Chapter 58: Powers Unleashed

Aurora

Somehow, I managed to escape from Wendell, and dart back into the woods.

I ran for over an hour, dodging around trees, trying to get away from the hunters.

I was trying to get back to the pack house, to warn them, but I couldn’t get through the rogue bastards, and I couldn’t manage to mind-link anyone since I wasn’t in wolf form.

I couldn’t shift. My white wolf would be an easy target.

If I had been crowned luna, I could reach out to every pack member if I needed to, without having to shift.

Somehow, the human hunters had created a barrier that muffled the gunshots, so that no wolf had been able to hear them.

If they could, by now they’d be swarming the entire forest. This had to be the work of a witch, but how had they managed to get one to cooperate with them?

I’ve sniffed out nine in total people, including Wendell and Tallulah.

That bitch. I couldn’t believe she’s working with them.

That was how they’d known our weak spots. That was how they’d been able to get through our borders and kidnapped our warriors and seekers undetected.

That awful woman had been helping them.

“Now, now, Aurora. It’s useless to run away from us! There’s no way for you to hide, and we won’t let you get back to alert that pack of yours!” Wendell shouted across the distance.

“I have an idea. Why don’t you shift into that wolf of yours? I’m dying to see that white fur covered in your blood!” he continued.

“Oh, I know. How about we kill off some of your pack members. I hear they’re having a celebration at the house? How about we crash the party?” he taunted.

“You three. Head over to the pack house and cause some havoc,” he instructed wolves I couldn’t see.

I heard three sets of footsteps retreat back in the direction of the house.

~“Rory, we have no choice. We’re going to have to take them down. We can’t let them get to the pack house,”~ Rhea said.

I had to agree. We couldn’t keep running like this.

I tried to remember my training, and took a deep breath as I steadied myself, compelling my senses to hunt down each of my foes.

I crouched down and allowed Rhea to take over my body partway.

I felt my nails grow into claws, and my fangs descended. I leapt from behind a tree and dashed at a lightning speed.

In seconds, I managed to disembowel two hunters and cut another one's throat.

Then I caught sight of two of the hunters running toward the pack house, so I dashed after them.

I stabbed one in the back, then used him as a shield while the other man shot at me. When he ran out of bullets, I dashed after him and tore his throat out with my fangs.

I ran through the forest searching for that bastard, Wendell, when suddenly I was tackled to the ground.

Tallulah pinned me beneath her, lunging at me with her claws out.

I managed to dodge one and caught the other in one hand, lifting my feet from beneath her to push her away from me.

She rolled a couple of meters before gripping the ground with her claws, then steadied herself and dashed after me again.

By now, Rhea wanted blood. I readied my stance as I waited for the impact.

Tallulah came at us at full force. Her eyes were pitch black.

She threw punches, and kick after kick, but she was no match for Rhea and I.

She tried kicking me in the side, but I caught hold of her leg, my claws digging into her calves.

I threw her forcefully, and her body slammed into a tree with a resonating crack that made me smile in pleasure.

She tried rising, but had broken her leg. Still, she didn’t give up, and continued struggling.

“STAND DOWN!” I commanded. The authority in my voice forced Tallulah to bow her head down in defeat.

~Clap, clap, clap.~ We looked over as Wendell came out of his hiding spot.

“Well, I’ll be. Look at you. Overpowering an alpha she-wolf. You’re definitely a royal.” He sneered.

“Kill off the alpha she-wolf. She’s no use to us anymore,” he said to the other hunter, who stood with his gun pointed at Tallulah.

“What are you doing? You can’t kill me! We have a deal! I’d give you this bitch, and you’d spare me and my pack!” she shouted at them.

I could see her shivering.

Just as the man was about to pull the trigger, a huge black wolf shot out of nowhere and practically bit off half of his upper body.

“Wolfgang,” Tallulah breathed out in relief.

~“Our mate! He’s here to save us,”~ Rhea cheered as we watched Cronnos stalk Wendell, who looked unfazed.

“Look who we’ve got here. The big bad alpha. Took you long enough,” Wendell said. He looked back and shouted. “Now!”

A dozen more hunters came bursting from above the trees, all of them holding guns or crossbows.

They shot at Wolfgang, but he managed to dodge them as he scampered over to Tallulah and I.

~“Get on!”~ I heard Wolfgang’s voice command me in my head.

I quickly climbed on to his broad wolf back and grabbed on as tightly as I could to his fur.

“Wolfgang! What about me? Aren’t you gonna help me, too?” Tallulah whimpered.

Cronnos just stared at her before huffing and running off.

“Wait! Wolfgang!” Was the last thing we heard before a round of gun shots resonated behind us.

Cronnos ran swiftly through the thick forest, dodging every tree in our way. I held on tight, so as not to fall off.

“Wolfgang. We could have saved her,” I reprimanded him.

~“You’re incredible!”~ I heard his exasperated voice in my head.

~“Me? Why?” I asked.~

~“Tallulah literally sold you to those hunters, and here you are arguing because I didn’t save her sorry ass?! She was lucky I didn’t bite her head off!”~ Wolfgang growled.

I still couldn’t help but feel bad for Tallulah. Yeah, she was a bitch, and had made my life a living hell, but she didn’t deserve to die like that.

~“What were you even doing out here on your own? I told you not to wander in the woods!”~ he growled.

I felt guilty. Once more, I had placed myself in harm’s way unnecessarily.

“How did you even find us?” I asked. He had come out of nowhere.

~“I was on my way back to the village when Cronnos sensed that you were in danger. Then I caught your scent mixed with blood. I told you that guy wasn’t trustworthy.”~

I was just grateful he’d shown up in time to save me.

~Aahoooooooooooooooooooooo!!~

Numerous wolves howled in the distance.

“Are those our warriors? How did they know to come?” I asked Wolfgang.

~“Since someone was dumb enough to come out here without a warrior, I alerted them as soon as I smelt the blood,”~ Wolfgang retorted.

“Hey, I can’t do a massive mind link like you, Mr. Alpha!” I said, trying to defend myself.

~“You could if you had agreed to become my luna and performed the ritual,”~ He countered.

I had no answer to that.

Soon all our warriors, including Max, Remus, Emma and Aspen were in the forest in their wolf form.

As they ran past us, they bit and clawed at the human hunters who were chasing us.

“What are you doing? Why aren’t you stopping?!” I shouted as Wolfgang kept running toward the pack house.

~“I’m getting you to safety first,”~ Wolfgang answered.

“What? No, I’m staying to fight!” I said. I jumped off of his back.

Because of the speed he’d been running, I rolled a few yards before getting to my feet and dashing back toward the battlefield.

~“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?!”~ Wolfgang and Cronnos growled in my head. Wolfgang quickly caught up to me and stood in my way.

“He’s after me. I can’t let anyone die while I cower away. What type of a luna would that make me?” I asked him.

~“Aurora, I need you to be safe. Let me take you to the bunker,”~ he pleaded, his tone a bit more passive, but I wouldn’t budge.

“No. If you take me there, I’ll just come back running out. I won’t let you guys fight without me,” I said, crossing my arms.

We had a brief staredown before Cronnos huffed.

~“Alright. But stick close to me, and don’t try to shift. You’d be an easy target,” he said.~

I nodded, and we sprang back toward the battlefield, where we heard growls, shouting, and gunshots.

The entire scene was like a horror movie, with bodies laid all over the clearing, where werewolves still fought humans. The air was thick with the smell of blood.

~“Aurora, look out!”~ Cronnos jumped toward me and bit the hand off a human who was about to shoot me with his crossbow.

~“Focus Aurora! This is no time to be spacing out!”~ Cronnos growled, and I nodded.

We sprinted through the field, fighting off the hunters, always careful of their guns and silver-laced weapons.

Cronnos spared no mercy to any of them as he lunged with his massive fangs, but I could tell he wanted to rip one particular human in shreds.

Wendell.

I fended off a couple of hunters easily, but Wolfgang continued to butt in and kill most of my enemies.

“I can fight on my own, you know,” I said, kicking a human hunter in the chin then knocking him out with an uppercut.

~“Yeah, you were doing so well that you would have gotten yourself shot if I hadn’t showed up last minute,”~ Wolfgang deadpanned.

I could hear the teasing in his voice.

“Shut up,” I huffed as I punched another hunter and broke his nose.

I looked over the field to see how our friends were doing and spotted Emma’s wolf, Psyche, faring off against three hunters.

Emma was one of the strongest warriors, so I had no doubt of her skills. She had always been at the top of our defenses lessons.

Suddenly, I saw a figure lurking near the ground.

It was a human hunter in grass-colored camouflage about to pounce at her.

“Psyche!” I called.

I threw my hand out on instinct, as if I’d my arm could magically stretch to where Emma’s wolf stood.

Suddenly, a massive wall of earth grew in between her and the hunter right before he tackled her. The earth wall fell with a great thud, crushing the hunter.

I looked at my hand in shock. Had I just done that?