70: That’s a legend.
**Samantha pov**
It wasn’t the blood that bothered me, it was how quiet the walk to the barn was. There was no saying what could happen next and what they had done.
The three of them hadn’t said a word when they fetched me from the house. Like in some sick, twisted reality, they stood in the doorway of the kitchen where I had started doing the dishes.
They looked ridiculous - covered in sweat and dirt like they had just returned from a war zone, while the look in their eyes made them appear like they still wondered if they really survived.
So, naturally, I didn’t ask questions and followed the fools. Not because I owed them submission and undying obedience, because I didn’t. No, I went along with their spectacle simply because I saw the visions and ever since, my skin hadn’t stopped crawling.
Thane led the way, like always - he was the silent, calculating leader of the group. Torin hovered beside him, jaw clenched, eyes flicking between trees like someone might jump out and gut him. Kieran dragged a rusted shovel behind him, not saying a damn thing, but letting the sound of it scraping the dirt fill the silence.
Dramatic bastards.
“Are you planning to tell me what’s going on,” I finally asked, growing more frustrated with every step we took closer to the place I knew had turned into a cursed nightmare. “Or do I have to keep following you into horror movie settings and pretend this isn’t the dumbest decision I’ve made all week?”
No one answered, of course, that much I figured even before I spoke up.
We kept walking in silence, surprisingly not running into a single pack member on our way to the barn and when we finally reached the building, I felt like my heart was stuck in my throat.
The air around the barn smelled like sweat and iron even before Thane opened the large door and ushered us inside.
As soon as I stepped inside, I instantly saw the large, heavy chains. Although I could see things, just barely, at first I assumed the barn was empty and they had decided to use it as a perfect coverup for another private meeting.
I was wrong, oh, how wrong I was.
I heard it - a low, shallow breath, a barely-there groan and as I slowly turned around and my eyes stopped on a silhouette, I finally understood what the three morons wanted to show me. Alpha Bane.
He was tied to a support beam, shirtless, wrists bound above his head, legs half-folded beneath him like he couldn’t quite sit up straight anymore. His chest rose and fell slowly, one side of his face was swollen, lip split. He looked like someone had tried to clean him up, but did a piss poor job at it.
“Is he awake?” I whispered as I took a tentative step towards him.
“Barely,” Thane said and tried to block me. “We hit him with enough sedative to knock out a damn bear. He’s conscious. Just… not present.”
I slipped around him and stepped closer to the Alpha.
Now, he didn’t look half as scary as he used to be in the past and not even a fraction as scary as he was the last couple of weeks with the entity leading his hand. The beast everyone whispered about - the monster in the woods - the thing that wore a man’s skin and gutted anything it touched.
Restrained and drugged up like this, he looked small and weak. However, despite that, I still didn’t feel safe around him. Even while he was chained and bleeding, there was something wrong about him. Almost like the body still remembered what the parasitic soul inside it had done.
“What happened to him?” I asked, tilting my head as my eyes slowly scanned his injuries - there were a lot of those, far too many.
Kieran stopped next to me and placed his hand on my shoulder, squeezing it, as if he was trying to remind me that staying back was safer. “We found him at the edge of the border, limping, looking half-dead. We didn’t make it much worse than it already was. He kept insisting he saw her.”
I turned to look at him, my eyes wide. “Luna Alpha?” I whispered, silently praying to the Goddess it wasn’t true and that angelic woman was safe, hidden away from the monster our Alpha had become.
Torin nodded. “Alpha claimed he saw her face, said something about her glowing and fighting the bastard inside him off. We still have no idea if it was some kind of fever dream or if he said the truth.”
“She glowed?”
“Some kind of shockwave bullshit,” Thane whispered. “First he told us about Luna glowing and later, after we drugged him up, he wouldn’t shut up about magic, bloodlines, Luna stunning the monster or whatever for long enough for him to take control. Sounded like the mumbling of a mad man.”
I looked at Alpha Bane, who shifted slightly, like he heard us but didn’t care enough to actually look around or stand by his supposed words.
“And you’re sure it’s him in there?” I asked as I pointed a finger at Alpha.
Kieran laughed under his breath and shook his head, squeezing my shoulder just a little tighter. “You wanna find out?”
I didn’t answer that. Instead, I crossed my arms in front of my chest and looked around at them. “So you called me here for what? A seance? An exorcism? I’m not a witch, guys, nor a priestess, so I don’t know how to scare away evil spirits. Or are we just going to happily sit around and watch him drool into the hay?”
Thane’s eyes met mine, the look in them so sharp, I swear, it looked like he was planning to kill me any moment or hang me next to the Alpha. “You saw something in the library.”
I blinked. “Excuse me?”
“Don’t play innocent, now Samantha. You told us, but I have a feeling you held something back, you’re not telling us everything. There’s no way you did, especially after looking like someone punched your soul out of your body. And now, you come across rather defensive. What are you hiding from us?”
I didn’t move a muscle, not wanting to feed his delusions. Maybe it was the wrong approach, but instead of instant denial, I glared at him. “You’re spying on me now, Thane?”
“Your cheeks burn when you’re scared,” he said flatly, looking down at me like I was nothing but another obstacle in his way. “They burned that night.”
For a second, I said nothing. Then, I sighed and stepped aside from them, needing the distance. “First of all, I didn’t mean to see it,” I said, meeting his eyes. “I was looking for something that could explain what’s been happening to him. I thought maybe the old Alpha kept records. Maybe some history books, spell books, damn it, a fucking diary would help even.”
“And?” Torin asked.
“I found that book Thane mentioned, the one with the green covers. I already told you everything about Gideon and the vision I saw, but the experience was unreal to say the least. The moment I touched that damned book, I couldn’t let go and it almost sucked me in, you know?” I explained.
“So the visions weren’t a joke, huh? You were serious.” Thane asked.
I nodded and Kieran muttered a curse under his breath.
Then, Thane looked at me again and frowned. “You went back, didn’t you?”
My breath caught in my throat. I wanted to deny his accusation, maybe even run away and never look back, but by the look in his eyes, I knew it was useless to even try.
So, against every instinct in my body screaming for me to cover and hide, I sighed and admitted everything. “I did and I saw more. But these visions were different, not as clear as the ones with Gideon and the Goddess. Maybe because of the green book - it’s damaged. Only half of it is left, the other looked like it’s been ripped off. These were like flashes of lightning. I can recall a woman chained to a stone, she was screaming in a language I didn’t understand and there was blood running down a mountain. Oh, and a wolf with two shadows.”
Thane stepped closer to me and frowned. “Two shadows?”
I nodded. “Yes, two. I barely caught a glimpse of it, but since I remember and noticed that weird thing, I think it might be important. One shadow cast forward, but the other backward. The other was darker too, slightly bent in an odd angle, almost like it didn’t belong to that wolf at all.”
As all three of them exchanged glances, I quickly looked at Alpha Bane - he was still breathing, not moving, not reacting to the conversation we were having right in front of him.
“He’s cursed,” I whispered and nodded at Bane. “Not by accident, but I have a feeling that there’s more to it than just the old visions about Gideon. I might be wrong, but I feel like the moon Goddess wasn’t the only one who got sick and tired of watching the bloodshed.”
“You’re saying someone made him like this?” Kieran asked and motioned at Alpha dismissively.
Thane cleared his throat, “can the curse be broken?”
I shook my head. “No idea, the visions stopped before I could see more, but there was a name.” Everyone stilled as I lowered my voice and added, “Moravane.”
Torin sucked in a sharp breath. “That’s a legend.”
“It’s a bloodline, Torin. A hated, forgotten, cursed bloodline. From the original packs before the split. I checked the libraries and found old books about them. I read that our people said that the bloodline carried the voice of the first wolf of their blood and they could shift without moonlight long before we evolved to what we are today.”
“And you think Bane-”
Before Torin could finish the sentence, I cut him off. “I think his blood isn’t what we thought it was and I think the thing inside him isn’t just shifter god punishing him.” I stepped closer to the Alpha’s barely-conscious form. “I think it’s a heritage.”
Kieran ran a hand through his hair. “You’re saying this thing can’t be killed?”
I looked over my shoulder to glance at him and whispered, “I’m saying if we kill him the wrong way, we might free it.”
Thane exhaled slowly, his jaw tense, veins in his neck popping out as he growled. “So what do we do?”
I looked at Alpha Bane again and took in his supposed drugged up stage. The worst part was that the longer I looked at him, the more I felt like he was listening to every word that echoed in the barn.
“You don’t kill him,” I whispered, not looking away from the Alpha, trying to notice if he would show any reaction to my words. “At least for now. We read, research, seek elders and witches, we do whatever to find solutions. Gideon, if he’s really in there, is a problem we could deal with, but a bloodline? Guys, that’s so much worse. If you kill the Alpha and release whatever is in there, the next poor soul it touches won’t be strong enough to hold it. And you’ll be fighting this thing in five years - just with a different name.”
“Then we need to find the rest of that book, I bet the other half holds answers if someone went out of their way to rip it in half and steal that part,” Torin muttered
I nodded. “And we need to keep her away from him. Whatever Luna did - it hurt it, but I also think that the run-in woke up that thing, or pissed off Gideon even more. If he gets close to her again, I believe he will kill Luna on the spot. She might be the key to this cuse, bloodline thing, but we need to find out how.”
Kieran chuckled bitterly. “You think she’ll stay away? Alpha told us she recognized him, we all know how Luna is, if she noticed a single spark of hope, she’ll keep fighting to help him.”
“I don’t care if she glows and can somehow take him out for a bit. Remember she’s still made of flesh and blood, and that thing wants her.”
Thane nodded at me and turned toward the barn door. “It is agreed then. We don’t kill the Alpha, but we must keep watching him until we find answers. He is not to be left alone.”
I hummed in agreement and followed Thane to the door. Kieran and Torin were already planning something, whispering to each other, so I took the chance and glanced back one last time. As my eyes focused on Alpha Bane, he still wasn’t moving, but then, I saw it - just one finger, twitching.
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