The Hunted Wolf – Chapter 37

My heart raced as I went over every possibility of what was happening. Jori’s plea for friendship was all a lie. I was so naive, and I was furious with myself. But why would he bother to plead for friendship if he was just going to turn around and ambush the pack house. It made no sense.

“Come with me quietly, and we won’t have any issues,” Jori said, reaching down to grab my wrist.

Mark! Help! I linked, desperate for his help.

I shifted away, so I was standing directly behind him. “Do you honestly think I’m just going to go with you quietly?”

Jori growled. “I warned you not to do anything I’ll make you regret.” He lunged at me, pulling some sort of long stick out of his pocket.

I took a step back, easily dodging his blow. “Do you really think you’re going to get away with this? Others are going to be here any second.”

Jori stopped and smirked at me. “Take a look around. No one is coming to help you.”

A sinking feeling filled my stomach. I knew the house was too quiet. “What did you do to everyone?”

“Don’t worry. They’re not dead. They are just having a nice long nap. They’ll stay alive if you agree to come with me.” Jori’s eyes flashed black, but this time the darkness completely overtook his eyes, staying there.

“Who are you?” I asked, taking a step back. I knew something was wrong with Jori, but it was starting to come together for me. Jori wasn’t the type to threaten the lives of others. He was the type to save his former best friend, even though there was bad b***d between them.

His smile deepened, and he took a few steps towards me. “I’m Jori, of course.”

“No, you’re not. Jori would never do this.” I kept stepping back, trying to keep as much distance between us as possible.

Mark, I tried linking again, desperation filling my voice. Whoever this was had done something to the pack, and I was worried Mark was hurt. Even if he was asleep, he should still be able to feel our mate bond.

“Do you know Jori, though? You’ve known him for what, a few months? How do you know what Jori, what I would really do?” His stride quickened in pace.

I went through the steps of what Ginger had taught me today. I quickly made an energy ball and threw it at Jori. He winced as it hit him, but it barely seemed to affect him, which made no sense. I threw another one at him, making sure to put the intent of protecting the pack behind it. The attack hit his shoulder, which threw him off for a moment, but he still approached me.

I turned on my heels and started running, not knowing what else to do. If my magic wasn’t strong enough to stun Jori, my other option was to run. I bolted towards the living room, trying to give myself more time to concoct a plan. I heard footsteps following me, making my heart race faster. I wasn’t going to just give up, even if he was stronger than me.

I put my hand on the arm chair and used my magic to throw the chair back. It flung at Jori with great speed, but he held up his hand, shattering the chair into little pieces just by lifting his hands. He definitely used magic to protect himself, and I knew he was possessed by the Son of B***d and Magic. Nothing else made sense.

I burst through the front door, unsure of where to run, but I had to do something. As I scurried down the stairs, Jori suddenly appeared in front of me, hitting my face with the back of his hand with such a force it knocked me to the ground.

“I didn’t want to hurt you, but you didn’t give me much of a choice,” Jori said. He crouched down next to me.

I reached up and felt b***d on my l*p dripping down. A strange calm fell over me. I looked up at the sky and saw the moon shining down on me, as if it was casting a protective light over me. I took a deep breath, searching deep inside of me.

Jori stabbed something in my neck, and I felt all of my powers diminishing. My eyes felt heavy, and my body was growing weak.

“What was that?” I asked, fighting the sleep trying to take over.

“Don’t worry about it.” He placed his hand on my chin and held it for a moment. “All will be as it’s supposed to.”

My body collapsed below me, giving out before my mind. It was hard to keep my eyes open, but I fought as hard as possible.

Mark, please, I linked one last time, hoping I would get through to him.

“Did it go as planned?” a new voice said.

“I have her, don’t I?”

“You were supposed to hurt her.”

“She resisted.”

I lifted my head as much as possible, and I saw Cain standing next to Cain. My heart squeezed tighter as I saw this. Cain was working with Jori.

–

MARK I woke up with a sharp pain in my head. My head was pounding, and the light in the room almost felt like it was burning my eyes. It almost felt like I was hungover, which was impossible. Something was wrong, but I didn’t know what yet. I sat up, and my back was sore from the position I was in. There was a blanket on me, and I could smell Adira on it. She must have put it on me after I fell asleep.

I looked around, but I didn’t see her here. Normally, I was the first one awake, but maybe I needed the extra sleep.

Where are you? I linked her.

I didn’t move while waiting for her to respond. My body ached, and my head was throbbing. Maybe I had caught some sort of weird virus. It was a rare occurrence in werewolves, but it did happen. I closed my eyes and focused on my breathing.

Why wasn’t Adira responding?

Are you okay, love?

Still no response. I forced myself to stand up. It was strange for Adira to not respond in a few minutes. The room spun a little as I stood, and I had to use the chair to steady myself. After a moment, I made my way out of the room. Everything was strangely quiet. Ever since Pack Lyna started staying with us, the house was never quiet, except for when most people were asleep. Even then, it wasn’t this quiet.

I went down the stairs, trying to find anyone, and I froze when I saw the living room. Furniture was broken and scattered everywhere. A fight had clearly gone down here, but why wasn’t I woken up? Everyone knew to contact the alpha if anything as serious as a fight happened, and broken furniture indicated a large fight. My heart raced as I searched everywhere for someone, but there seemed to be no one downstairs.

I burst through the back door and took a big sniff. I could smell a werewolf not too far away from here. I ran, following the scent as I went. I paused when I saw Darian face down in the dirt behind the pack house. He was in charge of the night patrol last night. Something seriously went wrong.

I ran to his side and gently turned him over. His chest was heaving up and down, so I knew he was still alive. I shook him gently, trying to wake him up.

Darian opened his eyes, groaning as he did. “Why is the sun so damn bright?”

“What happened last night?” I asked, helping him sit up.

He squinted his eyes, looking around the best he could. “I was making my rounds around the pack house. I heard a noise, so I went to investigate it. That’s the last thing that happened.”

I grabbed Darian’s hand and pulled him to his feet. “I can’t find anyone in the pack house. I think we were attacked last night, but I have no idea what happened.”

Darian started processing everything that was going on a little faster. “Is anyone hurt?”

“I’m not sure yet. You were the first person I found,” I said. “I tried linking Adira, but she’s not responding.”

Darian furrowed his brows. “She wasn’t in your room last night?”

I tried to force the panic of not knowing where my mate was down from the surface. I didn’t know anything for sure yet, and it would be no good for me to start to panic. “I think she was there at some point. Her scent was in the room, but I fell asleep before she came to bed, and she wasn’t there when I woke up.”

Darian grabbed my arm, giving me a reassuring squeeze. “She’s around here somewhere. We’ll find her. We’ll find everyone.”

I had my doubts with Darian’s statement. It was strange that I hadn’t seen anyone in the pack house when walking through it. If everyone was drugged, surely their unconscious bodies would be lying around somewhere. Darian was okay and alive though. That was the only hope I had. If whoever was here had severe malintent, Darian would be dead. I hoped the others were okay, and I hoped we would find Adira soon.

I nodded my head, trying to make sure I was acting like a leader and not a panicked mate right now. “Okay, let’s go find everyone.”

Darian and I considered splitting up to look for the others, but we decided it was best to err on the side of caution and stick together on the chance that the ambushers were still around. We found a few other warriors tucked away in some bushes nearby. They were in the same condition as Darian, confused with a major headache. Once we filled them in on the situation, they added to the search.

Inside the pack house, several people were tucked away in closets. Whoever did this made a point to make sure it wasn’t easy to see the werewolves passed out. They also made a point to make sure everyone was unharmed. I was relieved for the safety of my pack and Pack Lyna, however, something about it didn’t sit right with me. The longer we looked without finding Adira, the more worried I grew.

Once enough warriors were in a condition to help with the search for the missing members, I made my way upstairs to look for Zayla. I went to her office first to see if she had passed out there. When I opened the door, I saw Zayla drawing b***d from her arm. She didn’t bother to look up at me.

“Don’t worry, Alpha. I will figure out what this drug is that was used on us,” Zayla said. She finished drawing her own b***d and then proceeded to label it. “I could use a sample of your b***d as well.”

“Of course.” I rolled up my sleeve and walked over to her. I sat in the patient’s seat and held my arm out to her.

She quickly drew the b***d and then made another label for mine. “I’m curious about how this drug was administered to the pack so efficiently. It definitely wasn’t something ingested. That would have been too inconsistent. Perhaps a gas. Do you know if anyone was unaffected?”

“It seems like everyone we come across was affected so far.”

Zayla put a bandaid on my arm. “Interesting.” She finished what she was doing and then paused, staring me directly in the eyes. “She’s still alive.”

My heart raced at her words. I knew exactly who she was talking about. I was trying not to think about what happened to Adira. We were still finding pack members. But it was hard not to jump to the worst-case scenario. “You don’t know that.”

“She’s still alive,” Zayla repeated.

“Zay, how do you know she’s alive? We still don’t know where she is.” This thought scared me more than anything. Several people were after Adira, and if they had taken her, I didn’t know if she was hurt or scared or even alive.

“She has to be alive. Alpha would be too sad otherwise.

“We don’t know that yet. Until I know where she is, until I hear her voice again, until I know she is safe in my arms, it’s impossible to know if she’s alive or dead.” My chest tightened at the thought. There was something about saying it out loud that made it too real for me.

The door to Zayla’s office flung open, and someone from Pack Lyna burst in. “Alpha Mark, come quick. We found b***d.”