it’s annoying and not painful. No one knows why and the only ones who know about it are Ben, Devon and Rev.”

“And me.” He gave her a single nod again. “The last wolf to be immune was killed for his blood.” He didn’t have to add anything to his sentence. She already knew that if she would ever think of telling someone, he would kill her. She composed herself as she dropped her hands from his one. “Where are we going?”

Caden closed his hand and dropped it as well. “Follow me.”