Chapter Thirty-Six

**Myra**

She ached all over.

She wasn’t sure how long she was unconscious for this time around. Her eyes, well her right eye, opened up, and she could glance about the room. She vaguely remembered being moved from the cellar to another room, but this room looked like a makeshift operating theatre.

Her arms and legs were still numb and not responding to her brain’s commands to move. Furthermore, she still couldn’t sense her vixen, and that itself was frustrating.

She needed to escape.

She needed to live, not for her own sake, but that of their would-be unborn child.

Suddenly, her angry stomach growled, protesting from the lack of food. “*How long have I been here? Damnit, I can’t remember the last time I ate.*”

“Finally, the slut’s awake.” Elizabeth’s ugly face soon hovered over Myra’s. For several minutes, she just stared down at Myra as if analyzing every pore on Myra’s face. The stare-off was discomforting, but Myra wasn’t going to be the first to look away. “That stupid bitch, Stacy… she set us back a couple of days… Bri-Bri wasn’t happy. I’m afraid he lost his cool.” She cooed, roughly jerking Myra’s head to the side.

On a gurney next to Myra’s was Stacy. She was sickly pale and very still. Myra gazed upon her chest and soon realized she wasn’t moving, indicating that she was dead. Myra gazed beyond Stacy and saw Leanne. She was restrained to the wall and unresponsive as well.

“*Please still be alive.*” Myra prayed. She kept staring at Leanne’s body. Myra breathed a sigh of relief when she noticed a slight movement of her chest as she inhaled and exhaled.

Myra ignored Elizabeth, who was going off about Stacy and how she had to die. But Myra could care less about the girl who betrayed her. Her death was meaningless.

“*Leanne?? Can you hear me?*” Myra tried linking with her. She waited a moment or two before trying again. “*Please, Leanne… answer me.*” Myra waited a bit longer. But the longer the silence span between them, the deeper a sense of despair filled her; the seconds ticked by with no response. Until finally, she heard a whispered reply in her mind.

“*Myra?? Is that you?*” Leanne whispered, almost unsure of herself.

“*Thank goodness… I thought you - you were…*” Myra started to say but decided against it. “*… forget what I thought.*”

“*I’m so sorry… I’ve failed both you and the Alpha,*” Leanne confessed.

“*Leanne… none of this is your fault, so take that thought out of your mind.*” Myra scolded her, “*Can you shift?*”

“*No… my – my panther… I can’t sense her.*”

So, the rogues did do something to their animal spirits. Myra was now certain of it because she couldn’t sense her vixen too.

“… now that you’re awake, the main event can occur.” Elizabeth cackled, causing Myra’s eyes to snap back to the deranged woman standing above her. The eerie smile on her face told Myra she wasn’t going to like whatever this main event was.

“Main event?” Leanne voiced from across the room. “What event?”

Myra saw Elizabeth’s right eye twitch in annoyance. “No one was FUCKING TALKING TO YOU!!” Elizabeth screamed, throwing something at Leanne. A glint of silver flashed across the room, and Leanne groaned in pain. A red stain started gathering around the dagger that was sticking out of Leanne’s upper thigh. Her blood soaked through her jeans and ran down her leg.

“Leanne!” Myra croaked, glancing back at Elizabeth’s smiling face.

“I could never stand you… you bitch!” Elizabeth snapped, walking over to Leanne. She placed one badly manicured hand around Leanne’s neck and grabbed the dagger with the other. “You were always sniffing around Sloan like a bitch in heat…” She shouted in Leanne’s face while twisting the dagger, causing Leanne to groan aloud. “You could never get over the fact that Sloan was my man.” Elizabeth pulled the dagger out, and a rush of blood poured down her leg.

Elizabeth stepped back, looking at the blood-covered dagger with renewed interest. “Even though silver doesn’t affect you the same way it does to wolves… the coating of wolfbane and deadly nightshade should make the process of death long and definitely painful.” Elizabeth started laughing hysterically. After a moment of laughing, she walked away from Leanne, still chuckling to herself.

Myra started to panic because without their animal spirits, they wouldn’t be able to fight off such poisons. “*Mommy may never get to see your beautiful face, my sweet pup.*” Myra sombrely thought.

However, her thoughts were interrupted when Elizabeth suddenly slammed the bloody blade towards Myra’s face. She quickly closed her eyes to avoid witnessing her own murder. But the pain she was expecting never came, only a burning sensation on her cheek. She cracked opened her eye and saw Elizabeth’s wicked smirking face still hovering sadistically over hers.

“Stabbing you will only end your life quickly… and if I wish for the title of Omega to pass onto me. I, unfortunately, have to do it by the book, but giving myself several advantages would make the fight *fairer.*” Elizabeth explained, dragging the dagger down Myra’s arm. Her skin tingled and burned as the blade passed, slicing into her skin. “But seriously… a fox would never beat a wolf. Even without all these different chemicals in your body. My lover is quite adapt to modern chemistry and biological makeups.”

Elizabeth smiled at her words and turned back to Leanne. “That’s right Lee-Lee… I’ve been fucking your baby brother too… it turns out he’s my mate. Do you like my mark sister?!” She pulled her dull platinum blonde hair to the side to display her neck. The bite mark however looked jagged as if an animal bit a huge chunk out of her neck.

Leanne looked both disgusted and confused. “Don’t… make me… vomit.” Leanne groaned through laboured breaths.

“*How long do you think you can hold on before the poison takes full effect?*” Myra asked Leanne, ignored Elizabeth, who was gushing about her relationship with Leanne’s brother.

“*Not… sure… I may… bleed out… before then.*” She confessed. Even in her thoughts, she was in immense pain.

“*Please hold on… Sloan will find us… he has too.*”

“Are you girls having a nice chit-chat?” The masked man walked into the room. Elizabeth smiled and threw one arm around her neck while using the other to remove his mask.

“Baby, you don’t need this mask… your sister will die in a matter of hours, and so too will this bitch.” Elizabeth cooed, causing bile to rise in Myra’s throat, and Leanne gagged aloud. The sound made Myra want to laugh, but she could display her humour without experiencing the consequences.

Like Myra, Leanne had nothing in her stomach, so after several dry heaves, she spoke up. “How could you, Brian?”

“Fuck you, *sister*… how could I not!” He snapped at her. Myra could see Leanne looking at the young man in a new light. “Poor Brainy Brian… little weakling who could gain an animal spirit… well, I used those brains, everyone teased me about and created my own animal hybrid creature. It’s fast, stronger and more advance than your precious Alpha.”

“And when I win the Omega challenge… we will take all the pleasure in slowly killing Sloan, and Bri-Bri can become the newer, better Alpha.” Elizabeth giggled, kissing Brian on his neck.

“Tell me, sister, how does it feel to know that you are partly responsible for all that has and is about to happen?” Brian laughed.

From her spot, Myra could see Leanne trying to comprehend what he meant.

“You were too trusting, and you willingly answered my questions which you mistook for genuine pack concerns. I just needed to know if your dumbass of an Alpha figured it out. Hell, even kidnapping his pathetic mate was so easy.” He laughed some more, slamming his fist on the gurney. The impact caused a weird vibration sensation to rock through Myra.

“I swear I didn’t…” Leanne started to apologize, realizing her part in the attacks and their capture.

“So pathetic…” He barked at her, cutting her off. He then snapped his fingers, and the two men from before entered with another gurney. They untied Leanne from the wall and roughly placed her on the steel bed. “Make sure she gets a good view of the show.”

The men nodded and wheeled Leanne out.

“*I’m so sorry.*” Leanne’s parting voice echoed.

“Where are you taking her!”

“The same place you will be going to,” Brian smirked, pulling Elizabeth towards him, and he messily kissed her.

“*Sloan!*” Myra cried out in a hopeless attempt to contact him.

“**Myra?**” a voice finally replied, causing Myra to pause. She had to have imagined it. There wasn’t a possible way for Sloan to respond to mind link her; unless they were closer to each other than she originally thought.

She felt tears well up in her eyes at her mind’s cruel trick.

“**Myra??**” The voice called out again. It didn’t sound like her Sloan – it was deeper, darker, almost menacing – so she knew it couldn’t be him. It may be a side effect of the drugs they pumped into her system. “**Angel? Can you hear me?**”

Against her better judgement, she responded, “*Sloan?*”

“**Yes, it’s me… sort of.**” He sounded relieved, but the voice didn’t match her memories of him. She was slowly starting to believe that the chemicals pumped into her system were messing with her mind.

“*It – it can’t… be you…*” She sobbed silently; tears rolled down the side of her head as hope fled her.

“**Angel… it is me… so much has happened in the short space of your kidnapping… and I promise we’ll explain it once you are safe and sound… but I need you to help me find you.**” He carefully explained, but Myra’s mind wouldn’t let her believe it was him.

Strangely Myra felt something stirring in her mind, like an animal waking from a long slumber. Myra suddenly knew she was safe, and it was her Sloan talking to her. But how?

“**Angel, where are you?**”

“*I don’t know.”*

“**Skye?**”

“*Who’s Skye?*” Myra began to ask, but suddenly, she was pushed to the back of her mind like when she’s about to shift, and her vixen took over.

“**I’m Skye.**” Another angelic feminine voice echoed in Myra’s mind.

“**Skye, what do you smell?**”

Myra heard Sloan asking, but she was now a spectator in her own body. It’s a strange feeling when still in her human form. Her animal spirit, apparently named Skye, had taken full control. However, Myra was fuming with her furry spirit. The little rugrat had abandoned her when she needed her the most.

“*Excuse us, I’m no rugrat… and for your information, I was protecting our pup.*” Skye snapped at her.

Myra brightly smiled; it was one thing to think she was pregnant, but another of having Skye confirmed that she was with a pup. Now the need to get out of captivity was strong. She wasn’t fighting for her own life but the budding life inside her.

“**Girls, you can fox-fight at another date… I need to find you before…**”

“*Before this crazy bitch tries to kill us… okay…*” She sniffed the air and glanced at both Elizabeth and Brian, who were still blabbering and making kissy faces with each other and completely ignored her. “*I smell dirt… blood… chemicals, and something else.*”

“**What kind of chemicals?**”

“*I can’t name most of them… but it smells like rotten eggs and sea salt.*”

“**Rotten eggs, that could be Sulphur… anything else?**”

“*Sea Salt… it’s very strong, both scents.*”

“**Okay, what else?? Do you hear anything in particular?**”

“*I can’t make out any identifying sounds… so I think we’re underground somewhere.*” She tuned out Elizabeth and Brian’s lovesick conversation and focused on her surroundings. She could pick up on every step, tap and shuffle of different shoes as individuals moved about the building. She even heard the excited buzz of conversations from multiple voices gathered in one location. Lastly, she could still hear Leanne’s laboured breathing. “*Several footsteps… most of them heavy… but Alpha, you need to hurry… Elizabeth intends to uphold her challenge... Leanne’s gravely injured, and she’s also hurt that her brother is behind all of this.*”

Instead of a verbal response, Alpha’s angry growl echoed in her mind. It was low, threatening and… hot. Myra attempted to clear her wayward thoughts, now wasn’t the time to be getting aroused.

“**Fucking brainy Brian! What about sight?? What do you see?**” He desperately pleaded. “**Angel, I need something to help me find you.**”

Myra glanced around the room, but there wasn’t much to it. She sniffed again, and the same chemicals flooded her lungs. She even strained her hearing to pick up anything new.

“*The room I’m in is plain… and old… a makeshift operating theatre of some sort… everything is covered in orange-red rust and falling apart.*” Her eyes fell on the metal circular hatch on the rusty door on the far end of the room. “*Wait a minute.*” Even though it was rusty and worn from years of disuse; there were some faded letters on the hatch.

“**What is it?**”

“*There’s something on the door… but it faded… there’s an H, something, something… umm, I think that’s an E, V, something, L, something, E, W, A, something, something, R, something, something, something, L… that’s it.*” She tried listing out what she was seeing.

“**That’s perfect, Angel…**”

But Skye was so focused on secretly speaking to Alpha that they both didn’t notice the two men had re-entered the room until the gurney started moving. The jolt caused Myra to resurface, and panic of being transported somewhere else set in; her breathing changed, and fear flooded her system. Elizabeth clapped in glee and kissed Brian on his cheek.

“It’s time… soon, my darling, you will be alpha.” Elizabeth squealed.

“*Sloan, please hurry.*” Myra cried out in her mind as her anxiety increased tenfold.

“**We’re coming!**” He said confidently, and the link suddenly dropped.