Reality shatters inside me like a glass being blown to pieces. They then disintegrate into glass dust and disappear with the air. They make me question if I have perceived reality wrong all this time.

Or... perhaps I am in a dream?

I can't move for those initial seconds. My eyes keep blinking themselves, hoping that with each blink the sight in front of me will disappear, that I will wake up from this nightmare, or that they are just pictures that my mind makes up.

With every second passing, I hold my breath, hoping that it is not real.

That is not me. Can't Lyall see how her face and body are so different from mine?

It can't be real, right?

That is not me!

THAT IS NOT ME!

Please...

...This can't be real.

But the pictures in front of me won't disappear. Worse, time keeps on moving, not caring that I haven't been able to process what's in front of me. In the next cruel seconds, Lyall undresses the woman right in front of me. His firm yet gentle movement breaks my heart, making it bleed right on the spot.

Seeing him smile and laugh at the woman feels like a stab to me. Didn't he say I am the only one who can make him laugh like that? Can't he see that that woman is not me?

His touch is supposed to be mine. His warmth is mine.

He vowed that to me just a few hours ago.

"Lyall!" I try to shout his name, try to reach our bond deep inside. I can feel it. The bond is like a tightly tied knot that connects both of our mental states. Ever since we have claimed each other, the mental walls surrounding our consciousness have softened, allowing us to check up on each other's thoughts once in a while.

But right now... I can't enter his mind at all. He has his mental walls up so high and thick that not even Sasha can even claw her way in.

No matter how loud I scream inside, no matter how hard I bang on the walls, my voice can't pass through the wall.

"Lyall!!" I scream out his name again. And again. And again. But it seems like they can't hear me. I look at our surroundings. The warriors in hiding are supposed to realize that this is wrong, right?

In a frantic, I run towards them, thinking that perhaps if Lyall can see me, he'd snap to his senses.

My feet stumble upon something solid on the ground. As soon as my body hits the ground, my face turns instinctively to see what it is that makes me fall.

I don't think my heart is beating as soon as I see the pale, slumped face next to the tree bark. It's a man dressed in a black cloak. From his scent, I can tell that he is a werewolf. His claws are out, his eyes are opened, but they are lifeless. His neck has been turned into an awkward angle. And his skin is bluish on the lips.

It's a corpse.

Before I prop myself up, my eyes search for other spots where I know our warriors should be hiding. I sniff the air several times too and heightened my sense of hearing.

The tang smell of blood fills my nostrils. And no heartbeats in the vicinity other than Lyall's, my own, and that woman's.

Why have I only realized this now? I was so preoccupied seeing Lyall with another woman that I let my guard down, that I blocked all my other senses.

We have been compromised. Our warriors have been murdered.

Does that mean Lyall has been manipulated? Or was it all just an illusion, after all?

Without finishing my trail of thoughts, my feet have moved again. I get up and run towards Lyall while calling his name out loud. But it seems like an invisible force field has been blocking my voice from reaching him. That, however, doesn't stop me from raising my voice even more and fastening my steps.

I need to get to him. I need to save him.

The moment my feet step into the clearing, I see a flash of darkness under me. My shadow seems to move on its own. And in a fraction of a second, I hear a boy screaming inside my head, "Mars, run!!"

It's Sky's voice.

My heart lurches at the speed of light. Something is terribly wrong.

But before I can turn around and flee, I hear someone clicking their tongue loudly in annoyance very close to my ear.

The next second, I feel a gush of wind on my face. The force is so strong that I am thrown back until my back hits a large bark of a tree. My shoulder blades scream in pain from the impact. In that moment of panic, my hands go to my belly. Whatever happens, I have to protect my baby.

A strong hand grips my neck mercilessly. The nails puncture deep into my skin. It's so hard to breathe that my eyes are becoming blurry.

When my eyes focus again, all I see is a dark-haired woman smiling widely. But something seems wrong. Because as my eyes travel to the surrounding space... I don't recognize the place. It's like we have been transported somewhere else. I try to console the fear creeping up my spine.

Calm down, Mars. Calm down and think.

Lyall will find me. He promised.

That's when I hear the howling. It's Lyall, calling for me. I can hear the worry and panic in his voice. Yet still, I can't reach him through our bond. Something must have blocked our connection.

I want to howl back, but Adina's grip on my throat prevents me from doing so. What's bothering me, even more, is the way her eyes change as soon as she hears the howl. Those eyes are burning with hatred and emptiness at the same time. It's a strange combination, as if she has expected this would happen, but she despises it nonetheless.

If fire can turn black, her eyes are the embodiment of that. Her gaze makes my skin crawl. The hair on the back of my neck rises.

Yet somehow, I can feel the anguish behind those eyes. And I can't help, for a few short seconds, to wonder if Adina has been hurting too all this time. I find myself pitying her.

"Adina," I whisper her name despite her hand strangling me.

Sasha screams inside me, cursing my pregnant state that won't allow us to transform. My only defense is my claws and the knife I have been holding on to. But the moment I flick my right hand, I realize that I have dropped the knife on the forest floor when Adina pushes me.

Adina flicks her hand, and shadows emerge from the tree. They grab both of my hands and pull them tightly to the back, causing me unable to move. I grunt in anger. Panic courses through every part of my vein at the realization that I am helpless at this moment.

"Cute," Adina mocks me with that eerie smile of hers. Then she clicks her tongue again. "That bastard Shadow Walker dared to defy me for you. How annoying."

I blink as I try to calm myself down. I need to stop moving around to preserve the oxygen within me. That's when my mind makes the connection.

"You kidnapped Sky," I whisper. "You took his power."

That was why I could hear Sky's voice. Somehow, Sky found a loophole while Adina was using his power and sent a warning to me through the shadows. And this angers Adina even more.

Adina's smile fades so fast. Her eyes look at me sharply. "Sky?" she spits in my face. "You named my pet? How dare you?"

I throw my face to the right, so her spit doesn't hit my eyes directly. Then I return my gaze to her. How dare I?

How dare she call that boy a pet? I didn't even realize I have been looking at her with anger until she points it out to me. "What?" she raises her chin. "You care for that pet?"

"He was just a pet I made so Lyall would love me again," she continues in that fake sultry voice of hers. "He was so eager to please me that he'd do anything for me to name him. He thought by me naming him, I would finally consider him as my son. I was supposed to name him, not you. Like I was supposed to marry Lyall, not a nobody like you!"

Her grip on my neck tightens. Choking sounds come out of my throat. My vision blurs again, and I can feel my face reddening.

"How dare you waltz your way into a life that is supposed to be mine!" she screams at my face. "How dare you just take everything I have built in this kingdom effortlessly? You don't deserve Lyall. A lowly female werewolf like you doesn't deserve anything you have right now!"

I know she is angry. But the way her eyes look at me proves to me that there is a hint of sadness behind her anger.

"Give it back!" she cries out. "Give everything back!"

I am struggling so hard to breathe that I didn't realize it when she put her hand on my belly. Her eyes shoot down.

"No..." It hurts so much to talk, to fight against her strong grip. We are talking about a fully grown female lycan here, who I know has warrior blood inside her. "No, please no...," I cry out, "Don't do anything to my baby. Please! Please!!"

No matter how hard I try to pull my hands from the tree, the shadows wouldn't budge. Fear has stimulated my adrenaline to keep trying. Yet nothing I do is strong enough against her, against Sky's power that she has taken.

My muscles have failed me while fear keeps on flowing to every inch of my veins. My heart races and my mind can't think straight anymore.

"Don't..."

Adina's smile blooms yet again as soon as she sees me crumbling like this. The more she smiles, the more fear takes its root inside me.

I could just be imagining it. But one shadow intertwines itself with my fingers without Adina knowing. It brings a slight warmth and... I can feel its regret. Somehow, I just know that it's Sky telling me he is sorry. The fact that I am not completely alone at that moment soothes me only a bit.

"It's time to push, Werewolf Girl," Adina sneers. Then she puts her lips right next to my ear and whispers again, "Push, if you want her to be safe." She caresses my belly with her drawn-out claws.

It isn't time yet for me to give birth. But suddenly, an unbearable pain radiates in my belly. It's sharp, and it burns so much that I can't help but scream at the top of my lungs. My mind is empty of any thoughts as soon as I feel a warm, thick liquid snaking my inner thighs.

I can only think of the pain.

And the fear.

And the agony of not knowing whether my baby will be safe.

That one shadow tightens its grip on my fingers, and I find myself gripping it back as I keep on screaming.

The pain just seems to never end. But the fear... the fear is what makes it unbearable.

***

–Lyall–

"Where is she?" I bellow in the clearing. My heart races wildly as worry seeps into me like poison.

All the warriors we have stationed in the clearing have been murdered. Lycans, werewolves, faes. All are dead.

They are all slumped on a tree, with their necks bent at awkward angles. The moment I smell the decaying scent of their bodies, I call for backup with my mind. Only I can mind link my warriors. Then I rush to the clearing, hoping that Mars is okay.

Along the way, I find half of Mars's dress in a bush. And I can trace her scent until the clearing. But when I try to figure out where she has gone next, the scent stops.

It's like she just disappears.

My mind becomes frantic as worry turns into fear. How can this happen? We have thought of all loopholes, thought of all precautions we have to take. We spent days and nights perfecting this plan, even wasting time and effort to lure some of Adina's supporters to our side. We took measures to make sure a rebellion can't happen.

This isn't supposed to happen! This doesn't make sense.

Where is my wife?

Unless Adina has somehow gained an unexpected magical ability, she couldn't possibly take down all these warriors at the same time and then vanish with Mars.

I thought that perhaps there is a mole between us. And the moment Athena, who is on standby some distance away from the clearing, gets here, I almost bite off her neck out of anger at the possibility of having a mole. If it isn't for Helios who stops me, I would have injured my sister. Once Athena talks sense to me, I calm down.

We will get to the bottom of the problem later. What's important now is to find Mars. My mate.

My wife.

Where is she?

"Where is she?" I howl loudly into the night, hoping that she can hear me because I can't reach her mentally. It's like she has a concrete wall up that is preventing me from crossing over.

I don't like this. No, I vehemently hate this.

If only I can't feel, I might have been able to think clearly and act objectively. But ever since she came into my life, I have embraced the emotions that I thought were lost to me. I have come to love the way she makes me lose my mind, the way she makes me laugh, the way she makes me feel warm on the inside.

But... if losing her feels like this... It's torture. It's as if a thousand swords with fire pierce through my chest.

Just when I thought things couldn't get any worse... I hear her scream.

It's loud, full of agony and fear. And it's far. Much further than we predicted Mars could be.

My heart stops at that moment, it's probably been torn completely by now.

Oh, Goddess.

Then my feet move on their own. I run through the forest with all my might, demanding my feet to be faster with every second passing.

Why is she so far away?

Why can't I be faster? I need to be faster.

I promised her she will be fine. Please...

If I can trade my position with her, dear Goddess, I would without hesitation.

***

–Sky–

Adina has chained me on top of a pentagram carved deeply on the wooden floor. The spell she has cast on me makes me unable to move. She made a deep gash on my stomach, carving it to resemble the large pentagram on the floor. Each side of the pentagram has a symbol. I notice one of the symbols is the fertility mark.

Oh, each slice she made was pure agony. Even my shadows curled in fear.

My blood has flowed nonstop for hours. It fills every dent of the floor carvings from the center to the outer part. The more my blood fills the pentagram, the lesser my connection to my shadows. It's like something is draining me of my power and my life's energy. If this keeps up, I won't survive.

I need to warn Lyall that Adina is coming to get to Mars.

The deal we made in the dungeon was that I would help Lyall weaken some of Adina's supporters. And then my final task was to kill Albus. What I didn't know is that Adina has escaped from the Dark Tower with the help of rogue werewolves.

She promised those rogues power that can make them the most powerful pack in the world. And to do that, she made them kidnap fertile females from all kingdoms, even kidnapping humans from another realm. They thought Adina would only use the females as 'rare commodities' as bargains with other packs and kingdoms.

But as I have been listening, though I have been in a state of deliriousness for weeks now, it turns out that Adina has been using the fertile females to siphon their energies. It's a forbidden art, one that even I, a Shadow Walker, shivers when it's mentioned. Life energies from fertile females can be used to create magic with a forbidden spell. Man-made magic.

It's a barter of energies. To produce magic, life energies need to be taken by nature. In other words, Adina has been sacrificing those fertile females to gain her own magical ability. She then used her new ability to get out of the Dark Tower undetected.

However, man-made magic... is unnatural. And thus, it always appears to be dark and unstable. Lycan bodies or any other bodies other than Shadow Walkers are never meant for such darkness.

This is where I come in.

She needs my dark magic to stabilize the magic in her veins.

She had planned for this to happen. She kept me around in the Dark Tower, not because she wanted me. It has always been because she needs me for this moment.

"I gave up my blood to create you," she told me with a smirk as she cut out my gut. "It's only natural for you to give your blood to me now so I can be powerful."

Yet the saddest part of it all was when she said, "I need to be powerful enough so Lyall can love me again."

Until the end, she is just a woman who wants to be loved by the man she loves. Just like me, who sought her love as a mother.

Fool.

I understand now that we can't force love. And that I was chasing the wrong love when what's right for me has been in front of me all this time. Mars's smiling and radiant face keeps coming up in my mind as I alternate between being awake and unconscious.

I miss her so much.

I... have come to love her.

Right then, at the witching hour of the night, somehow, my shadows feel a tug. A vision plays in my mind. It's a dark forest with a large clearing in the middle. On one side of the clearing, I see Mars stumbling to the forest floor because of a dead body.

Her face is full of horror. I can see her entire body is shaking.

But she gets up and tries to enter the clearing where Adina has been standing, waiting for her, with a devilish smile.

No... Mars is walking on a trap.

Not caring about the pain in my stomach, or the huge amount of blood loss I have, I scream with all my might. "Mars, run!!"

I don't even know if my voice will get through to her. Heck, I don't even know how my shadows can show me this vision even when they have been taken over by Adina now. My eyes flick to the one corner of the pentagram where my blood has not filled. One side of my mouth quirks upward slightly knowing that my shadows must have liked Mars as much as I like her too. So they rebel against Adina. Even if they are slowly losing as my blood keeps on spreading on the pentagram.

Luckily, after a few hours, blood clots can form and slow the blood flow. It gives my shadows the narrow window they need to help me warn Mars.

I am so happy when I see that Mars can hear me.

But the moment she tries to run, Adina has caught up with what happened. Then Adina yanks the shadow's connection from me roughly. She appears close to Mars, teleports them both to another part of the forest, and pushes Mars to a tree.

My eyes flick yet again to that one corner of the pentagram. My blood flow has halted so much that I don't think that corner will be filled anytime soon.

I have a chance. A slim chance. But it's still something.

With a racing heart and no time for doubts, I reach out to my shadows in the forest again. My connection is weakening. But damn it. I am the Shadow Walker.

Adina is just a lycan female.

I am the one with the greater power.

So I grab the shadows in my mind, and with all the strength I can muster, I pull some of them to my side again. The vision of the forest appears in my mind again. I can see what my shadows are seeing now.

My heart lurches to the ground as I see Adina using magic to force Mars to give birth. Mars's screams pierce through my ears. Seeing her in so much pain makes me so angry. I hate my uselessness. That I can't prevent this from happening to her, the one person who has accepted me as I am. The one person who has not judged me based on how I was born.

I hate not being able to save the woman who has given me a beautiful name.

Damn it.

I grit my teeth and force my eyes to focus. I clench my fists on my sides. I can feel the tight ropes around my body.

There is not enough time for me to escape now. I need to call for help for Mars, while Adina has not noticed me gaining some control of the shadows again. My first thought goes to Lyall. But he is so far away in the lycan kingdom.

So who can I ask for help?

Just a few hundred meters away, I see a village full of werewolves. Among the werewolves, there is a huge black wolf, who seems to be preparing to leave the pack with a few other werewolves to hunt.

Instantly, I know who he is. He is not the ideal backup I wish for. But it's him or nothing.

Let's hope you are in the mood for a huge battle, Alpha Mason of the Moon Chaser pack.

–to be continued–