The Beast Across The Lake

Chapter 22

                                        

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Isabella
"My name is Caleb Waru-"

"I know that!"

"Let me finish."

Caleb was calm despite my apparent rage. It took me a moment to realize that I was shaking. I took a deep breath and released it and Caleb continued.

"My father was the alpha of the Waru Tribe, the one that got attacked in Vermont. We were wiped out by an enemy pack of rogues who had been looking to steal our land for over half a century. I survived, the rest of the pack members didn't."

I was silent for a moment and then," why wasn't it on the news? There was only one report of a person dying-"

"There were over fifteen-hundred wolves that died. They were my pack members, my friends and family. They were all murdered as wolves, not humans. My little brother, he was the youngest one, he's too young to shift and so when they killed him, he died in his human form."

Caleb swallowed and I felt as if the mechanics in my brain had begun to malfunction.

"In the science room, you said you could have saved him if you shifted in time. What did you mean by that?"

"I hadn't shifted when I heard about the attack, when I got to the pack house I was still in human form. I was slower, I couldn't hear or smell as much, I thought if I stayed in this form that the rogues wouldn't smell me coming. It didn't matter though because when I did find them, he was dead already."

I felt my heart sink. Caleb's gaze had darkened as if reliving something that haunted him forever.
"At what age do you...shift?"

"Usually 16, sometimes if you're a late bloomer it's 17, there's gotta be a full moon. I shifted when I was 15."

I swallowed again," that night when I came looking for you, that was you wasn't it? You weren't killed by the wolf, you were the wolf."

He nodded," the sheriff, he covers up for me. He's got a tribe here too, The Altaha Pack. They have been at Eastsound for centuries now."

I skimmed my brain for where I had remembered that name from.
It was in the article ; THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WARU FAMILY from that blogger in Vermont. She'd mentioned about there being others, the name Altaha was listed. Even then it had rang a bell and I suddenly realized that the Sheriff's name was Michael Altaha.

"Why did you come here?"

"Because the Altaha tribe and the Waru's had always had a partnership, they agreed to look after me, patrol the woods at night for rogues until I figured out what to do."

"Which is what?"

"The only way the rogues could wipe out the Waru Pack and take our cities is to kill every living Waru."

"That's why they want you, you're the last one," I felt a knot in my throat as big as a brick. The thought of him dead felt like there was a switchblade inside of my guts.

"Yes, that's what they think,but there are more Waru's here."

"In Eastsound?"

"Yes, we called them Half-Breeds. They are humans with werewolf ancestors. Centuries ago, many wolves from our tribe mated with humans and made babies that couldn't shift. The only way for these half-breeds to consume their full werewolf form is to drink the blood of a fully shifted Waru wolf."

"So youre saying that there are people who live in Eastsound that think they are human but they are really part werewolf?"

"Exactly. They don't have an effect on the rogues though, if they were to kill me, the rogues could still take our cities."

"So you came here to find the last of the living Waru's and have them drink your blood?"

"Only if they are willing to. It's the only way to rebuild, to save my tribe, my name."

Caleb seemed hesitant now. His eyes were glued to the ground in hopeless ponder.

"Have you figured it out, who the last Waru's are?"

I caught sight of his throat wobble up and down and he nodded. I widened my eyes and thought that Eastsound is so small,  I knew everyone here.

"Who?" I asked.
There was nothing that could have prepared me for his next words.

"You...you and your mom."

I gawked at Caleb for a while.
Surely, he couldn't be serious.

I could have burst out laughing if I still was not confused by my utter state of shock.

"Say something."

"That's not possible."

"I didn't think so either, and then I found this."

He reached into his back pocket and pulled out a picture. I recognized it immediately, it was a photo of my great grandmother. It had been safely secured in a photo album that was somewhere in my bedroom.

"How did you get this?"

"From your room, I had a feeling that you might be a Half-Breed when I-" he cut himself off and seemed to rethink his next words.

"When you what?"

He paused for a moment," the first day that you came over to my house, my wolf shifted for the first time without my permission. I went feral for a few hours, I couldn't understand what was going on. I followed you home, I needed to make sure you were alright, it didn't make sense and from then I suspected that we were mates."

"Mates?"

"Yes, I couldn't know for sure until I tasted your blood. That's why in the science room when we kissed, I bit your neck."

The hickey. I had wondered for days why he had given me one when he knew that I had a boyfriend.

"What does the picture of my great grandmother mean?" I asked.

He suddenly reached above me to open the cupboard about my head. I sucked in a breath of air and he finally retrieved, holding onto a photo album that looked like it was stitched together with old leather and rope. He slammed it onto the kitchen island and flipped the stained pages until landing one a black and white picture.

"Look," he pointed at the people in the picture. There were three women in the photograph standing in front of what looked like a giant cottage in the woods. There was a black wolf on one side and a lighter one on the other. One of the women in the photograph had long black hair and even blacker eyes. She was younger back then but I recognized her immediately. It was my great grandmother.

"Oh my god," I felt the wind get sucked out of me," that's really her."

"She mated with a human, your great-granddad, that's why you can't shift-"

"When did you take the photo from my room?"

"The night you came back from the movie theater."

He was following me the whole time?
I gasped at the realization of the night he was referring to. When I had rubbed my clit to the thought of him in my bathtub and moaned out his name. I had heard a constant shuffle by the window, it must have been him. I looked at his face and the look on it confirmed that he had seen everything that night.