Modified: How It All Began (ORIGINAL)

21. Battered And Bruised

My heart beats wildly at the sight of Trey in his wolf form sniffing at the base of the tree, he moves away and he rears his head up and starts to howl out, I look up as the branch starts to sway and the guard runs up the tree and past Calebs still form and begins to give the alert call, they all start to bounce around into other trees screaming out the call, I look down to see the wolves looking about.

Then my foot slips.

It sends a trail of bark down the trunk that hits a wolf on the head, he looks up with a snarl which attracts the others attention, I quickly look up and scramble the rest of the way up the tree as a group of snarls can be heard at the base, Caleb helps me up and looks back down at the wolves that one by one start to change into people, a male comes at the base of the tree and looks up and grins and begins to climb up.
I stop breathing as I'm being tugged to the other side of the branch, I gasp as I remember when I bit through it,
"No the-" I'm cut off as the branch gives way underneath us sending us plummeting through the branches, I grab onto a thick branch half way down and pull myself up to see Caleb above pointing ahead of us and starts to move forward, I look down to see some people moving up the branches towards me, I quickly start jumping and swinging from branch to branch and inch my way up to Caleb.
I catch up with him as another howl sends off towards the direction we were going, I slam into his back and he steadys me as I wobble about on the thin branch.
"What now?!" I hiss at him as we both frantically look round for an escape, he starts to lift me up wards and we begin to climb up.
We reach the top to the see the person that started to climb up the tree not too far away making his way towards us,
"We got to take off come on", Caleb quickly says as he opens his wings and takes off, it sends the branch shaking and I try to gain my balance, I look back and gasp, I open my wings and I take off but I hear a feral like roar below me and I feel teeth pierce my foot and a clawed hand rake down my leg, I scream as the pain of his one inch claws going deep into my thigh and going all the way down my leg, I try to bat harder to lift myself into the air, I lift my leg and kick at his face making him groan in pain, he sinks his claws into my leg and tail and lifts himself up to bite down on my shin.
I scream even louder as I feel his canines sink around my bone on my lower leg, tears start to coat my face as he starts to claw at my tail leaving a deep line down the length of it and on my hip.
At the corner of my eyes I see Caleb narrowing towards me and smashes into the man holding onto me with his teeth, I grit my teeth at the relief of is fangs leaving my skin, I'm about to bat upwards when I see a person dive towards me and catch my wing within his mouth which sends me off course and tumbling through the trees.
I hit the ground with a groan and I hear a snap on impact beside me, a male crys out in pain, I look towards the person who has his teeth in my wing to see his arm bent with his bone sticking out, fury rolls through me as I snarl at him and grab the bone that's sticking out and snap it downwards sending the man into a fit of roars and whimpers, I'm tackled behind by a large wolf it grabs me at the base of my wing and begins to rag doll me around like I was a toy, I swipe a clawed hand out and catch it, it yelps and let's me go, I spin around in my defensive position to see I've scratched through its eye, wolves start to surround me in front snarling and growling at me, I mock charge at them which makes one of them barrel towards me at full force and slam down into my shoulder with its jaws I try to bat it away with my wing then I start to scratch at its eyes, it lets go and I start running off into the forest.
I make it to a clearing and open my wings to try and fly away, my wings start to flap but for some reason I'm not lifting up, I try jumping but I'm not going anywhere, I growl out and continue running across the clearing, I'm stopped short as some wolves run out in front of me, I skid to a halt and something smashes into me and grabs my wing that was being tugged around earlier, it begins swinging its head around then I feel my tail being pulled, I snarl swiping at all places.
Then I hear an almighty roar, I'm on my belly growling out my breaths as the wolves straighten me out and step on my wing and tail that they have got captured.
I look to my side to see Ethan in front of Trey to the side, I bare my teeth at him as he comes closer to me,
"Now now now look what the cat dragged in", I hiss at him sending saliva spraying at him, he wipes it off with a sigh,
"Take her back we got things to discuss", he says as he looks down at me.
Someone comes towards me and pulls my arms out from underneath me, I successfully swipe at them and catch them good which they just kick my head, I snap at their shoe piercing straight through it and to the bone, he crys out which makes the wolves holding me down start to swing their heads tearing at my tail and wing, I let go with a whimper, he securely ties up my hands behind my back and lifts me up,
"Keep hold of her tail", one of the men says as the one in my tails grip tightens a slight notch, I grimace at the pain.
They begin to shove me forward on the long journey back.

They push me cross the meadow where I catch a few glimpses of other wolves, on my way here I notice that my right wing has no feeling in it whatsoever it just hangs limply at my side as my flight feathers drag on the floor, the guards purposely step on them as we walk through the forest. The sun is coming up and I look behind me to see red specks of blood that is dropping from my wings and down my white tipped feathers, I've been losing blood the whole way, I'd be lucky if I don't bleed to death, I let out a hard breath as we enter the pack house, I'm pulled to a halt, I stumble as I get my footing.
Ethan is in front of me and starts to walk forward he stops a few inches in front of me,
"You don't look too good Belle", he says with no expression shown I hear a few snickers from beside me as I look at the ground, he grabs my chin and tilts my head up to look at him in the eyes, I let him as I have no energy left in me,
"And really weak", he smirks, I don't bother to give anything off as my legs begin to shake,
"Take her down", he says with disgust in his tone.

I'm shoved into a cell which I just greet by falling in, I lift myself up from my face and turn around so I can face the bars, I sigh as I look down at my legs, there are large slashes that go down from my thighs all the way down to my calf, I let out a shaky breath as I move my leg to look at my inner thigh, my eyes go wide as I notice it's still bleeding, he got a main artery.

I look at my shoulder to see deep teeth marks embedded within my tissue, I move my arm behind my right shoulder and grab my numb wing and pull it forward, I hold back tears as I notice that there are holes all the way up my wing and thick long tears down them which includes a lot of missing feathers, I move my hand between my shoulder blades and feel around to feel that my wing is just hanging with half a bone fully exposed, tears fall down my cheek at the thought of not being able to fly again, I move my hand in front of my face to see it dripping with bright red blood, I'm going to bleed out. I drop my wing as I start to shake and sobs begin to burst through my mouth, I huddle against the corner as I bury my head between my knees and tears fall into the stone floor.

I lift my head as I start hiccuping from my major breakdown, I look at the door as it begins to sway in a twirling motion, I shake my head as I look back up to see the door open and Anne come down, her eyes go wide as I see the floor coming closer, I hit the floor with my cheek as I see  Anne's face drop and hurry to get to me, she grabs onto me and starts to panic I hear her shout out but it sounds like a whisper as I'm thrown into darkness.