Supreme Impostor

6◇New abilities

"Are you hungry?"

I respond positively even before thinking. Garnet then hands me a t-shirt, a patalon and something to tie my hair mid-long. As soon as I get home, I’ll get rid of that damn mane. I’m not going to look like a hippie.

I just finished putting on shoes, I hear footsteps approaching the door. The smell, I guess it’s a woman, but she has a little something more...

I even estimate the number of seconds it will take to be there, if it continues at the same pace and momentum. Exactly fifteen seconds.

Garnet turns his head towards the door, perhaps having felt it too. Following the expected number of seconds, the woman actually arrives in the room, with a notepad in hand. Her first reaction... a frown. She is visibly annoyed to see me standing.

"I am Gemma, healer of the Garwall pack.

- I...

"You should lie down" she cuts me without looking at me any further.

If I used to refer only to first impressions, I would say that this so-called healer hates me, whereas I have never seen it before. Surely sensing that I might reply bitterly, Garnet takes the lead by advancing towards her.

- Alpha is feeling well, Gemma. Now he just wants to eat.

Being named Alpha bothers me as much as this Gemma, but neither of us contradicts that fact.

"Garnet. He is a human with the spirit of the original wolf. Know that he can become unstable at any time and attack one of us."

It is not her words that annoy me, but the condescending tone and the cold look that she uses while observing me.

What are you waiting for to make this woman understand the extent of our superiority? Rip his throat out.

"I do not wish to attack anyone," I said irrevocably, addressing the wolf and Gemma. "I am going home."

"Not yet," said Garnet, grabbing my wrist.

He smiles at me and that’s enough to calm me down. The warrior, who looks about thirty years old, continues to observe me as the worst scum. Fortunately, Garnet takes me outside this big hut which also seems to be a clinic.

I barely put one foot outside, that I am assailed by a horde of eyes starting from disappointment to anger. All the lycanthropes present seem to carry me a silent and irrevocable hatred. I still do not know the extent of their assent, but this overview does not tell me anything good for the future.

"Ignore them," Garnet whispered to me, nodding to follow him.

I nod my head as I look down. My heart is beating at a thousand at the hour and I begin to feel anxious as I did when I woke up recently. Despite my ease in managing my breathing, I have the feeling that I cannot inhale the air properly, and that a spike sinks into my heart every time a member of the pack throws me a murderous look.

Hearken to your superiority. Make them understand that you are supreme, whether they like it or not.

- Shut up, I whispered.

Affirm yourself! Cry the wolf. You humiliate us!

Her inhumane voice causes a sharp pain in my skull, forcing me to stop to put my hands on my ears by clenching my teeth. It makes absolutely no difference. I hear the echoes of his dominant voice, and shivers of terror shake my muscles.

It is when I crouch down that I perceive a gathering around me. I hear whispers that I am unworthy of being supreme alpha, others saying I should abdicate. This backbiting reinforces my pain for a reason I don’t know.

"Hey, Jelyan" call out to my best friend with a reassuring hand on my shoulder. "It’s going to be okay."

I raise my eyes to him. He obeys me with seriousness and complicity. He is indeed the only one here who does not wish my death, and this puts a balm on my heart.

"Finally, I’m taking you away from here."

Without further ado, he grabs me by the arm and draws me after him. But the problem is that I always hear slander against me. I don’t want to hear it anymore, because it hurts me like hell.

- I think the best thing is to run. We will get to the barrier much faster.

I barely have time to turn my head towards Garnet, who is already rushing between the trees at breakneck speed. From my instincts, I start to pursue it by leaping also. But this sudden velocity destabilizes me, to the point that I entangle my feet. Instead of accepting the fall, I bounce off my hands and perform a somersault with the sole purpose of catching me on my legs. Gross error.

I find myself propelled unintentionally, more than five meters high. I scream, drawing the attention of Garnet who raises his head to me without ceasing to run. The ground seems to approach slowly. I prepare to go down, but I see a young woman half naked on my landing point.

- Attention!

She looks up at me, and I recognize the young woman who hypnotized me last night. Her eyes, darker than anything else, widen as she steps back. But unfortunately, I’m already falling back. Landing is all the more difficult when I try to control myself so as not to fall heavily on her and hurt her.

As soon as I reach her, I hug her naked body, fall with her and brutally roll on the dead leaves without ever letting go. I hope I’ve at least lessened the shock. After a short moment during which her breathing mingles with mine, she straightens up on my torso and looks at my face.

Her long black hair is a little scattered on my face, chest and floor. Her big, surprised eyes detail me for long seconds before she frowns. Her vanilla smell fills my nostrils and disturbs me. The sensations of watching are nothing compared to what I currently feel.

I want this girl. I don’t know her name or age... But all my being cries that it belongs to me and that my life is nothing if it is not close to me as it is now.

Our better half, comes the wolf in my head.

I feel my pupils burning for her. My fingers rise and I remove a dark strand from her face to better contemplate her. But her reaction is worse than a pious heart: she grimaces in disgust and rises in a good graceful and aerial. What did I do wrong? Why is my love moving away from me?

I also stand up, my eyes disturbed. She says nothing and goes to a tree from where she recovers carefully folded clothes. She dresses under my wounded gaze, just as Garnet finally shows up.

"Spathy?" he begins by approaching my beloved. "What are you doing here?"

Spathy, her name is Spathy. I print that name in my memory and keep repeating it to me, like a litany. So is the wolf.

"You can imagine that I was about to make my rounds, when that stupid human fell on me!"

She points at me as she looks at me, and I feel my heart being radiated by a pain more appalling than my experience of the lunar ceremony.

"Hey, this is your supreme now," whispered the beta, trying to appease the brunette. "He’s one of us."

"I don’t accept it! The goddess got it wrong by telling her our future, for me this guy is just an impostor."

And she turns away without adding anything more, leaving me with the echo of her hurtful words.