Chapter 18 Nyx
Nyx
Acosmic shift almost knocks me off my feet. The ground trembles while the stars flicker overhead, as if a powerful surge were pulling them toward us. The world seems to shift on its axis, thrown off kilter.
The corner of my mouth lifts for the first time in a long time because, for once, I know exactly what has happened.
Lumi rejoined Wintermoon. She’s an alpha.
And the world gave her powers beyond any of us.
She took control of her wolf, ripped it from Ambrose, and no one will be able to take that from her again.
Good job, my love. I’m proud of you. You are worthy, trust that.
But I know my words die in my head, never reaching her, just like every other thought I’ve had that I wanted her to hear.
I shift into my own wolf, needing to just run and run and not think. So I do. Letting the cool, night air flood my face as I run.
I’m not alone, I realize quickly. I could outrun whoever it is, but something in me tells me to hesitate.
White fur, unlike anything I’ve ever seen before, flashes under the moonlight.
Untamed, pure beauty carved into a sleek, muscular frame.
She’s taller than before, yet still a half foot shorter than me.
Every movement ripples with endless power and confidence in her body that draws me to her until I’m transfixed.
I watch her run. Each of her strides is magnificent, as she seems to glide like a cloud of snow over the ground.
And then I see him.
Another wolf is hot on her heels. A low snarl is directed at her.
No fucking way.
I see red.
I don’t know who it is or why they are chasing her like they want to murder her, but fuck that. She doesn’t get to be attacked on her first day as an alpha. I refuse to let that be her story.
I leap, going straight for the brown-furred wolf with a death wish, knowing that I’ll easily be able to stop him. But stopping him isn’t enough. I want to rip out his throat. I want to murder him for what he did to her.
I tackle him to the ground, my teeth inches from his carotid.
The vampire in me that still lurks even now sharpens my fangs and begs me to sink my teeth in.
To taste the blood that I know is flowing.
It has no preference between wolf shifter, witch, or human blood.
It’s all the same to the predator within me.
The brown wolf doesn’t fight me. Doesn’t try to stop me. Like he thinks I won’t truly kill him.
He’s wrong.
I angle my head, moving toward him, when Lumi howls.
It’s the kind of howl that reverberates through you, down to your very soul. It stills every animal that hears it within a hundred miles and me.
I turn my head and gaze at her. I can’t not. It’s the howl of an alpha. One that commands me to leave the wolf beneath me in peace.
I howl back—alpha to alpha. And there’s a tingling where our bond used to be.
It’s not the same. Barely a whisper of what it once was.
But it’s there. The kind I share with other alphas.
The most rudimentary kind of bond that might allow an emotion or simple phrase through to each other when I’m doing alpha business.
“Let. Kael. Go.” Her command is crystal clear in my head. Gods, I’ve missed her. And now she has that raspy, commanding edge to her voice, threaded with something dangerous and powerful. Fuck me, I’ve never wanted her more. It’s going to take everything in me to control myself.
It takes me a second to realize that it’s Kael that I have pinned. Not that I care at all about his life. He’s nothing to me. An annoying cockroach that somehow wormed its way into Lumi’s life and has done more harm to her than good, as far as I can tell.
I go to release him when I feel the trepidation coming off Lumi. She became the de facto alpha of the Wintermoon pack. The gods sure as hell weren’t going to let this bastard become the alpha. I know that Kael was trying to challenge her. Trying to get her to see that she was deserving.
She doesn’t feel deserving. She doesn’t feel powerful enough. She doesn’t realize that she could initiate into nearly any pack, issue a challenge for alpha, and win, if she chose. I can feel it in her aura. This is who she was always meant to be. She just needs to believe it for herself.
“No,” I say back, my voice booming louder.
Her ears perk up in shock at my word. She thought I would give him up easily to her once I realized he wasn’t a real threat to her life.
But he is. Everyone is. Any one of us could kill her to fulfill the curse.
And she has to be strong enough to fight any one of us at any time.
She needs to be alpha and believe in the full strength of her position.
“Nyx,” she hisses in my head.
“Don’t move or you die,” I say to Kael, using my vampire mind control on him.
Kael freezes beneath me. Lumi notices. But she can’t tell me her thoughts. Not as freely as before.
I position myself between him and her. Waiting for her to decide what she’s going to do. Run or fight me.
“What the hell are you doing?! You could kill her!” Ambrose shouts through our bond.
“You let her run through the woods. You left her and Kael alone. He could have killed her.”
“If you fight her, you’ll definitely kill her.”
“That’s why you’re here. To make sure I don’t do that.”
“I’m not going to let you lay a finger on her.”
“You will. She needs this. Hide—ensure she doesn’t know you’re here protecting her. She needs to do this herself.”
“Nyx—don’t you—”
I block him out.
I don’t know if he’ll interfere, but it will destroy her confidence if he does.
I’m still standing. Still waiting to see what Lumi will do.
She growls in my direction, showing off her massive teeth as she continues to snarl at me to release Kael.
I snarl back, baring every ounce of the terrifying monster I can muster. I won’t kill the leech—no matter how much instinct demands it. For whatever incomprehensible reason, he’s her best friend. And it would shatter Lumi if I killed him.
But Lumi has lost all faith in me after she smelled Amora on me. She won’t believe I’m above not killing her best friend.
Finally, she attacks. She doesn’t leap straight at me in a rush of anger or blind emotion. She’s smarter than that. Calculated. Strategic. She cowers first, positioning her body back in the direction of my house and the others who could come to her aid. Like she’s waiting for help.
But she’s far too fearless to wait for help, too much of an alpha to allow others to risk their lives on her behalf.
The second she senses the slight drop in my guard, she strikes. One explosive jump of muscles that she’s never released before. All of her trust is put into this new body. Zero hesitation creeps into a single movement.
She doesn’t pull her punches. She goes directly for my jugular—a kill strike.
Maybe she intends to kill me. Or maybe she knows it’s the only way I’ll let her win.
That’s my girl.
Her teeth graze my neck, but I move before I allow her to take me out in a single bite.
Hazy flickers of each other’s thoughts and images float between us. “Not. Going. Kill. You.” Her thoughts float to me. “It’s. What. You. Want.”
Her paw strikes across my face, hitting me in the jaw. I strike back, putting my full body into it so that she doesn’t think I’m holding back against her. I’m not. I’m giving her as real a fight as I can manage without accidentally hurting her.
She snaps her jaws in my direction with another menacing snarl. “Not. What. You. Deserve.” Her clipped words hit me hard. She thinks I deserve worse than death. She’s right. I do.
As her words hit me, they distract me. She tackles me. Putting her full force into the hit.
We roll, both fighting for the top position.
She’s strong. Stronger than she’s ever been before. But I’m stronger, bigger, faster. And I have years of honing my wolf and alpha strength on her.
I pin her beneath me. She’s going to have to work smarter to beat me. I’m not going to just give her the win. Find a way to get Kael back, to win against me. She can’t use her pure strength.
Suddenly, she shifts. The strong, muscular wolf’s body shifts in an instant to her bare, naked, womanly form.
Fuck.
I try to scramble off her before I crush her. But I can smell her. Touch her. I haven’t been this close to her in too long and I…
I shift without thinking. Wolf to vampire. Because, as much as I miss being just human. I’m not just human.
She pins me to the ground, straddling me at my waist.
I suck in a deep breath. Fuck, I should earn so many awards for not touching her and fucking her senseless right now.
She smiles down at me, her lips curling in a she’s won victory.
I don’t think so.
But then I feel it. The sun’s rays flay my skin in a searing, merciless heat. Combined with her thighs pinning me to the ground, I truly can’t move.
She’s won.
And then, as if it’s not enough, a zap of magic hits me hard in the chest. Reminding me to keep my hands off what’s his.
“Fucking asshole,” I say in Ambrose’s mind.
“Keep your hands off her.”
“You win, love. You win.”
She sucks in a harsh breath. Watching in horror as my skin starts to bubble from the intensity of the sun.
If she doesn’t move me soon, I’ll die. A few more seconds, maybe a minute at most. But if this is how I’ll die, I’ll die the happiest man with the most beautiful woman in the world, naked, straddling me.
She realizes what’s about to happen and rolls us out of the sun quickly. Until I’m now that one on top of her, our bodies pressed firmly together. But the sun has made me incredibly weak. I can’t move even if I wanted to.
“You’re going to have to move me off of you, love,” I say.
But before she can move, Ambrose’s magic has me on my back.
I chuckle. He really is the type to get so possessive and jealous.
“You’re free,” I say to Kael. Who instantly shifts and runs over to Lumi’s side.
“You okay?” he hovers over her.
But she waves him off as she stands over me, looking down at me like she’s not sure what to make of me. But I see the heat in her eyes. The look that tells me exactly what she wants to do to me, even still. I see her wandering eye dip at the growing appendage between my legs.
I smirk and then say words that I know will cut her deep enough that she’ll let me go, “You still look at me like that, love, even though you know I’ve been in another woman’s bed.”
And then she slaps me before walking away without another word.
I sigh, closing my eyes, the smile never leaving my face. Lumi’s an alpha. She’s stronger than she’s ever been. Maybe she’s strong enough to survive after all.