Chapter 38

Chapter 38

Times had evolved.

Everything was different from how it had been centuries ago. But just because the world modernized, it didn’t mean that my principles as a Legen should have been different.

Legens were once protectors of humans, guardians of kingdoms. Life was sacred to me. It wasn’t simply something that I thought or that I wanted. It was something that I felt, that ran deep. But nobody understood that. Zev and Layton didn’t. I doubted any Wolf would ever understand how I felt about life.

My parents became the center of my thoughts for a while. They would never understand either. They were different. They were human.

My dad loved me. He got excited every time a new gift kicked in. But it was for the wrong reasons.

I had become what I was because of my mom, from her side of my family. She had heard the stories and the rumors. She had the books, and a lot of information about Legens. But even for her, it had all been one big story full of myths, until I came along.

I was born a Legen. I was the only Legen I knew of, and that changed things for me. Because in the end, no matter how much anyone tried, they would never fully understand me and what I was.

Liam didn’t need to die. It was wrong. I felt lonelier because I was the only one who thought he deserved to live.

The tears in my eyes blurred my vision, and made it harder to keep flying. I had been high up, high enough to make me invisible in human eyes.

As soon as I set foot on the ground, I could smell the scents around me. I had learned to recognize and divide the scents from both packs. I was standing in the area that separated Blue Bloods and New Elite, but there were still scents from both packs.

I could feel Wolves around the area, but all of them were a distance away from me. I didn’t doubt that Layton and Zev were out trying to find me. I continued walking through the woods, stepping away from the trees just before I crashed into them.

I had never felt so low in my life, and yet I didn’t know who to be angry at. The loneliness was starting to turn into a deep emptiness, and I knew I didn’t want to feel whatever followed after that.

“You’re here.”

I thought I was imagining those words, so I continued walking. My thoughts were too blurred, and my mind was in another place. I barely had any consciousness to realize where I was, or if anyone else had joined me.

That was the main reason I missed her. Hanna had been calling my name, but I was completely blocking her from my mind. I was blocking everybody.

When I finally turned around to face her, I just had a second to step away. She has charged towards me with enough speed to knock me down.

“What are you doing here?” She growled at me.

“Huh?” I mumbled out, breathlessly.

I was thrown off by the fact that she really was there, and I hadn’t imagined her.

Hanna was in such bad shape. Her hair was sticking up all over the place, messily. She was only wearing a long t-shirt that reached her mid-thigh, leaving her scratched and bloodied legs exposed. The shirt she was wearing belonged to Zev. I had seen it on him some time ago.

“Did you come looking for me?” Hanna asked.

Her eyes were blood red. I could easily tell she’d been crying. There were cuts and bruises all over her body, which looked recent.

“You’re hurt,” I told her, taking a step closer.

“Don’t touch me!” She snapped, letting out a string of curse words in between growls.

“I’m just trying to help you.”

“After everything you did to me?” She cried.

I was surprised when she broke down sobbing in front of me. I wasn’t expecting that. I looked around the area, wishing for someone to appear and help me handle the situation.

Seeing Hanna there, in a heap on the floor, tore at my heart. If only she knew how much I wanted to slump myself on the ground, and cry along with her.

“I didn’t…”

“This is all your fault! Zev left me because of you. He loves you, and he blamed me for what Liam did to you!” Hanna said in broken words, while she continued to cry.

“Liam is dead,” I mumbled, the words still feeling strange in my mouth.

“He’s… dead?” Hanna slowly asked. She seemed surprised with the news. If only for a moment, she sobered up, and looked at me with dark, haunted eyes.

“That is your fault too!”

I looked down at my hands. I could feel the tears rolling down my cheeks, leaving a tingling sensation over my skin. A part of me wanted to break down sobbing too. It would make me feel slightly better, but I felt that wouldn’t be fair to Liam.

Hanna was right. It had been my fault. It was all my fault. But accepting that only made me feel worse.

I was in the middle of an inner battle with myself, when Hanna lunged at me. She had shifted into her Wolf.

I wasn’t expecting her attack. It was a complete surprise, but I didn’t push her away when she landed over me. Hanna’s Wolf easily covered my entire body. She was stronger than me. Even if she hadn’t been, I wasn’t really putting too much effort to shove her away.

I had never considered death.

I had never thought about it. But I was too depressed and too far gone, to even want to react to what was happening.

I could’ve easily pushed Hanna away, but I didn’t.

She was on top of me, snapping her teeth in my face, but wanting to get the final bite down on my neck. I had noticed that was like a Wolf code. All of them always went for the kill by biting off each other’s throats.

I found it strange that in my last moments, I was thinking about how Wolves fought. It was a nice way to go— thinking about Wolves and by the hand of a Wolf.

Wolves were intriguing to me. Finding Wolves had been a huge moment in my life. Because of them, I had considered myself less of a freak in a world dominated by humans. But Wolves were destructive. And in the end, they turned out to be more different from me than even humans were.

I was ready for the final bite to come, for Hanna to finish it off. It was what she wanted, and it seemed like it was what I wanted too, but it never came.

When I opened my eyes, I noticed that Hanna and I were surrounded. While I had drifted away in my thoughts, Layton and Zev, along with other Wolves had appeared around of us.

They had us circled, enclosing Hanna and me in. Hanna’s eyes roamed around the area, before she looked down at me. She didn’t speak, but her dark eyes said it all for me.

I nodded at her, giving her permission to go for it. I felt like I had nothing else to lose. And Hanna did it, she went for it.

She was so close to me, I could feel her breath fanning across my face. She was about to bite down and finish it all, but Zev was faster than her.

He didn’t only push her off of me. Once Hanna was a safe distance away, Zev went in for the kill. What Hanna had been about to do to me, he did to her. Zev didn’t even hesitate when he sunk his teeth into her neck, and ripped her throat out.

I was sure the chocked out sobs that left my body were heard all over the place. Every Wolf in the area turned to face me, but I couldn’t stop the uncontrollable sobbing. I was hitting the ground, kicking and screaming.

Hanna, who had previously been in her Wolf form, shifted back into her naked human form as soon as Zev dropped her ragged body in the ground. She was bloodied and beaten. Hanna had been like that before Zev killed her, but it somehow looked much worse now.

Layton tried to get near me, to hold me. I didn’t want that. Even though my body craved his touch, I couldn’t stand to be near him. My mind couldn’t handle it.

Everything was wrong. Everything felt wrong. Before Layton could take another step closer me, I shot up in the sky as fast as my body could take me.

I wasn’t sure how long I flew. I didn’t really feel tired, but the sky had grown dark. That might’ve had something to do with the direction I was going in.

Before leaving my house, I had only been carrying the clothes I was wearing. I didn’t have my phone, or any money. In my haste to leave the house, I hadn’t thought about that. After what happened with Hanna, I couldn’t really think about anything else but that.

I lowered down in a small tree covered area. Even though I wasn’t tired yet, I wanted to take a break. I needed to think, to breathe, to be. It had been hard to breathe while I tried to contain the exhausting cries wanting to leave my body.

I could hear the bustle of a city somewhere up ahead. I didn’t want to be around people, but I thought it might’ve been better than the silence that covered the woods.

I did my hair in a braid that would definitely fall off. I didn’t have a band with me to hold it together.

My shorts and shirt were comfortable, but they did little to help with the cold night air that was stinging my skin. Wearing them with sandals wasn’t exactly helping my case. My clothes were dirty, from the scuffle between Hanna and me.

I looked like a homeless person, despite my efforts to clean up before walking into the city.

Once I got to walking on the sidewalk, with people coming and going beside me, I realized what a mistake I had made by not having anything. It had been an unplanned flight and trip, but it still left me empty-handed. I was in an unknown city, far away from home, with no one I knew around.

All I had to do if anything went bad was fly away, but that idea didn’t appeal to me.

Going home was a reminder that two people had died because of me, and I wanted to clear my mind from those thoughts. I felt like it was slowly dragging me to a dark place, and I was trying to find something to carry me away from that.

There was a digital clock outside of an already closed bank. I couldn’t really believe it was past midnight. I had flown longer than I originally assumed.

I ended up making my way to a diner half filled with people. It seemed like a friendly place, and considering how I looked, I was simply glad they didn’t kick me out once they caught sight of me.

If it weren’t for the fact that the city was fairly big, I would’ve found odd the amount of people out and about at such a late hour.

I took a booth towards the back, trying to hide myself from all the other people who were accompanied by someone else.

Seeing those people together made me feel lonely.

I wasn’t sitting alone for long before a waitress came to take my order. The middle aged lady seemed nice with the way she smiled warmly.

“Are you okay, sweetheart?”

Her eyes were roaming over my face, and down to my dirt-stained shirt. Even if I tried to deny it, I was sure she could tell something was up.

“I’m fine,” I mumbled.

“You sure?”

I nodded in reply. It didn’t seem like she believed me. She stared at me for a while longer, before finally nodding in return.

“What can I get you then?” The waitress, whose nametag read ‘Rose’, said to me. She had her pad in hand, waiting for me to reply.

I felt embarrassed for not having any money. I was really cursing the moment I decided to leave my house without anything.

“I don’t have any money,” I admitted, already expecting to get kicked out of the diner.

I didn’t want to order anything either way. I simply wanted to sit down and think, but I doubted anyone in that place would’ve been interested in letting me chill in the diner. I just really didn’t want to be alone, and I had no interest in going home. I knew what was waiting for me once I returned, and I wasn’t ready to face that. I felt ashamed over what had happened.

I felt ashamed and guilty.

The waitress gazed at me with what looked like understanding. I didn’t even realize when my eyes had grown blurry, but I did see the pity in the way Rose kept watching me.

“I’ll pay for what she’s having. And can you please bring me the usual.”

My head snapped up in the direction of the person who had spoken. Whoever he was, he had caught me off guard. Rose wrote down something on her pad and then turned to give me an expectant look.

“You can order anything, I’m paying,” the guy standing right next to my booth said.

He didn’t seem like a bad person, but I didn’t want to get myself in trouble by taking anything for free. I had enough trouble to last me a lifetime. All I did was stare at him, with what I later realized must have been a scared look.

“Just bring her a coffee and a muffin,” he said to Rose, dismissing her.

Once she was gone, he took a seat in front of me.

“There are plenty of empty booths.”

“You’re in my booth, in my seat, actually,” he said, not looking affected by my question.

“Your booth?”

“I come here every night, and this is the booth I always sit in, in that seat,” he said, pointing to where I was.

“Sorry,” I mumbled.

“It’s cool. You can have dibs for tonight,” he said, giving me a lazy grin.

It was strange, but the way his face lit up with a simple grin made me happy. I felt like it had been ages since I’d seen someone be happy. It ignited something in me, some of the darkness that was dimming me down.

“I don’t have any money to pay for what you ordered,” I told him, just so that he was clear that I was basically broke.

“I heard. I also remember saying I would pay.”

The way he spoke was so matter-of-fact was strange. While I was looking at him, I couldn’t help but take in his appearance.

He was something nice to look at, in a ‘Harvard smart’ kind of way.

He was wearing smug dark denim jeans, with a black shirt. His shirt had a picture of three different test tubes, which added to his ‘I’m a smart cookie’ appearance. His black hair was fairly long, and it had that skater kind of look. Most of all, his hazel eyes made the biggest impact on his looks.

Zev also had hazel eyes, but his were different. Ever since I found out what Zev was, I felt like I could see his Wolf in his eyes.  I loved that about him.

This guy seemed like a normal person, which was refreshing. I wanted normal. I needed normal in those moments more than anything.

“Why are you staring at me?”

I chuckled at the bluntness of his question, although it seemed like if he was waiting for an actual answer.

“You have nice eyes.”

“Oh, thanks,” he said, and his features eased up. “So… you okay?”

“Fine,” I replied, cocking an eyebrow when he squinted his eyes at me.

“You don’t look like it.”

I hadn’t noticed that he was carrying a back pack, which he took off and placed beside him. He started taking out some kind of sketchbook and pencils, but his eyes remained on me.

“You draw?” I asked, nodding at the pad in his hands.

“Some,” he shrugged, and opened up the book for me to take a look.

He was good, more than good. I was sure he knew he was good, because he was looking at me expectantly.

“They’re good,” I told him, which was exactly what I had been thinking.

That made me smile too. I didn’t have to restrict my thoughts, at least not with something so simple.

“I know,” he said, and grinned once again.

I returned the smile, even though it felt strange. Even in my good days, I never got so many happy looks from either Layton or Zev, or any of the guys. While some of them were typically cheery guys, the fact that they were Wolves always played a large role in their way of being.

It wasn’t a bad thing, but it was something I noticed while sitting in that booth with the human.

When Rose returned with our order, I realized that ‘the usual’ he had ordered was actually a load of food. There was bacon, pancakes, scrambled eggs, tiny muffins, ice cream, a soda and a coffee.

I cocked an eyebrow at all the food sitting in front of me. Compared to my coffee and muffin, he had an entire banquet.

“If you need me, just call out,” Rose said before leaving.

“That is a lot of food,” I commented, more to myself than to him.

He looked up at me and shrugged. “I’m usually hungry around this time.”

“And you eat it all?” I asked, watching as he organized the food in front of him. I still had his sketchbook in front of me, but other than that, most of his food took up the entire table.

“Usually, I do. Sometimes I order an extra coffee. It keeps me alert.”

“It keeps you awake.”

“No,” he said, shaking his head. “I’m always awake. But the coffee helps me be awake, and know what the hell I’m doing.”

“Maybe you’re awake because you’re drinking coffee so late,” I suggested.

“Maybe if I didn’t drink the coffee, I’d still be awake and walking around, but seeing it all in one big hazy mess,” he said, matter-of-factly.

I narrowed my eyes at him, and he again just shrugged at me.

“You want some?” He asked, holding out his fork. I shook my head, still finding his behavior different, yet uplifting.

“You don’t know me.”

I took a sip of the coffee he had bought me. It was already paid for, so I felt dumb letting it go to waste if it was sitting in front of me.

“I’m not proposing marriage. I’m simply asking if you want some food,” he said, causally.

His answer me blush, and I noticed that he smiled when I did. I expected him to say something about it, or at least poke fun at me for it. He didn’t.

“I’m Aaron by the way. What’s your name?” He asked, continuing to dig in to his food.

“Cassidy,” I replied. Strangely enough, I felt comfortable with him.

“Cassidy…” he said, narrowing his eyes at me. “Hmm… It suits you,” he said, turning up, and giving me an intent look.

I didn’t break his gaze, and that didn’t make me squirm. I liked that too.

Humans were the main reason I considered life so sacred. I was too young to be worrying about a world that was too big for me to contemplate.

Death was natural. That was how things were meant to be.

The real question was: what about when death could be prevented? Liam and Hanna were not entirely human, but they had a human side to them. Their deaths were always going to hang over my head, like a dark cloud.

“Cassidy!”

“Huh?” I asked, snapping out of my thoughts. Aaron was looking at me somewhat worriedly, but he shook his head once he had my attention.

“So, are you lost or something?”

“Why would you ask that?”

“You look lost, possibly scared,” he shrugged.

“Neither,” I quickly replied.

“Does that mean you always carry that worried vibe with you? It sounds tiring.”

“No,” I replied defensively. “What about you? Why am I the only one on trial here?” I asked, crossing my arms.

“Well, I’ve slept about two hours in the last three days, so I’m basically a zombie right now,” he replied.

“Why haven’t you slept?”

“I have insomnia. By the time sleep comes to me, it’s already late in the morning and I have to be up for class.”

“That sounds annoying,” I said, empathizing with him. Sometimes I struggled to fall asleep, but it was never as bad as he seemed to have it.

“What year are you in school?”

“I’m a freshman in college. You?” He asked, looking genuinely interested.

“I’m a sophomore, in high school,” I replied, with a grin on my face.

I imagined he would pick on me because I was in high school and he was in college. He surprised me by giving me a grin of his own.

“How’s that going?” Aaron asked, cocking an eyebrow and even going as far as putting his fork down to listen.

“Eh, it’s not so hot right now, but I’m alive.”

“Do you go to Jefferson?”

“Nope, I’m not from around here,” I said, quickly dismissing any thought of home that was trying to seep through my mind.

“Are you alone?”

“Yeah, I am.”

“Did you run away from home? If you’re a sophomore, you must be… what, fifteen or sixteen?” He hadn’t picked up his fork to continue eating, seeming really interested in our current conversation.

“I’m sixteen. I didn’t really run away from home, sort of.”

“Do you want to talk about it?” He asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Not really.”

“If it’s bothering you so much that you had to run away, there’s an unspoken rule stating you should probably talk about it,” Aaron said, nodding at me.

“You think?”

Even if I wanted to tell Aaron anything, there was no way I could mention everything. Not only would he call the police if I mentioned Layton and Zev killing Liam and Hanna, but they’d probably throw me in the loony bin for saying that they were all Werewolves. It was too complicated.

“Well, yeah, I do. I’m also really curious,” he said, chuckling.

I smiled, thinking of how I was going to explain the whole problem to him, without really explaining the true problem.

“I’m not going to get into the whole issue. It’s-” I started to say, but stopped.

There really was no way I could narrow down all that had happened. Aaron wouldn’t understand me if I didn’t give out at least a few details.

“Is it that bad?” He asked, picking up his fork to continue eating.

I thought about Liam being dead. For the short period of time I had known him, he had been a good friend. It was until he kidnapped me that it all went downhill.

Even though Layton had physically killed him, it was all been because of me. Hanna’s death had been unexpected, and I was also the cause of that one. I simply wanted to stop thinking about deaths.

“Spill,” Aaron said, reaching out for my hand.

“It’s complicated,” I finally replied.

Aaron finished off his soda, and looked at me like he was trying to figure out a hard math problem.

“So this is over a guy?”

“It’s because of a guy, but it’s not exactly a relationship problem.”

“If he has you like this,” Aaron said, shaking his head. “He sounds like a gem.”

I smiled at the sarcastic tone he had used. “Do you have a girlfriend?” I asked, shifting the spotlight onto him.

“Nope, but don’t feel bad for me because of that,” he said, sounding like he’d had plenty of people trying to hook him up with someone.

“Don’t worry, I wouldn’t do that. I’m the worst person anyone can turn to for relationship advise,” I said, thinking of the strange relationship I had with Layton.

Aaron chuckled, holding his hand up for a high five.

“I’m sure I’m cursed with the same thing.”

We continued talking for hours. The conversation shifted from school, to traveling, to pets, to hobbies. It kept changing until I noticed him yawning.

I checked the clock on the wall of the diner, and realized it was past seven in the morning. I had drank about five cups of coffee and even had breakfast, all paid by Aaron. Every time I tried to tell him it was fine, he ordered something else for me. It was too tempting to resist, especially the coffee.

Sitting down in the diner, which had quieted down, went by much smoother with coffee.

“I think I should go,” I told him, smiling warmly.

“Whoa, time flew by,” Aaron said, taking out his phone from his jean pocket.

“It’s late, or early in the morning, however you want to look at it.”

“I have class in three hours,” he told me, scrunching up his nose. “But now I feel like submitting my homework and taking a nap.”

“How do you survive like this?” I asked, shaking my head when he yawned again.

“I usually don’t stick around here too late.”

“So it’s my fault?”

Aaron laughed, and shook his head. “Not really, I just go home and chill. The days that I manage to sleep more than two or three hours, I crash… for a long time.”

“I don’t think I’d survive living like that.”

“I do what I can. The quiet can be good company. It helps me think.”

While I pushed the dishes to the side, Aaron began putting his stuff away. That had been the strangest night I had ever had.

“Thank you so much for the food, and for everything.”

“I won’t see you again, will I?” He asked, giving me a half smile.

I shook my head, and returned the smile. “I doubt it. I’m really not from around here.”

“It’s cool, I assumed that much. I was like your one night stand,” Aaron said, and the teasing look on his face made me smile.

“You were my one night stand, with complimentary breakfast,” I said, and Aaron joined in on my laugh.

His car was parked near the diner. When I turned to make my way toward the short patch of trees where I had descended from earlier, Aaron didn’t want to let me go.

He thought someone could hurt or attack me. I smiled, knowing that if that were to happen, the other person would be in more danger than me.

Before parting ways, we exchanged numbers. I didn’t have my cell phone with me, so I simply placed the little piece of paper with his number in my pocket.

After I walked away from him, I turned back and found him still staring at me. He held up his hand, and gave me a small wave. I nodded my head at him, before entering the woods.

It felt weird. That entire night had been strange, but the weight on my shoulders had lifted, if only for the few hours I had spent with Aaron.

I never would have imagined that I could have been comforted with the company of a human.

I landed on the back patio of my house, shocked that everything was so quiet. I almost expected my mom to be going crazy, attacking me with questions.

To my surprise, I was met with silence.

I flew into my room through the window. I assumed the front door would be locked, and I figured I’d sleep off all the time I had spent out.

I hadn’t flown straight home after leaving Aaron. I had been roaming around in the air for hours on end, before I grew tired and finally decided to head back. I wasn’t sure what I was doing, and my thoughts were muddled.

I wanted to give in, but I wasn’t sure to what. If it weren’t for the worry I knew everyone must’ve felt because I’d been gone for so long, I wouldn’t have returned home.

I didn’t want to see anybody, yet I was starting to miss them.

The clock read half past seven in the afternoon. My parents should have been home, and not seeing them was a surprise. All I wanted to do was shower, jump into bed, and cry my eyes out.

It had been a continuing occurrence… crying. I was sick of it, and my eyes hurt. I couldn’t stop the tears, and half of the time I hadn’t known what exactly I was crying for. All I knew was that I hated death, and I felt guilty for the two I had caused.

Shuffling downstairs brought me out of my thoughts momentarily. I assumed it was my parents who had arrived. My senses were weak, so I couldn’t feel them immediately.

I was about to walk towards the door, when he stormed into my room.

“Cassidy,” Layton said under his breath.

I could see the worry that had been etched in his features. Layton looked extremely tired, even for a Wolf. He was looking me all over, but I could clearly feel the anxiety rolling off him.

“Hey,” I whispered. It was the only word that I could manage.

“Cassidy, I was-” Layton started to say, but I held my hand up and interrupted him before he could finish his thought. I knew what he was going to say, and it broke my heart, but I didn’t want to hear him.

“Remember the other day,” I said.

My lips were trembling, and my hands were shaking. I held my hands together, but they were already feeling warm and sweaty.

“What day?”

“The other day,” I started again, and closed my eyes.

I didn’t know where I was getting the strength to do what I was about to. I hated myself for doing it, but I hated myself even more for being responsible for Liam and Hanna’s deaths.

Layton was staring at me, waiting for me to continue. He wanted to reach out to me. Our connection was so strong. I could feel his Wolf calling out to me. It was strange, and yet it was only making things harder.

“You told me that if I wanted you to stay away, that you would,” I stated.

Layton finally registered where I was going. I couldn’t tell what was going through his mind. I was surprised he hadn’t gotten into my head and poked around. I had done everything I could to cut off myself from him, so that he wouldn’t be able to read my mind. It seemed to have worked.

Layton was displaying a mixture of anger or shock— I couldn’t tell which emotion dominated. His hands were in fists, his teeth were clenched, and his eyes had grown a dark deep color.

He closed his eyes, and took a long breath, before letting it out. It almost made me go back on my words, but that wasn’t what I wanted. I had to be strong. I hated being strong, at least in that moment, but I had to.

“Why?” He asked, and I faintly heard when his voice broke.

Every moment I had ever seen Layton vulnerable had always been because of me. It only reinforced the thought that maybe I wasn’t meant to be with Wolves or with humans or with anybody. I was too different.

I was hurting Layton too. I was the only one who could ever hurt him, and that was something too strong for me to carry or to even comprehend.

“Why? That’s exactly what I’m wondering. I have so many questions, and barely any answers,” I replied.

“This is about you?” Layton asked.

I shook my head, and took a step away from him and closer to the window. Layton must’ve thought I was going to fly away once again, because he tried to reach out to me. I sidestepped him, and moved across the room.

“I’m vulnerable when I’m with you, and you’re the same with me. I don’t like it,” I told him, shaking my head. “But most of all, I’m never going to be okay with you killing people.”

“Rules are different with Werewolves, Cassidy,” Layton stated, like if that was an excuse that should have held up with me.

“A life is a life. You and Zev, and all those other Wolves,” I said, shaking my head. I was at loss for words, and Layton was making me choke up.

“You have no respect for life, Layton. You want to keep killing people — because that is what they ultimately are, they are people — just because they do something to hurt your ego. I’m human too. Wolves are human. Any creature that has a human side should be treated like one. Saying that rules are different for Werewolves shouldn’t be something that swings by. That isn’t fair, and you are not God.”

Layton didn’t speak for a few minutes, and I didn’t pressure him to do so. He was staring at me with calculating eyes. Nothing I said had gotten to him, not at least in the way I was hoping.

“You’re going to be the Luna of the pack. These things, they can be modified. Each pack has its own rules. Blue Bloods can be different. It can be what we make of it,” Layton said, yet all I heard were empty promises.

“I can’t,” I told him, and turned away, because I was already regretting my next words. “I don’t want this life any more than I want to be a Legen. I always thought I was a freak, that I was different. But I was able to live with that. I accepted what I was. You and your pack and Zev and his pack— all of you made me realize that I can be different. I can make a difference, and I will. But I won’t do that with you. I’m not like you.”

“You’re not leaving me,” Layton growled, and I suddenly felt him pressed against my back.

The shocks of electricity ran through me as soon as we came into contact. It was always the same thing. It would always be the same. Layton was my mate, but that didn’t mean I had to be with him.

It was difficult, but I managed to pull myself from him.

“You tried that once, and it didn’t work. I’m sorry, but it’s over,” I said, and those were my last words before leaving.

I made my escape through the same window where I entered. If I didn’t leave then, I was never going to do it.

I heard Layton’s growls and snarls, before a long loud howl was heard throughout the area. I was already up in the air, but the sound resounded through the sky.

I could feel his pain, and it was tearing me apart. I couldn’t understand what was happening, but I felt like if someone was gutting me inside. My chest was pounding too fast, but I also felt a pain shooting throughout my body.

I flew as fast I could manage until I couldn’t take the pain anymore. I was moaning out, trying to contain what was happening to me.

I landed messily, miles away from my home. My wings went into hiding even before I hit the ground. I didn’t know what was happening to my body, but it was freaking me out.

I was near Zev’s territory. The scent of his pack gave it away. I could barely concentrate on anything because the pain took over my entire body.

It grew to be too much, that body suddenly ignited in flames. I was crying out, for someone, anyone, but no one was there.

*Aaron, who appears briefly in this chapter, has his own story. It is titled True Love, and you can find it in my profile page.