Hunt

Chapter 75: A New Home Under the Moon

Nyx approaches me on the last afternoon before the night of the full moon. Work around the camp had been rather light today, the summer heat proving to be too much for even the most capable of the workers. The cabins weren't much of a reprieve from the heat either, their interiors less of a living space and more of a sauna.

"Mr. Parker? Can I talk with you about something?" Nyx asks as she approaches. Timidly sitting next to me on the couch where I had been slowly withering away in the suffocating heat.

"Y-yeah. What's up?" I respond, beginning to fan myself with the newspaper I had been trying and failing to read for the past hour.

She fidgets with her hands for a moment before speaking. "I... I know you're scared about tonight, about what's going to happen. I want to offer some piece of mind. Reassure you again that everything will be alright."

"Thanks. Nyx..." I say with a small sigh, trying not to make it sound like a groan. Everyone had been giving me the same reassurances the last couple of days, it was seemingly the only topic anyone would talk to me about. Right now it was doing more to strengthen my anxieties than relieve them.

"I-I know I'm not usually the best at this... but I know what that fear is like, the worry that you're feeling. It's because I've been through it too..." Her voice trails off before she clears her throat, continuing. "I wasn't born with this gift like Reyna or Walker had been. I was turned. Bitten, like you."

I stop fanning myself, setting the paper down as I pass a confused glance down the couch to where Nyx was sitting. "You... Weren't born a lycan?"

Nyx shakes her head, staring down at the floor. Her hands clasped tightly in her lap. She was staring at something seemingly miles away from us. "I was bitten. I was stupid and reckless as a kid. Got attacked by a rogue one night when I was young. Everyone thought it was just a dog bite. That someone's crazy and aggressive dog had gotten loose... They wouldn't listen to me when I told them it was a wolf that attacked me, they just thought I had an overly-active imagination. We realized all too late what it really was. When I killed my..." She squeezes her eyes shut, falling silent for a moment as she shakes her head, changing her words. "When I lost my parents. Reyna and her brothers were the ones who found me after it happened, they managed to wrangle me in and bring me to their father. David officially brought me into the pack and purified me. They gave me a home when I had lost all that I had."

I listen to Nyx tell her story in silence. This is the most exposed and vulnerable I've ever seen her. The seemingly unbreakable 'royal guard' to Reyna Anderson was nearly in tears as she tells me her life story.

"Nyx... I..." I finally stammer, seemingly unable to find the my words at the moment. My head was a jumbled mess of sympathy for Nyx and fear of what this could all mean for me. Just how dangerous will I become when I transform?

She gives me a reassuring smile. "It's quite alright Mr. Parker, this was a lifetime ago now. I've had so many good memories with the Andersons and the Silverlock pack. Enough for a lifetime. All the crazy things these last months have brought us. I'll be sure to keep anything like that from happening to you tonight. Nobody's gonna get hurt, I promise."

It was like a switch had been flipped in Nyx DuPont. One second she was on the verge of tears, recounting the terrible story of her turning. The next she was back to her normal self. Strong willed and reserved. But a switch had been flipped in me as well. Her words of reassurance were now striking a different tone than what I felt with the others. This felt a lot more substantial and honest. Talking about her experience, especially how she's gone through something similar to me had put me more at ease than anyone else had managed to up until this point. But there was also something about her story that got me thinking...