Enter the Shadows (1st Edition) [SAMPLE]

Choices Are - 3 |i

The creaks stopped.

Penny held her breath waiting for the force that would send the door flying to splinters off its hinges. She looked down at Lochlan who was still unconscious, to Black who could barely hold up his head. The wolf was wounded and needed help. Seeing him like that unable to move... Penny swallowed a lump in her throat as a new realization formed in her mind. She had followed a wolf. A wolf she thought had been Black. Maybe Lochlan had a few tricks up his sleeve that she didn't know about. Or maybe it just wasn't Black she had followed in the dark woods, in the middle of a rain storm without any questions. Penny swallowed again.

It wasn't that she was anxious to die, but waiting on it to happen when she knew it was so close was nerve racking. Lochlan started to stir changing back to his human form just as there was a knock at the door. Penny shushed him when he groaned.

"There is someone out there," she whispered, going over to kneel by him. She cast a worried look towards Black who had gone very still. Penny's brow furrowed in concern. He couldn't die could he? Then she remembered killing one of the gray wolves herself.

"I doubt anyone who wants to kill us would knock first."

"You don't know that."

Lochlan looked at her amused as he got to his feet. Penny looked away a blush stealing up her neck to her cheeks. He stretched his sore muscles before walking over to the sofa where Penny had left an extra towel. It was barely enough to cover him.

Penny thought he was lunatic for going to answer the door under the current circumstances. They - she was being hunted. Whoever was on the other side of the door could have been sent to kill him, and take her. When she turned to go over to Black he was gone, leaving a pile of bloody rags and towels. Her head went instantly light. Lochlan was there to steady her before she could collapse.

"Black—"

"Is fine. Don't worry about it."

She turned to refute that when she saw the man, standing just inside the door. If she had thought Lochlan was tall and built like an ox, the man on the other side of the door was a tower built from thick steel rods wrapped in tan skin. Their eyes met and Penny could feel the weight of his judgment. Stupid girl, he had called her. His eyes that had been red were now dark and intense. She saw death there. Not a cruel kind of death, but death in its most beautiful, purest form. Could death be beautiful? Penny had no idea what she was thinking. Her brain was still reeling from everything that had happened tonight. From everything that had been happening to her for the past almost three months.

He took his eyes from her and looked at Lochlan when he spoke. "You two have certainly made a mess." His voice was quiet, but it held a steely authority. Penny looked down on the floor at the admonishment. Now she did feel like a stupid girl.

They argued, knowing that she could hear them. Black, with his head in her lap was fast asleep. It was a curious world they lived in, or more like a curious world she had been dragged into. A world where the impossible was the norm. Where werewolves and vampires were real. Where your spirit could manifest as an animal outside of your body. Penny ran her fingers through Black's fur on his side. He felt so warm, so real. He was a wolf, but not. As long as Lochlan lived, so would he. A fact that would have been good to know beforehand.

Penny would have a wolf for herself too if she changed. All werewolves started off with one, and as they aged, and as they killed, it multiplied. Marx, the man with the red eyes and disapproving glare, had four. How many people did he have to kill to get them? She wasn't about to ask. Sitting, facing the wall of glass, Penny stared out into the night. She zoned out the two men and their heated debate about her choices. It had been a fatal one, that much she had learned the hard way.

The man, Marx, didn't hesitate to mention all the people who were killed and injured in the complex fire. Faulty gas main was apparently blamed for what was really a heartless massacre. All for the sake of her. He didn't mince around the danger she had brought to them in the mountain either. He was blunt. But he spoke nothing but the truth.

Around her was a dangerous place to be. The Shadow Pack now had her in their sights, and until they got what they wanted, or she was no longer in the picture—meaning dead, they would keep coming. Death or the change. Those were her options. And it wasn't just limited to her death. As word of Sven's claim spread no one would come for her except his own pack. This being Marx's territory would not dissuade them. They had the numbers, so they had the power. The werewolves tonight had been a pack of two. Marx said they hadn't been a real threat. Penny's side said differently. One silver lining? The vampires would never come to the mountain.

"He's mad," Penny said when Lochlan's reflection appeared in the glass.

"What gave you that impression?"

"That same thing that leads me to believe he doesn't like me very much. He called me a stupid girl."

"In this case, neither of us are very smart to him." She thought she saw him smile.

"He does have a point, though. I didn't listen, and people died."

"Nothing we can do about that now. Plus, I didn't either."

Penny heard the sadness, and the pain in his voice when he said it. She looked over her shoulder at him. His face didn't give away the emotion she had heard in his voice, as he stood looking out into the night. She was curious, but she didn't feel it her place to pry.

"I lost my family because I didn't listen," he volunteered some seconds after. Lochlan knew she would want answers. It wasn't that it was a big secret, it just hurt too much to talk about it. "Sven's men came for me, and I told them to take a hike. They did. Found my family, and killed them to prove a point. Marx had warned me that they would. That they were heartless monsters with no regard for life. Whether human or otherwise. I didn't listen, my family died. Marx changed me. The end."

His reflection shrugged it off like it was no big deal but she knew it was. Penny ached for him as she ached for herself. She had lost her family too. She understood now why he had been so mad at her for making the choice to remain human. He saw history repeating itself, and there was nothing he could have done because it was her choice. Penny wished he had knocked her over the head, and dragged her away. Taking away her choice, and saving so many lives in the process. Now she was here with trouble in hot pursuit. She had to leave. Enough lives were on her conscience. Penny couldn't add Lochlan or the surly man to her list too. But how does one run away from a werewolf?

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Author's Note:

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