Vyra

My fingers break first.

They fracture like branches, brittle from the winter winds. My scream rips out of me, growing in time with the claws that erupt from my nail beds.

I fall forward on my hands and knees, wet blood beneath me in a wine-colored puddle. My vision swims at the gory image, but I have little time to care. My spine snaps in three places, forcing me into a hunched position.

I feel my neck stretch, my jaw unhinging. My gums ache as my teeth begin to climb into peaks within my skull.

Screams shatter my thoughts. The sound of a million heartbeats pounds loudly over every cracking bone. Shouts and curses from miles away are as noisy as the wind roaring outside the cave. My ears are flooded with the sudden loudness of my surroundings, and I cannot cover them.

My arms elongate, and the outcasts sitting beside me flinch out of the way. My hips splay as my legs curdle like milk.

Am I going to die?

It feels like it, as my organs wage war inside of my body. My vision dims even further, and the chaos around me begins to look like shadow puppets against the light. My body crashes to the floor, as I can no longer hold myself up.

I am alone, and not a single soul would care if I left this world. In fact, they would rejoice.

What is happening to me? I am sure someone cursed me, using the ways of the spiritual realm to torture and then kill me for daring to exist. For humiliating the pack by being the Alpha's fated mate.

"Breathe child! Keep your eyes open for goddess's sake."

I hear the Mistress's wailing voice, distant but real. I try to focus on the sound, yet my body does not follow the commands of my mind.

"Be brave, you can get through this!" The voice calls again, and I try. I will try. But I have never been strong. Not a single day in my pathetic life.

"Wake up." A deeper voice calls to me, familiar though in my pain I do not care to place it. It rings over the sounds of chaos, and the screaming older woman next to me.

Just when I thought my body would finally give up, my eyes opened as the pain began to subside.

Mistress.

Hearing a strange animalistic whine, I jump from my lying position. I swivel my head to the side, trying to run from the direction of the threat.

I look to the old woman for help, and everything is wrong. Wrong. I see every wrinkle in her face, clear as the lines of an ancient pine. Her eyes were a brilliant amber when I always believed them to be a dark brown.

I see her fear. I smell its ripeness. Its iron taste taints my tongue. I feel too much. I want it all to end. The colors are too bright, the sounds too vibrant. The fire is like the sun, and I wish to close my eyes against it.

"Vyra? Do you hear me?" The old woman holds up her hands in surrender, using a sweet tone I had never been the recipient of before, "Do not move. You have changed into your wolf form, and if you so much as breathe wrong any being in here will not hesitate to kill you."

I want to laugh, thinking the Mistress had finally lost it after years of being a tyrant. I look down, ready to make sense of why I have been in such pain, and why I am still alive. My body freezes in absolute horror.

My human body no longer existed. Where my hands once were, were giant fucking paws. I was covered in brilliant white fur.

My mind simply cannot make sense of it.

I cannot change. One of them must have eaten me.

My voice does not leave my throat as I attempt to scream.

No.

Instead, a piercing howl claws its way out of my lungs. Cries and gasps erupt around me from the pack members, a symphony of horror. My furred neck cranes as I strain towards the ceiling, my pain and confusion a never-ending sonnet.

The room seems to swell with the belief that I would retaliate, ripping all of them to pieces. Clan members start to pull out weapons, others bringing their younger children away from my corner of the room. I remain alone in my agony, as I call to the moon and ask her why she cursed me.

My body collapses once again, convulsing as I somehow morph back into a human. My bones snapped harshly into place, my skin forming its way across me once again. My skin burns, my throat scorched as my howls turn back into human yelps.

Gasping on the floor on all fours, my human vision remains on the dark stone below my hands. I revel in the harsh feel of it against my soft palms. Wounds still cover my skin, but I am alive. I am a wolf no longer, in a familiar body that is in tune with my mind.

I shake, unable to handle the meaning of what just occurred, barely feeling the cloth that the Mistress wrapped hastily over my naked and bloodied body.

"Get up girl." The Mistress seethes into my ear. My body rejects her, feeling sick as she hoists me up with her bony arms alone, "You do not have a choice!"

I use her to rest all of my body weight on her. Barely able to lift my head, I try to look around the room. Every single Lycan stared at me, with varying degrees of horror. In most, I saw the truth.

They wanted me dead.

"Please."  I try to plead, loud enough just for those closest to hear. Cyrus from Clan Umbra steps forward with a spear, and I try to get my voice to work again. I burrow myself into the Mistress's shoulder, and she does not push me away. "Please, I did not know-"

"End this abomination this instant, as your father should have years ago! End her at once!" An elderly man from Clan Sol spews from across the room, his eyes blazing with fire.

I do not look at Seren. I never want to look at him again, for I would rather burn than see the accusation in his eyes.

"She has been given the blessing of the moon, by Lunae herself. Our divine law states that a Lycan with the ability to transform without the direct light of the moon is a contender to become an Alpha. You must go through-" The Priestess suddenly stopped. I did not have to look up to know Seren had been the one to make her stop talking.

My body trembled without end. I kept my head down, my tears trailing across my face freely. I kept repeating my plea for my life, as I knew what was in store for me.

There were only two beings who could transform into Lycans without the moon. The Alpha himself, and the heir who could dethrone them. As Alpha heirs were usually passed through bloodlines and to the firstborn males, this was never usually an issue. Only when the moon goddess decided to play with fate, did Alpha heirs appear.

It was rare.

It happened during my father's reign.

It couldn't happen to me. I could not be Seren's rival or his mate. This was all wrong, and equally strange.

"She's a woman!" yelled one Lycan.

Problem number one. No Alpha, blood heir, or blessed heir was female in the history of our kind. 

Mistress scorned the bloodthirsty crowd, "Vyra never changed before this moment, I watched her since she was a child. She is a hybrid, someone messed with the spirits to make this happen."

Problem two, I did not possess a Lycan body. Never once after years outside and under the moon did I change, not until tonight.

"She is the bastard daughter of the traitor, and she should be dealt with. Swiftly." Cyrus growled. I could feel his aggressive presence encroaching, and I wished to hide further in myself. I felt his breath on the top of my scalp as he attempted to intimidate me, "The little runt will die anyways."

"Please," I whisper, shaking.

My Mistress was ripped from me, and I could hear her struggling. I did not dare lift my head to watch. My heart ached in an unfamiliar manner, as the woman who had been cruel to me all my years fought to keep me alive. I knew her efforts would have little influence on what happened.

It still made me feel less forgotten.

"Where have you been hiding that beast inside you all this time? Was the old you just an act, Vyra?" Cyrus spits out my name like poison, his body coming closer. His breath curled around my ear, and I squeezed my eyes shut as I awaited my suffering, "What else is hiding within that weak, unworthy skin of yours? Come on Fracti, show me those claws. Make one more failed assassination attempt before I rip your guts out." The werewolf grinned coldly, "It will not bring your family back."

I opened my eyes slightly, just to see that he let his claws unfurl. No one made any move to stop him, even as he lightly scraped them over my stomach. I whimpered, moving away from the Lycan. His laughter sent dread down my re-formed spine.

"Touch her, and I will make sure you never use that hand again." The Alpha's rich voice invaded the space beside me, authoritative and final in his word.

His presence was a force. I could already feel him there before he spoke. It provided me no comfort, even as Cyrus moved away from me. His claws remained at full length.

"I am sorry." The man said, falling back in with the rest of Clan Umbra. "Make your father proud and end her."

This is it, I am going to die. I have nothing to show for it.

Falling to my knees and letting my head fall back towards the sky, I accept my fate. I do not want to fight. I keep my eyes tightly shut, not wanting to see the silver my father saw during his last moments alive.

I gave the Alpha a clear path to my throat. His strike will be true, and I will bleed out within seconds. I tell myself that is how quick death is, only a fraction of a moment compared to the endless heartache I endured.

I will no longer live a life in exile, as an outcast.

I will be free.

A smile spreads across my face at the thought, and my tears seem to come from bitter-sweet relief.

"Get up." The Alpha's voice is deep, velvet against the roaring of chaos. My body betrays me as I realize he is speaking to me.

Why does he sound so amused?

When I open my eyes to look at the Alpha above me, he shows no signs of any humor. He is practically carved from stone as he glares down from his stark height. I stare at his corded muscles, knowing he could spare me any pain with one swipe of his hand. 

Seren is what I believe death to be. So beautiful you die inside slowly first. And when he cuts you down, you do not weep. You willfully accept his devastating last embrace.

"Please-" Just end me, do as they ask.

End our agony.

The Alpha took one more step forward, his silver eyes piercing me before his claws ever got the chance. He narrowed them on me before answering in a low voice, "I am not going to kill you." His words were clipped, like speaking to me took more effort than it was worth. No, of course, he would not kill me yet.

He would try to torture information out of me, though I had none to give.

The Alpha then regarded the crowd of Lycan that formed around us with a more lethal edge to his tone. He faced slightly away from me, his profile cutting through the firelit shadows of the cave, startling and without fault. The ceremonial silver chains around his honed body rattled even with careful movements, "Anyone who attempts her life in the meantime will be executed by me."

What? Why?

For a moment, I thought that I had died, and this was my hellish afterlife. The crowd of Lycan seemed to agree, as they jeered and called for my blood once again. More than half the beings wore expressions of shock and disgust at the decision.

A more striking realization cut through the confusion.

It was the Alpha himself that called to me, just when I was going to give up.

"Seren you cannot do this-" Cyrus started, his laugh cynical. He looked at the Alpha like he had lost his mind.

I could not see his face, but surely the Alpha did not like that response. The much taller man squared his shoulders at his supposed friend, his head cocking to the side. The entire chasm went silent as the dead.

"I can. And I will." I am left breathless by the sheer power in his voice, which seems to make even Cyrus appear like a small pup next to their leader. He draws his shoulders back, and I can see the visible strength in him, as if he were holding back the wolf inside of him, "Question me again, and I will not hesitate to make you the first example."

Why?

I am left in a state of denial, shock, and utter fear. There would be no reason for the Alpha to wish to spare my life out of the good of his heart, considering my family name and the blessing of the Alpha placed on me. Fated mates or not.

I am the sole person who could steal everything he had from him. Seren knew that, and still let me live.

It just meant that something worse was waiting for me in the future.

When he turns to me, I am unable to move. My knees are still bound to the stone floor. My chest tightens in time with my stomach, as Seren looks at me with dizzying suspicion.

"You are coming with me. Alone."

He stepped closer to me but did not offer a hand to help me up. Still shaking, I slowly lift myself from the floor. It feels like I have fallen from the top of a cliff and crashed into the waving sea below.

I know that I am altered forever.

My skin tingles with the understanding that something beastly now lurks inside me, waiting for a chance to escape. Heat erupts over my body as I right myself, the entire right side of me nearly meeting the barely dressed Alpha as I stumbled over my unsteady feet.

I try to ignore the twisting of my stomach, the bolt of ice that impaled my heart at being so close to him. I imagine that his eyes flit across my face, settling along my mouth. The corner of his lips drew downward, disappointed by what he saw. His scowl only deepened as I righted myself and backed further away, not daring to touch him. My cheeks erupt in flame, a red flood that spreads to my chest and my temples.

Afraid. I was afraid. He could probably smell it pouring out of me. If he had no other reason to reject me, he would hate me on principle alone. A great Alpha, bound to a skittish rabbit of a being.

The Alpha turned, and without acknowledging that I was following, began to make his way out of the cave. I am left without choice, but to quickly fall in line behind him.

I turn to look back at the other outcast, maybe for the last time. I see my friends huddling together, refusing to look at me as I beg them wordlessly for salvation. Years of our shared plight meant nothing, and I could not ask them to risk themselves to help prove my passive nature. I caught my Mistress's eyes, and she shook her head.

Her warning told me that I was right in my assumptions.

Whatever the Alpha has planned for me, I am doomed.